Where to start....

A past customer (the STi I detailed) brought me his father's 2002 MB SLK 230. "Rough Shape," would have been a compliment to this condition of this paint, it made Zak's truck (pre correction) look like it just rolled out of the paint booth. It seriously looked like someone had washed it with sand and steel wool pad. Anyways, there are ALOT of pics, but take a look.

After wash, clay, and rewash-




Not too bad, eh? Wrong, you fail.



This car had so much **** IN the paint that after claying THREE times, the water/soap coming off the clay used for lubrication was black-



Here are before/after and 50/50's-

 

 

Very Nice, that paint was nasty

 

your My Hero!

U must teach me the way of the Wax on/Wax off! lol

 

Dude will you please do a traveling detail shop and come to ohio? pleaseeee

 

Sure will, you pay for all the travel fees and room arrangements, and the cost of the detail!

shake and bake, shake and bake

 

Nice work!

 

thanks!

 

So because of all the "mistreatment" of the paint and the extra effort, did you charge extra?

That is a crazy difference in appearance! Most people would be complacent with just getting the dirt off and calling it a day but for those in the know, such as yourself, those hairlines are just barf-tastic. KUDOS to you. That's quality work

How much to come to Chicago?

 

That is awesome work man.

How long did it take you? How much did you charge him?

Again, sick job man.

 

Goddammit man... looks good hommie!

 

wow dude! a job well done! make sure you post more pics of your work.
they seem to inspire us all!

 

id rather not disclose those, but it makes me sick thinking about it because it should have been more. oh well...

gas, hotel, and price of the detail

 

hatrickstu

Listen to Uncle Juan, that is a $500.00 Detail job, is that simple, I know it, you know it, just pass it to your customers, my 0.02

looks good

 

you are right, but i honestly dont know how to ask for $500 for one of these haha. once i get my customer base built up im sure ill start asking for that. prices are going up right now though

 

did you work this one with the orange CCS/optimum combo as well? or did you go for the more agressive cut? Break this one down for me please.

 

no orange ccs pads for me, i really do not like their orange pad. i use the orange light cut pads that autogeek advertises big time. NEVER had a bad experience with them. i probably should have started with an extra cut compound though, but i didnt realize how hard this paint was. faggin ridiculous

 

subscribed thats some damn fine work man!

 

Again my humble 0.02 if I may,

Explain to them why one detail is $150.00 and the other is $500.00 you should take some pictures of some of those jobs, then you need to explain to them and they can “visualize” exactly what is it that you are talking about, it may cost you $30.00 dollars to make some small type of book but trust me is worth it, during that process you must explain that the $500.00 detail included paint correction, which you will have to explain even further, in addition explain that the process takes multiple steps 4-5 or as needed.

For travelling you should average what you make in a week, if you do 2 or 10 cars a week, if you travel then you will loose those business plus those earnings, that’s why at times you see people paying outrageous prices for detail, they are been compensated for the lose of business plus the expertise, to all of that you have to add the cost of the products, good products costs, is that simple, some products are more inexpensive and the “look” may be deceiving but the durability and the protection are the trust test of good products.

If asking is the concern you can provide 3 packages, package A, a simple detail $125.00, package B $150.00 package C $ 500.00 right now if you are doing package C for the price of package A the only winner is the customer, he is getting all of that for free, there’s no need to prove to anyone that you do good quality work, you have proven that over and over, now is time to take your talents to the next level.

 

u made a how to right?

 

haha, i bet you had a good time working this paint. I'm sorry, i thought you used the CCS pads for polishing. now that i read up on it, you use them for finishing if i have that right.

I'm going to be experimenting with a friends old Cyclo buffer today. I think i really need to pick up a DA for my arsenal to back up my Makita 9227. I'm curious how much i will need to work the cyclo to get the results of the PC or the UDM.

 

and how did u learn?

 

You are right in every bit of that man and I really do appreciate it. I am actually working on that book today and printing off alot of pictures. I guess i better step on up on my next big job. ill let you guys know if i get laughed at!

indeed

lots of trial and error, and reading. alot of reading

 

good research on tool/products/techniques plus a good handful of patience and practice will yield you some damn good results. I'm sure Stu will agree.


edit: oops. he beat me to it.

 

i use CCS pads, just not for compounding. i like them for everything but the initial compounding. i usually use the white pad of theirs after the initial cut