I'm after a bit of advice from entusiast detailers on paint correction For my deep black R26 I Managed to finally get a das 6 pro with the menzerna sampler kit as ive heard good things about it. Got them with the White/ compounding pad, yellow/ polishing pad and black finishing pad. The polishes are Menzerna Fast Gloss FG400 - Menzerna Power Finish PF2300 - Menzerna Super Finish SF4000 - Menzerna Final Finish PF4500 My paint has the usual swirls and the odd scratch (doesn't go through the clear coat) . So I am wanting to know what pad with what polish to correct the paint and get it looking like new again i also have black hole and was going to finish with that but want a more permanent finish with a staged correction. Any input appreciated Si
a photo would be handy.. Gotta find yourself a test spot, usually 40*40cm somewhere back on the passenger side and try first the less aggressive combo - PF2300 with the yellow pad, speed setting approx. 5 and put some pressure on it, you should go slow side to side and up and down (have a look at YT for this) like 2cm a second and overlapping the passes 50/50 and do like 4 of section passes, when the polish starts to dissolve and disappear before 4th section pass spray the spot with just a water and it will allow to continue for a bit longer. Now you should spray the test spot with 25% IPA solution or carpro eraser and carefully wipe down, you need to see the paint without any polish residue to be sure the swirls are gone. If you can still see them you need to step up for the compounding pad and do the same process over again. And if this combo still does not do the best correction go for the FG400 with the compounding pad. That's just a general correction process. It depends on a many variables like how soft is that particular paint. Let's presume your paint is corrected and looking hazy and dull. Now polishing, this is the hard part. Go for SF4000 and polishing pad, do the test spot, speed setting 4-5 tops, less pressure, do a couple section passes, slow down a bit and put even less pressure on it and do like one slow section pass. See how it looks, it should refine the clear coat, but still do the IPA or Eraser wipe downs. Now the paint should look fine. The next step of PF4500 with finishing is optional, my guess if you do this correctly is you won't be able to tell the difference, but you can do it. So low speeds and low pressure, 2-3 section passes and jewel the paint. All of this needs some practice, there is not a written step by step process, every step evolves during the process. Even the pressure and speeds may differ to achieve the best results. Get yourself more pads for sure, always work clean, so clean the pads often, use a brush or a compressed air and get the residue off it. After you think the paint looks fine, wash the car with something like carpro reset shampoo (no wax addition shampoo), dry it gently, have a look at the paint under the direct sun light and pat yourself on a shoulder or do the polishing again! GOOD LUCK Here is my work on my friends 265 Trophy.
Spot on fletino I reckon I'll just do a lower section of door first to see how it finishes, I can only hope to get the definition and clarity that's shown on the black 250 from your photo but I'll get pics up when I finish to show. thanks for the input
i'm happy to help, it's not easy and it takes a lot of time to correct and polish, especially the black paint is the most hardcore paint to start with. I have spent 20h on the black Trophy and I've used FG400 with blue shinemate pad, PF2500 with white shinemate pad and finish up with CarPro Reflect and black shinemate pad. I do like the shinemate pads a lot, really nice results are achieved with FG400 and orange shinemate pad as a one step polishing but for a black/dark or red paint is always better to do at least a two steps. one more little advice - if you gonna have more pads of the same hardness, don't be afraid to change them during the compounding/polishing, they don't like heat but heat is neccessary the correct the paint so you can make them last longer. Same as washing them with warm soapy water after you are done for the day and let them dry over night. A lot of things I know and helped me are based on Larry Kosila's AMMONYC youtube channel, so if you don't already know him have a look on some of his polishing episodes, they might be useful.
