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The first step was an intensive clean; 4 stages including a 'snowfoam' covering. Whilst the car was still outside the opportunity was taken to clean the engine bay. Using a combination of degreaser and specific cleaners (agitated with various types of brush) the result was quite satisfactory. The plastics were treated with a semi-matt finish cleaner/protectant to give a touch of shine to the bay.
The next step was to remove any spots of tar from the lower half of the car with a dedicated remover. This was followed by the next step using the clay bar. As the car was to be machine polished and felt very rough to the touch a suitably aggressive clay compound was used. This ensured all bonded contaminents would be removed at the expense of minor marring (which would be easily removed by the polishing stage). The photo below shows the embedded dirt picked up from just half of the sunroof panel.
Now that the paint was smooth to the touch and ready for polishing it could be inspected thoroughly. Under the intense light of the fluorescent tubes and halogen worklights there were plenty of defects to be seen, from light swirls to deeper scratches. The camera didn't actually pick up quite how bad the surface was - however a fairly good representation is shown below:
Paint depth readings proved to be very healthy all over with no apparant evidence of respray work.
The delicate and textured trim was then taped up around the car. Next, some of the deeper scratches were carefully sanded out using 2000 grit paper, a small amount at a time whilst checking in relation to clearcoat depth.
Sometimes you have to make things look worse to make them look better!
All taped up using a combination of different low-tack automotive masking tapes.
The first 50:50 shot. This is after one test stage of passes to select a suitable grade compound for the rest of the car. The left hand side will be refined further - however the difference is already considerable.
The same difference on the bootlid with a more natural dividing line, quite a difference!
Difference in reflection quality:
The exterior was refined using a finishing polish and then cleaned, followed by a glaze and a final layer of a durable carnauba wax. The plastics were treated using suitable finishing products.
The exterior results:
At the end of the second day with the light dying - a nice dusk reflection shot.
