BluKoo
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Registered: 8th Apr 02
Location: Stonehaven (Scotland)
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This is an old detail I've decided to post up because I've noticed more appreciation for a great turnaround rather than an impressive finish or an impressive car.
I failed to mention this in my last post and it caused a little confusion but i'd just like to reiterate the point that im not a detailer, its my brother who works for Polished Bliss. I just like reading the write ups and I know a lot of you do too. Thats why I post them.
The following text has been taken from the thread on detailingworld.com..
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This Lotus Elise was booked in for a 2 day correction as according to the owner it just needed a "light polish" (we hadnt seen the car previously as the customer had travelled up from Edinburgh):
I'd barely spent 5 seconds looking at it to know that this was going to need a good bit more than a light polish!...
As you can see from the pics, the car has seen some bodyshop work in its short life (everything except for the doors had been painted) and to be honest i'm amazed how a bodyshop can hand a car back in such a mess :confused:
They even got polish splatter inside the car!
To make things worse, just about every single panel had huge amounts of overspray which left the paint rough and dull.
We explained to the owner that 95% + correction wasnt going to be anywhere near possible given the time limits and the horrendous condition of the car (if you think it still doesnt look that bad then wait for the halogen shots), so the main aim was to clean the car up as good as possible in the 2 days it was booked in for. I was already preparing for a late late late night!
So, 9am on day 1 beginning with the wash stage:
Pre-foam first:
This was left to dwell while i cleaned the wheels with Megs Wheel Brightener and Autosmart Tardis and the arches/tyres with Megs Super Degreaser.
I then rinsed the car off, taking extra care round the re-sprayed areas as there was some paint already starting to flake off which i didnt want to make any worse!
Zym0l Fabrique was used with a soft brush to clean the fabric hood:
A megs triple duty brush and Super Degreaser was used to remove all the polish residue from the plastic trim. This alone took close to 45 minutes to completely remove it all:
I then washed the car with the 2 bucket method and Shampoo Plus before rinsing and moving it inside for claying. I skipped the Tardis stage as some of the paintwork hadnt been baked and some panels were only a week or two old so i didnt want to risk the chance of stripping any paint off (i've seen this happen back in my Valeting days at VW).
Claying took around an hour and a half with an aggressive clay bar to try and remove as much overspray as possible but to be honest, it didnt remove half as much as i'd have hoped for so i prayed that the polishing stage would help with this.
It was close to 3:30pm before i'd got the car all taped up and ready for polishing, purely down to the fact that so may areas of the car needed properly prepped before i could get onto the next stage. This in itself was pretty frustrating as the majority of it was down to the bodyshop being crap at their job (sorry to put it blunt but it was a disgrace)
With the car all dried off and ready for polishing, i took some more pics to try and show just exactly what we were dealing with:
Air bubbles in the paintwork:
Buffer trails:
Overspray:
More Overspray:
Wee bit more overspray (!)
These marks were apparantly from when the bodyshop put a cover over the car before the paint had fully dried (!?!?)
There were also a fair few swirls and RIDS:
Up untill this car arrived, i'd have said the Evo V detailed in this thread was the worst:
http://www.detailingworld.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=40926
I think loking back at the two that the elise was worse, purely for the fact that the Evo's paint was mostly just oxidisation and etching whereas the Elise had just about everything you could imagine!
Paint readings were taking with the Composites gauge (no metal panels on an elise):
The original paint (which was the 2 doors) was around the 100 micron mark:
The re-sprayed panels was around the 150-200 mark:
I removed several parts of the car to gain easier access for polishing too:
I should add at this point that the owner had purchased the car after the rear end had been painted, and this was by far the worst area on the car (as you can see in the pics) however he had just got the front end and lower halves painted in recent weeks so i started with these bits first seeings as they werent quide so bad as the rear.
Considering the overall state of the paintwork it would have been pretty risky to use the rotary on this car as there was just too many exposed flaws (not to mention the higher risk of burning the paint on composite panels) so the machine of choice was the Meguiars G220 Dual Action Polisher.
I started off with a 4" Polishing Pad and Menzerna 106FA. This achieved an 80% level of correction with 1-2 microns of paint removal but didnt cut through much of the overspray, so i stepped up to a 4" Cutting Pad and Menzerna 3.02.
