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DetailingDude
Guest
My Car Care Philosophy (Part 1)
I guess I sould introduce my overall car care philosophy. My goal for every car is to achieve what I call "Maximum Optical Clarity". There are various things on the surface of your car that are either absorbing the sunlight (surface contaminants) or refracting the sunlight (surface blemishes).
I hope by this point most of you have read my posts "The Ultimate Clay Bar Guide", "My Ultimate Wheel Care Guide" and "What is a Swirl". Now I hope that this can build on those posts to help you understand paint and how to care for it.
Step 1:
The first thing that I do when I detail a car is get rid of everything on that paint that is not the paint itself. This has to be done in stages. The first thing that should be done is giving your car a pH balanced wash. I do not recommend using Dawn as it the Alkalines in it can begin to strip the oils out of your black plastic trim and also get into areas that you aren't going to be able to get with wax. Regardless if a car is new or not I would not use dawn.
Step 2:
The next thing I do is Clay the entire car. See "The Ultimate Clay Bar" for tips on claying and clay bar selection. I clay EVERYTYHING that has a hard surface: Windows, Side Mirrors, Headlights, Taillights, Chrome etc.
Step 3:
Then I De-Wax the entire painted surfaces with 3M General Purpose Adhesive Cleaner. Sometimes a car will arrive with some light surface scratchs that are just in the layer of wax. It also gets rid of Road Tar on the lower surfaces. Sometimes if there is some Alkaline water spotting or Acid Rain spotting the wax will have absorbed the damage and once the wax is removed the damage is actually gone.
Step 4:
At this point I do a full paint analysis. Using an opposing light source I look for swirls, surface blemishes, light surface scratches, oxidization etc. I want to find anything that was not factory paint. I decide, at this point, what needs to be treated in what manner.
Many detailers out there choose speed over quality. What I mean by speed over quality is that many detailers use products that are designed for speed and not what is best for the paint. Most detailers just break out the Alkaline-based cleaners and blast away with hot water. Then they break out the buffer and grind away at the paint.
This is what I do to every car that I do my initial detail on. I suggest that you do this to your Corvette this winter while you have the chance. Once you get it down to just the factory painted surface, and blemish-free you can put multiple layers of wax (Be that wax Lusso, Mother's, Meguiar's, P21S, Pinnacle, Zaino, or Zymol). With multiple layers of wax you can increase the depth of shine and the clarity of the color and increase the integrity of the protection. And then you can have "Maximum Optical Clarity".
I guess I sould introduce my overall car care philosophy. My goal for every car is to achieve what I call "Maximum Optical Clarity". There are various things on the surface of your car that are either absorbing the sunlight (surface contaminants) or refracting the sunlight (surface blemishes).
I hope by this point most of you have read my posts "The Ultimate Clay Bar Guide", "My Ultimate Wheel Care Guide" and "What is a Swirl". Now I hope that this can build on those posts to help you understand paint and how to care for it.
Step 1:
The first thing that I do when I detail a car is get rid of everything on that paint that is not the paint itself. This has to be done in stages. The first thing that should be done is giving your car a pH balanced wash. I do not recommend using Dawn as it the Alkalines in it can begin to strip the oils out of your black plastic trim and also get into areas that you aren't going to be able to get with wax. Regardless if a car is new or not I would not use dawn.
Step 2:
The next thing I do is Clay the entire car. See "The Ultimate Clay Bar" for tips on claying and clay bar selection. I clay EVERYTYHING that has a hard surface: Windows, Side Mirrors, Headlights, Taillights, Chrome etc.
Step 3:
Then I De-Wax the entire painted surfaces with 3M General Purpose Adhesive Cleaner. Sometimes a car will arrive with some light surface scratchs that are just in the layer of wax. It also gets rid of Road Tar on the lower surfaces. Sometimes if there is some Alkaline water spotting or Acid Rain spotting the wax will have absorbed the damage and once the wax is removed the damage is actually gone.
Step 4:
At this point I do a full paint analysis. Using an opposing light source I look for swirls, surface blemishes, light surface scratches, oxidization etc. I want to find anything that was not factory paint. I decide, at this point, what needs to be treated in what manner.
Many detailers out there choose speed over quality. What I mean by speed over quality is that many detailers use products that are designed for speed and not what is best for the paint. Most detailers just break out the Alkaline-based cleaners and blast away with hot water. Then they break out the buffer and grind away at the paint.
This is what I do to every car that I do my initial detail on. I suggest that you do this to your Corvette this winter while you have the chance. Once you get it down to just the factory painted surface, and blemish-free you can put multiple layers of wax (Be that wax Lusso, Mother's, Meguiar's, P21S, Pinnacle, Zaino, or Zymol). With multiple layers of wax you can increase the depth of shine and the clarity of the color and increase the integrity of the protection. And then you can have "Maximum Optical Clarity".
