By hand and water marks

jenk · May 24, 2007

Hey! Not a section i visit much but i have some questions for the experts

Inters is nearly here and i will be parting with my ibiza very soon so i want to get it looking as good as i possibly can. The colours gorgeous but it is hard work keeping it looking good. The car in question:

Been flicking through various forums looking into getting the best results by hand. To me it seems ag super resin polish is great for masking swirls and getting the paint looking fresh. So i was thinking of doing this:

Clean car with two bucket method (will be new to this)
Clay (new to this too)
A few coats of autoglym super resin
A coat of turtle wax gloss guard
A coat of decent wax....megs #16

Sound good??

Plus i have a problem with hard water, any tips for drying??

Cheers

jenk · May 25, 2007

No one?.....anyone?

olaf · May 25, 2007

Sonus Der Wunder drying towels are really good, was well impressed when using a couple of them the other day!

As for the products your using I haven't a clue! Sorry.

jenk · May 25, 2007

Cheers for the input

I use a megs water magnet, really good but sometimes water marks have apeared even before i get chance to dry it

olaf · May 25, 2007

Yeh I was having that problem the other day.

Just try and avoid washing in direct sunlight, or when the cars been sat in the sun as the metal work will be hot. Work in small areas at the time and keep hosing the car down to keep it wet.

jenk · May 25, 2007

Looks like my best option is to wash later on like i did last nite. cheers

Brummy · May 25, 2007

always a good idea to wash your car away from direct sunlight, Jenk. I normally end up doing both of mine (and sometimes the van if im in a really good mood/bored enough) never wash in direct light though, My Mk4 is Black and its a right royal PITA to keep that looking shiney!! the Mk2 looks fairly clean even when its manky, due to being a 'metallic' kinda colour.. but once its washed.... WOW!! hoping to get some more bodywork sorted before Inters, possibly having a word with someone about getting it sprayed up to match, too (if the price is right

) but I'll deffo give it a wash and wax one the Saturday before the drive down to Inters on the sunday..

jenk · May 25, 2007

My moms st170's metalic silver and thats a dream to clean, that gonna get a good treatment after i have done mine.

Get that ibiza sorted bud! Matt white bonnet huh huh

JonoUK · May 25, 2007

I just spent 2: censored: hours washing and waxing my car. I got instant water marks. I think we have really hard water here.

Stupid car. It's got flies on it now (they must like the smell of the wax, or the colour- not sure) but damn it looks nice :funk:

How did i get rid of water marks... washed it again and dried it in sections

jenk · May 25, 2007

The bugs are certainly out in force, the reason i washed mine last nite.

im going to buy the cleaning gear tomorow (if i can find it all) so if im on the wrong path let me know

olaf · May 25, 2007

Jenk your best bet is ordering online I reckon.

There were some bargain drying towels, buffing towels and polishing towels by Sonus on ebay sadly I've just bought the last set!

LDoR · May 25, 2007

Best way to avoid those water marks is to use a water balde followed by a micro fibre cloth like the water magnet from meguiers. I know people go on about water blades being risky but if you wash the blade (i put the hose on a jet and squirt into the blade) then you are not going to have a problem. Also use a pure silicone one.

As for hard water i'm sure you can get water softeners that fit in a hose or disolve in a bucket. Also are you using a decent car shampoo. I don't have hard water but can still get water marks unless i use the Zymol car shampoo. (Athough i'm currenly in the process of defecting to Meguiers)

Sisson · May 26, 2007

Forget the water blade.....

I found that the megs water magnet left loads of water marks aswell.

Try to wash in the shade, once you've washed the car, give it a final rinse and dry straight away with some Sonus towels.

Any water marks left will come out once you've clayed and polished anyway.

You are right about the AG super resin polish, it will hide some swirls quite well, follow this with Autoglym Extra gloss protection and then a high durabilty wax. Collinite 476 lasts ages, i put some on my mums KA and its still beading like mad 6 months later.

HTH

UncleFester · May 26, 2007

I dry mine with an MF cloth and QD spray for more stubborn marks, always wash later in the evening too

jenk · May 26, 2007

I stoped using my blade when i got the respray, its good on windows but i couldnt trust it on my paint. Will look into the sonus towels, cheers.

Im going to try hellfrauds as they have got the 3 for 2, just hoping they have got everything i want. Super resin it is

My mate said something about a thing you connect to the hose to filter the water, never seen one though.

Am i rite to think washing in fairy liquid is a good way to strip the old layer of wax off??