I thought I’d reignite this thread, rather than start a new one, to show everyone what the Menzerna polishing kit and pads can do in the hands of a first time machine polisher. Basically I bought a DAS 6 Pro and the Menzerna polish sample kit from CYC all the way back in February earlier this year. Unfortunately due to the crappy winter weather and having no spare time they were put into a box and forgotten about for 6 months. I wanted to give the R26 a full compound polish as I’ve had her for 3 years now and recently started to fall out of love with this 8 year old car. The paint was heavily swirled and looked tired, the steering was twitchy, the brakes no longer felt sharp and the flywheel was knackered. I was very close to trading her in for a new 265 but with the crap trade in value and buying my first house meant it just wasn’t the right time. Mid-July arrives and I finally have time (and a new garage) to park her up in and give the old Meg some much needed attention. The shots of the car before the wash To start off it was washed using ValetPro Citrus degreaser left to dwell and rinsed, followed by a hand wash using AF Lather shampoo and a mitt. Decontaminate using Tardis and Iron X then on to AG clay bar, a fair bit of contamination was left after the Tardis particularly on the lower side skirts. Then rolled into the garage to see to start the polishing. I’ve never done a proper machine polish on any car before and so I was a complete novice but following the advice from Fletino’s earlier posts, inspiration from Liquid F1 various detailing posts and many YouTube vids I had a close look at the paint. Under the light it was clear the swirls were worse than I thought after all the wax and filler was removed. Now there are a few things I didn’t have for this detailing job – tape (mine had become contaminated with a leaking AF revive bottle) which just left a horrible sticky mess on the paint and, so I couldn’t get any 50:50 shots or tape off the trims. Secondly I didn’t have a sun gun, I couldn’t justify buying one for the lack of use it will get. So I found an old desk top lamp and relied on the light in the garage and it seemed to show the swirls pretty well. Some pictures aren’t great but it’s quite challenging and time consuming to detail a car and photo it at the same time. Roof Before
Roof After Generally the roof wasn’t that bad but clearly some improper wash techniques were the cause of the linear scratches to the roof (not really captured but the after shots show what can be achieved). Close up- like a mirror The pads I used were Menzerna white (hard), yellow (medium) and black waffle (soft) pad with Menzerna 400, 2300, 4000 and 4500 grade polishes (which work from highest cut through to least going up in number). I tried a sample patch to see which pad works best but the majority of the time the yellow was suitable where as I used the white for some of the deeper and harder scratches. I tended to start from the grade 400 polish and work through the pads. Generally I used 3 stages of polish for each panel and the 400 grade only brought in where the others failed to remove the deeper swirls and scratches. After the roof I found that the yellow pad was starting to tear and when I moved to the curvier lower sections of the Meg, yellow foam was being spat everywhere, I decided to call it quits and dispose the yellow pad I was clearly doing something wrong and didn’t want to wreck a panel.
Yellow foam photo I started using the white pad more and kept the speed at around 4-5k rpm but after a couple more panels I removed the machine from the paintwork (a little too early I’ll admit) and the pad flew off the backing plate smacking me in the face. Turns out the pad had melted off the Velcro and it was clear I was working the pads too hard with too much heat. White foam pad Ordered 2 new pads and a day later they arrived so I could commence the polishing Boot & Rear Bumper Before
General Shots of Car After Just as a note I used CarPro eraser to remove excess residue and I recommend using this between each stage as it allows you to see the paint without any polish or filler. Plus I used it liberally and still have 4/5 of the bottle left. After the polishing stage I used Gtechniq C2v3 as a base coat then I applied 2 No coats of AF Spirit wax, allowing the coats to cure for 3 hours before reapplying. These are the full results when rolled out into the sun.
Generally I was very happy with the result and it’s completely transformed the look of car and the paint looks as glossy as my neighbours brand new Merc, although it took ages to do ! Plus after sending the car to MRS- Mark Black gave me a list of issues with the car- so a new .R clutch , SMF, slave, new DS2500 pads, new rack bushes and many hundreds of notes later the car feels like new too. As for the pads and polish combo it was very time consuming (generally so time consuming I was glad I had a garage to keep the car under cover). I found deeper scratches a real challenge to remove and the pads melted before they were polished out. May be lack of experience but in any event the polish and pad combo is a very safe one and there’s very little chance of it wrecking the paint even in the hands of a noob. I would recommend this polish kit to anyone, it’s an easy to apply product and comes in a handy squirt bottle. There is a fair amount of dust which is produced but admittedly that may be due to over application on my part. I like the black waffle pad and found that brilliant, although I would personally try other pads hard and medium cutting pads next time. Finally used AF revive for the trims, megs metal polish for the exhausts, polished the glass using ceriglass and rayon pad and coated with Gtechniq G1 & G2. Feels and looks like new Thanks for reading Si
Looks lovely! Attempting to sort the swirls on mine later today using same kit you used. Will be over the moon if I get similar results.
Thanks Sen, if you take your time you can get the results. My new car arrives this weekend so I may have to machine polish again, much sooner than I thought.
Good eye, at the time of the photos I hadn't used my AF revive but tbf I don't like how messy it is so looking to change.