This achieved much better results with the soft-ish paint reacting well to the polish and pad combination:
Overspray on front bumper:
After:
Before:
After:
It was now close to 7pm and with the completely f*cked rear end still to come, Rich fortunately was able to join me from there on to get the job done quicker which was a huge relief as i was seriously thinking about doing an all nighter!
So now both armed with our G220's, we tackled a side each and powered on.
Again, i must stress that this wasnt a full correction job, but the shots below will show just how much of an improvement we managed to make to the overall look of the car:
This shot shows just how much nicks and RIDS remained though:
I would estimate that to get the car looking as good as possible you would need it for at least 5 or 6 days with 3 or 4 of them being solid machine polishing and wet sanding. Even then i would still advise re-spray work of a decent quality to rectify some areas that were in all honesty unsaveable.
Rich and I agreed to get the car completely de-swirled (or as close as!) before caling it a night so that i could spend day 2 going back over the car with the finishing polish (the paint was soft in some areas and marred like mad so this needed refining).
When we finally fnished it was 2am (seems like a regular thing nowadays! :lol and we were both just so happy to have the main correction done that neither of us were paricularly bothered about what time it was.
Day 2 - 9am:
After around 4 and a half hours sleep it was back to work and on with the 2nd stage of machine polishing. I used Menzerna PO85RD and a Meguiars Finishing Pad which helped sharpen the paint up nicely and added a bit more gloss :thumb:
I then dusted the car down and then gave it a wipe down with Menzerna Top Inspection to allow Rich to apply a coat of Raceglaze 55 while i did the interior.
Interior Process was as follows:
- thorough hoover
- APC wipe down
- Leather cleaned with APC
- Leather fed with Raceglaze Leather Balm (love this stuff! :thumb
- Shuts cleaned and protected with Werkstatt Prime Strong
- seals dressed with Raceglaze Trim Gel
- Glass cleaned with Meguiars Glass Cleaner Concentrate
Rich also gave the car a final wipe down with Last Touch, dressed the tyres with Blackfire Long Lasting Tyre Gel, sealed the wheels with PB Wheel Sealant, polished the tailpipes with Raceglaze metal polish and "de-fluffed" the hood before applying Zym0l Field Glaze by hand.
The owner arrived around 15 minutes early and we finished pretty much bang on 5pm. This made the total work time around 32 man hours in 32 hours!!
Whilst i'm not going to lie and say the car was perfect, i'm sure you'll agree that in the available time we did pretty well. The Customer was over the moon with the transformation too which is the most important thing
Not to many afters as time was short but here's the best of what i got :thumb:
Overspray gone on the door (excuse the slight smears):
Roof was done too:
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Minty_Fresh
Member
Registered: 1st May 08
Location: westmidlands
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stunning turn around..
my gosh how bad was the paint on that!!!
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Graeme
Premium Member
Registered: 26th Jul 04
Location: Northampton
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The marks that he thought from a cover on the car before it dried are not that, there called swet marks. The sheeting used to cover up the car causes this if there is water under the cover and it's baked giving those marks.
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DannyB
Premium Member
Registered: 6th Feb 08
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Jesus that was in bad condition considering
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jr
Member
Registered: 20th May 02
Location: Kent
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fuckkkkkkkkkkk
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Norcy91
Member
Registered: 15th Sep 08
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Still an amazing finish considering the amount of work done in the first predicted timescale. I'd love to be able to get finishes at these standards.
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Ingham
Banned
Registered: 9th May 08
Location: Burnley, Lancashire
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Would have to have seen a full correction, but the turnaround was fantastic!
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fazza
Member
Registered: 7th Feb 08
Location: Plymouth
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whats the sort of cost for this?
awesome work as always!
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whitter45
Member
Registered: 15th Nov 02
Location: Norton
User status: Offline
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question for you
If the guy now cleans this as he normally would wont the imperfectiosn come back
not too clued up on detailing etc but surely the areas of poor paint will reappear over time
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Ben J
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Registered: 31st Jan 05
Location: Cheshire
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Alot was overspray etc from a cowboy bodyshop so that won't reappear. And you'd hope the owner will want to keep it looking top notch so change his washing method to suit. I'm sure he was advised when he picked up the car!!!!!