Cheers

UncleFester · May 26, 2007

Yeah it will strip just about everything barring paint

JonoUK · May 26, 2007

Question for you:
I have NEVER taken any proper, loving care over cleaning my car before. I probably just used a turtle wax shampoo thing, with a sponge and a brush, then dried it with a chammie, if at all. That was with silver/white cars and a dark grey one, kinda zenith grey colour.

They were all old or silver, and it didn't seem to matter.

Now I have a lovely black magic leon II. Gave it its first bath last night (as I mentioned) and I thought I'd try some AG super resin polish - tried a little test patch on the nearside C pillar - looked fine.

Then I thought I'd do the bonnet. It went on fine, but when I came to polish it off after it dried to a residue it looked... awful. I hadn't put it on everywhere, but the paint looked a bit darker where it had been. Thought I'd damaged the paint :-o

It turns out it just needed more attacking with the cloth/towel/whatever I used and now it's all shiney, but I didn't do the rest of the car with it.. it seemed to require a LOT of buffage. It didn't say buff like a

on the destructions...

Did I do anything nasty to the paint? I only had some around because my dad got scratches on his car driving too close to hedges on narrow lanes in the lake district, and it took them out nicely. Paint looks as good as new on his.

It doesn't LOOK like I've done anything bad to it. No swirl/scratch marks that I can see up close when the sun's on it (Don't have a handy halogen light or whatever torch pro detailers seem to like).

I just washed it with meg's gold class shampoo and polished those two areas... then the paint didn't look like it needed polishing anyway, so I put some gold class wax on it and it's really shiney now. Looks lovely. Bonnet still looks fine.

I don't have anything else really, and no shops nearby seem to sell what I want, so I'll have to order online.

I want to keep the car looking as good as possible for as long as possible, but don't want to knack the paint up in the process.

Any thoughts? Uncle Fester might know somewhere good to buy stuff, your parents live up in N/A don't they? There's charlie browns but that just seems to have AG stuff, which I have already....unless they updated their stock list a lot?

jenk · May 26, 2007

JonoUK said:
Question for you:
I have NEVER taken any proper, loving care over cleaning my car before. I probably just used a turtle wax shampoo thing, with a sponge and a brush, then dried it with a chammie, if at all. That was with silver/white cars and a dark grey one, kinda zenith grey colour.

They were all old or silver, and it didn't seem to matter.

Now I have a lovely black magic leon II. Gave it its first bath last night (as I mentioned) and I thought I'd try some AG super resin polish - tried a little test patch on the nearside C pillar - looked fine.

Then I thought I'd do the bonnet. It went on fine, but when I came to polish it off after it dried to a residue it looked... awful. I hadn't put it on everywhere, but the paint looked a bit darker where it had been. Thought I'd damaged the paint

It turns out it just needed more attacking with the cloth/towel/whatever I used and now it's all shiney, but I didn't do the rest of the car with it.. it seemed to require a LOT of buffage. It didn't say buff like a on the destructions...

Did I do anything nasty to the paint? I only had some around because my dad got scratches on his car driving too close to hedges on narrow lanes in the lake district, and it took them out nicely. Paint looks as good as new on his.

It doesn't LOOK like I've done anything bad to it. No swirl/scratch marks that I can see up close when the sun's on it (Don't have a handy halogen light or whatever torch pro detailers seem to like).

I just washed it with meg's gold class shampoo and polished those two areas... then the paint didn't look like it needed polishing anyway, so I put some gold class wax on it and it's really shiney now. Looks lovely. Bonnet still looks fine.

I don't have anything else really, and no shops nearby seem to sell what I want, so I'll have to order online.

I want to keep the car looking as good as possible for as long as possible, but don't want to knack the paint up in the process.

Any thoughts? Uncle Fester might know somewhere good to buy stuff, your parents live up in N/A don't they? There's charlie browns but that just seems to have AG stuff, which I have already....unless they updated their stock list a lot?

I know i have trouble polishing my bonnet/front bumper, im guessing that down to all the crap thats stuck to it. The reason i need to clay it to get it smooth. Maybe your problem mate??

JonoUK · May 26, 2007

Hmm could be. Silly insects and general gunk. I'm sure I missed a couple... definitely worth a try though, cheers

UncleFester · May 26, 2007

Wax and other finishing products will apply and come off much better on smooth polished paint - that is true. How you get your paint to that stage is bloody hard work and time consuming by hand, or fairly hard work and slightly less time consuming by machine polishing.

www.polishedbliss.co.uk is where most of my stuff comes from, i don't use halfrauds at all

If you clay the bonnet / wings / bumper after washing and before you start with the polishes and waxes etc it will make the job a little easier

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