I have always owned black cars, and so I'm used to constantly washing/waxing my car in order to keep it from looking like crap. However, I have always done it by hand and therefore never done really anything more than your average carnauba wax. So now that I recently bought a new TC I want to really keep a really nice finish on the car. Was reading a lot of the detail jobs people have been doing and was wondering if it was worth investing in a buffer. Any opinions?

 

Sure it is. But be careful, you can cause damage to the paint if you're not experienced.

 

The most important thing is acknowledging that you want to protect your investment, you have that very clear, and next step is to avoid inducing damage onto your paint surface,


Some of the most common ways to induce swirl marks onto your surface:

1- Automatic Car washes
2- Wrong type of Microfiber towel
3- Wrong type of wax product.
4- Wrong type of pads
5- Wrong type of machine
6- Harsh polishing compounds
7- Not keeping your wash mitt or sponge properly rinsed.
8- Wiping down a dusty or dirty car with a dry towel.
9- Towels and applicators containing polyester threads.
10- A dirty chamois or a chamois that has not been properly maintained
11- Using a car cover when the car or the cover is not clean.
12- Wrong type of shampoo/wash mitt

Once you avoid them you will be surprised how far you can maintain your vehicles surface without the need of power tools, however if you want to play around with a machine the Porter Cable XP is the most safe and friendly machine, since your vehicle is new you could apply the wax by hand and remove it with the machine for even better results, our hands can’t never duplicate the motion/heat/speed that the machine has.

If I was you I’d hold on to the purchase of the machine and concentrate on the hand tools, especial attention during the wash and wash mitt and the type of Microfibers that touch your vehicle’s surface.

I hope this helps and congratulations on your new purchase, any questions you can always email us /PM/ or even call us, we will gladly help you our FREE of charge.

 

My Porter Cable 7424 has paid for itself a million times over now....

Ohh, and don't mess around with the cheap buffers, get a PC7424 with Lake Country pads and the right products.

 

i like to do it by hand and take my time and insure its done right, but thats my personal preference

 

I can wax a car by hand almost faster than I can with my DA. Just because it's done by hand does NOT mean it's done right. If you are after paint correction, then you need a DA at minimum.

 

You might regret it if you are unable to get rid of polish marks due to inexperience. Just saying.

 

yes, its worth it to get a buffer. but just learn how to do it. watch on those how to on youtube.

 

yeah black cars are hard to keep looking in a good condition let alone clean, sub'd

 

This. Just got done spending some quality time with my pc7424 and my SS. pics will be up as soon as I zaino it.

The nice thing about a buffer like the pc7424 is that it's a random orbital buffer. It's extremely easy to learn to use it and achieve great results with it, and it's almost impossible to burn the paint or cut through it. When I first got it I took it to an old bumper and intentionally burned the paint with it and also cut through on an edge (where paint is the thinnest) just to see how much time/pressure was needed to damage the paint. It took about a minute of pressing down hard on the same spot with the speed all the way up before anything happened to the paint.

this is my passenger door after being washed and claybarred:


this is my passenger door after polishing it with my PC7424, an orange pad (medium cut) and 3M perfect-it stage III machine polish (for removing swirl marks):


Hand polishing will not get you the same results. I couldn't gut the buffer under my hi-rise so while the rest of the car was machine polished, the part underneath the spoiler was hand polished (I used to hand polish all the time, until I started detailing at work and learned the beauty of letting a machine do it for you) and it just doesn't look as nice.