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Nath
Member
Registered: 3rd Apr 02
Location: MK
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Now this one makes perfect sense to me. What a state that was in!
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Steve
Premium Member
Registered: 30th Mar 02
Location: Worcestershire Drives: Defender
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why do you keep putting (R) in the titles lol
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Colin
Member
Registered: 4th Apr 02
User status: Offline
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R for Retards?
The paint on that Elise looks properly shagged to start with!! 
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corsayoung
Member
Registered: 10th Feb 09
Location: Cheltenham
User status: Offline
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R is just showing that there company name is registered to them.
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BluKoo
Member
Registered: 8th Apr 02
Location: Stonehaven (Scotland)
User status: Offline
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quote:
Originally posted by Steve
why do you keep putting (R) in the titles lol
Polished Bliss is a registered trade mark.
quote:
Originally posted by fazza
whats the sort of cost for this?
awesome work as always!
I'm not sure what this one cost as it was about 2 years ago and the prices have changed since then.
If this level of work was to be carried out today (approx 32 hours work), it would be approx £1195+vat.
[Edited on 06-09-2010 by BluKoo]
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Colin
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Registered: 4th Apr 02
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£1200....+vat.
Surely thats around 10% of the cars value!? Wouldnt this customer have been better in this instance to have a full respray at a reputable place?
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RichR
Premium Member
Registered: 17th Oct 01
Location: Waterhouses, Staffordshire
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I agree with Colin; the work is fantastic quality and the difference before and after is amazing however, would it not have been better to have just had it re-painted?
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jr
Member
Registered: 20th May 02
Location: Kent
User status: Offline
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a respray will be alot more than £1200 on an elise imo
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Tomnova16
Premium Member
Registered: 21st Jan 06
Location: Gerrards Cross Drives: Porsche 911
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that paint is terrible, the guy shouldnt of accepted it from the paintshop,
did well considering the state it was in though
http://www.lemass.co.uk/ for all your automotive/bodyshop needs
Located in Chalfont st Peter
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BluKoo
Member
Registered: 8th Apr 02
Location: Stonehaven (Scotland)
User status: Offline
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I'm not confident that you'd get a good quality respray for that price.
I'm talking about the body being stripped and not just masked off.
Plus as i said, thats not what the Elise owner would have been charged as this was done 2 years ago and the prices have changed.
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Colin
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Registered: 4th Apr 02
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Elise isnt an overly massive car, it might cost more than 1200....might not, but that's neither here nor there when the 1200 detail is self confessed as not being outstanding due to the condition of the paint.
I just thought a quality respray would be a better road to walk down.
But then as per...what the fuck do I know, im just a dirty oil man 
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BluKoo
Member
Registered: 8th Apr 02
Location: Stonehaven (Scotland)
User status: Offline
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quote:
Originally posted by Tomnova16
that paint is terrible, the guy shouldnt of accepted it from the paintshop,
did well considering the state it was in though
You're the perfect person to ask...
If this elise was brought into you and it required a full respray including all the necessary prep work, what would it cost? Feel free to pm me if you'd prefer.
quote:
Originally posted by Colin
Elise isnt an overly massive car, it might cost more than 1200....might not, but that's neither here nor there when the 1200 detail is self confessed as not being outstanding due to the condition of the paint.
I just thought a quality respray would be a better road to walk down.
But then as per...what the fuck do I know, im just a dirty oil man
The benefit of the detail is, not only did the paint get corrected, it was also protected and the interior, engine bay, wheels etc got the usual treatment too.
Also once a car has been resprayed most good garages will give it a good polish. That would almost certainly be necessary to get such a good quality finish and therefore increase the cost.
[Edited on 06-09-2010 by BluKoo]
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Colin
Member
Registered: 4th Apr 02
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Even if the respray costs 500 more or whatever its still a better route to take surely?
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Steve
Premium Member
Registered: 30th Mar 02
Location: Worcestershire Drives: Defender
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i would say so, the detail is only a relatively temporary fix
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DannyB
Premium Member
Registered: 6th Feb 08
User status: Offline
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Fucking hell give the lad a break 
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