So, after using about twelve products, six coats of compound and polish, I decided to take my car and have it "professionally" done. The guy told me right off of the bat that he could never get all "scratch" marks out of a black car and that there will always be some. That set me off initially, but he promised that he could get 90% of the swirls/spider webs out with his wool pad and a 3m glaze. I let him.

The result was sub-par.. but better than before. I disappointed for the money I spent, but it is better than what it was before. There are still quite a few scratch marks... not so much deep, but just there. I can't, for the life of me, get them fixed. The closest I came was using my PC with 3m's swirl remover on speed 6 and a REALLY quick swipe across the area constantly. I didn't want to burn the paint, but I used that method and did substantial removal... just not enough.


I guess I'll have to concede and leave it the way it is.

On to the shitty cell phone pictures, because I'm too lazy to buy a decent camera.






Don't mind my fogged headlight. I'll fix that one day too.


Money shot!

 

how much did he charge?

 

id like to know how much he charged you

 

159 for the buff, 40 for the interior... which was a vacuum and too much armor-all.

By "BUFF" I mean, one coat with his wool pad.


Oh, and I brought it home, immediately sealed it with Poor Boys, used a Poor Boy's carnuba and Meguiar's as well.

 

I just got mine done today for 80, but he hooks me up because I refer other people to him. Black sucks. Have to live with the fact that there will always be lil swirl marks.

 

dude. you should be able to remove most of the scratches on your car. the ones buffing will not remove will be the scratches you can feel with your finger nail. If you got light scratches you can get them buffed out but only after wet sanding in most cases. However a good detailer should be able to get rid of the "spider-webed" look. If he didn't then he did not do a great job.

 

wish you were closer man i could have helped you out.

 

You have no idea how much I wish I could find a competent detailer. I'd pay someone 500 bucks to fix it the way I wanted it... but I don't trust anyone. Especially after this guy.

But it's okay. I'm trading it in, in March. Called and made my reservation on a Camaro.

 

Your car looks good, black is definately difficult to keep clean but nice job.

 

he only used a wool pad and glaze? hmmmmm.....i'm not saying he isn't a pro, but if he used only a wool pad and glaze on a rotary i can assure you after the first rain or good wash you will be seeing some holograms.

 

Looks great bro! Im gunna bite the bullet and take mine to be buffed and clay barred to get the spider mark thingeys out lol.

 

i gotta take mine to get it done but i have an awesome detailer that happens to be hatrickstu. you should deffinatly make a trip to ar to get it done haha.

 

Black is definitely the most difficult color to maintain... I know I'm on my second black car... They look menacing as hell, and probably the best when they are clean, waxed and shining... But you can't prevent scratches, swirl marks, and heck even water spots after meticulously washing the car... And seeing that the majority of us use our cars as DD's, the scratches are going to come and after a few years, they just don't look the same as they do when you get them brand new...

But the car looks good.

All I know is that if you can't handle some scratches showing, and it getting dirty even after sitting in your driveway overnight, then black is a color not to get. After I got my second black car (the SS/SC) I know not to get a black car anymore unless it's going to be a weekend car...

 

yea and you have double trouble for me...

 

oh hell yeah. id even have you do the civic if i cared enough about it hahah. plus the balt isnt in nearly as bad of shape as the stang.

 

Looks awesome!

 

Your car looks nice, what color Camaro are you getting?
Its almost sicking how many swirls and scratches cover my car, but its all part of having a black car. Even tho black looks the best I think my next will be blue or red.

 

Getting silver. It hides everything.


As for the detail.... I finally noticed last night (The first time I really examined the car under light) that his wool pad fucked my car up something fierce. It looks like it's been wet sanded... no joke. There are swirls from the pad all over. It looks bad.

So, it's going back today and he's going to fix it or pay to have my car repainted. We'll see.

 

Yeah, I'm going silver or white for my next ride...

 

I hate to say i called it. But i'm not sure you should let him try to fix it. Can't tell ya if it could do even more damage at this point. Try to talk him into a compromise where you have the car detailed professionally by someone who knows what they are doing and he takes the hit if you don't name names.

Sucks dude.

 

To update everyone, I went back expecting the guy to be a complete ***** and deny that he did a bad job. The guy was up front and said that he did miss, and overdo some spots and that he was willing to fix whatever was wrong.

I gave him my car this morning at 9. I told him I canceled all of my plans (that I'd need my car for) for the day and he was free to have my car as long as he wanted. He called me at around 230 and said that he was satisfied with the results. I went in, expecting to see a shotty job, slapped together again. It looks very nice, all of the swirls that he put in are gone it looks a lot better than I had expected.

The problem was that he uses florescent lighting in his bays and I assumed that he just didn't know what the hell he was doing. While we were discussing (read: arguing) about his workmanship, I asked if I was free to pull my car into the bay to verify that he could (not) see the swirls. I pulled it in and sure enough, you couldn't see a single one. So, I gave him a second chance to fix what was wrong and as stated above, I'm quite happy with the result. He even redid the interior, correctly. It looks about the same as it does in the above pictures, but you cannot see any markings that were there before.

 

well i'm glad he was upfront with you and glad he made an effort to fix what he did wrong. Can't say it shouldn't have been that way from the get go. much more cost effective to just do it right the first time.

Hope the results hold up for ya after a couple washes. I swear i'll never own a black car again.

 

Although he "fixed it" the second time around, I am highly skeptical that he actually undid any of the damage. For all you know, he could have just glazed it again.

The first problem I have is that he immediately went to wool for defect removal. Wool is very aggressive on a paints finish, almost always requiring a second finishing step to remove wool marring and buffer trails. This is especially necessary on a car with black paint.

In detailing, you always, ALWAYS use the least aggressive polish/pad combo that you can to get the job done. Reason is, modern car clearcoats are only so thick. When polishing, you remove a small amount of it each time. So you want to use a pad/polish combo that takes care of the swirls, but removes as little of the clearcoat as possible, thereby prolonging the life of the paint.

From what I've read in your posts, this guy is a shoddy detailer. Going from wool to done, without any refining steps, is the trademark of a "get-em-in, get-em-out" detailer. All their doing is making your car shiny enough to hide the swirls, get the money, and get you out the door. All he did was take a wool pad, and covered the car in a glaze. All this does is mask the swirls, it doesn't remove them. Once the glaze wears away, you'll not only have the original swirls, but all the buffer trails from the aggressive wool pad.

The fact that he wants to get the car under fluorescents to look for swirls is smoke and mirrors. The best way to see swirls is either under high-powered halogens work lamps, or under bright and direct sunlight. Look at any real detailing photos that show before and afters, they'll have direct sunlight shots in them, as they show the true condition of the paint.

As for your car, I would wash the car, then do an isopropanol wipedown (Rubbing Alcohol dilluted 1:1 with distilled water) on one of the panels. This should take any of the glazes or polishing oils off the paint and allow you to see the true condition. If you see swirls galore, cut your losses, and go find a reputable detailer. I wouldn't keep sacrificing your clearcoat waiting around for this so-called detailer to learn what he is doing.

Good luck

 

BINGOOOO. also, if he REALLY corrected this paint, he didnt do it in the time between 9-2:30. its just not possible for one man to:

prep paint
remove imperfections
polish
seal
AND interior

he skimped somewhere, you will find out soon enough

 

hat, will you drive up here and detail my car, it needs help badly...