jr001
Registered User
So, 16 years old and waiting for its full monty before making the journey south for the RS Cosworth gathering at Rockingham, organised by the BRSCC. This car is garaged most of the time and is kept very clean indeed.
The front end of the car had some accidental damage in the past and had been resprayed about a year ago. So, from the doors forward consisted of reasonably new paint. No clearcoat here just pure paint, which made the paint readings make more sense than they ever do. It was all paint on the gauges readings (185 285 microns)! Well, apart from some primer underneath. The rear quarters and the rest was the original paint (115 148 microns).
The owner was looking for something slightly different on this occasion and thats what he got.
A couple of before pics after the wash and clay that show the level of swirling.
Wash and Clay
Main wash - No hose connection available at the time so it was out with the buckets and soaking the car that way. Washed with Meguiars All Purpose Cleaner and Megs lambswool mitt.
Car rinsed by throwing buckets of water over the panels.
Clayed with Sonus green, lubed with Megs Last Touch diluted 1:1. Pat-dried with Poorboys waffle weave towel.
Polishing
Due to front end being resprayed, I went for Menz 106FF on a Megs polishing pad and this did the trick on the swirling. The rear of the car had to be given 3.02 on polishing pad. This however did not do much of a job on its own. Some patchy swirling remained. Rear end was thus given 106FF to finish it off and it did so very nicely. This included the tricky rear spoiler. Some RDS of course, considering the age, had to remain.
The rough detail of the polishing for those interested:
Roof (original) one hit of Menz 3.02 (900 rpm then 1700rpm then 900rpm, one hit with 106FF (900-1500 - 900)
Doors, bonnet, front wings and front bumper and front lowers 106FF (900 1500 - 900)
Rear quarters (original) 3.02 (900 then 1700, then 900), followed by 106FF (900 1500 900).
Rear spoiler (original) Menz 3.02 (900 1600 900) only went 1600 max here, but didnt produce enough heat to cause any worry about the plastics. Theres something about the plastics on this car, they are very much more solid than todays plastics. Very impressive. They did not heat up much at all, but I thought Id only go to 1600 rpm anyway.
Rear bumper 106 FF as above.
Side Skirts 106 FF as above.
Its fair to say that this was my first car that demanded a bit more thought to the levels of polish being used. A bit of variety providing some new learning.
Some of the during pics to show progress
Still a little bit of fine tuning on the bonnet to complete, as you can see from the above pic
Working front the front OS you can watch the progress:
Some others:
Sadly, by the time the HD Cleanse and Carboning had been completed, the clouds had obscured the sun. Heres some final whole-car shots to finish off anyway, who needs the sun to show off a 365bhp stage-3 beauty like this!
Cheers,
JOHN
The front end of the car had some accidental damage in the past and had been resprayed about a year ago. So, from the doors forward consisted of reasonably new paint. No clearcoat here just pure paint, which made the paint readings make more sense than they ever do. It was all paint on the gauges readings (185 285 microns)! Well, apart from some primer underneath. The rear quarters and the rest was the original paint (115 148 microns).
The owner was looking for something slightly different on this occasion and thats what he got.
A couple of before pics after the wash and clay that show the level of swirling.
Wash and Clay
Main wash - No hose connection available at the time so it was out with the buckets and soaking the car that way. Washed with Meguiars All Purpose Cleaner and Megs lambswool mitt.
Car rinsed by throwing buckets of water over the panels.
Clayed with Sonus green, lubed with Megs Last Touch diluted 1:1. Pat-dried with Poorboys waffle weave towel.
Polishing
Due to front end being resprayed, I went for Menz 106FF on a Megs polishing pad and this did the trick on the swirling. The rear of the car had to be given 3.02 on polishing pad. This however did not do much of a job on its own. Some patchy swirling remained. Rear end was thus given 106FF to finish it off and it did so very nicely. This included the tricky rear spoiler. Some RDS of course, considering the age, had to remain.
The rough detail of the polishing for those interested:
Roof (original) one hit of Menz 3.02 (900 rpm then 1700rpm then 900rpm, one hit with 106FF (900-1500 - 900)
Doors, bonnet, front wings and front bumper and front lowers 106FF (900 1500 - 900)
Rear quarters (original) 3.02 (900 then 1700, then 900), followed by 106FF (900 1500 900).
Rear spoiler (original) Menz 3.02 (900 1600 900) only went 1600 max here, but didnt produce enough heat to cause any worry about the plastics. Theres something about the plastics on this car, they are very much more solid than todays plastics. Very impressive. They did not heat up much at all, but I thought Id only go to 1600 rpm anyway.
Rear bumper 106 FF as above.
Side Skirts 106 FF as above.
Its fair to say that this was my first car that demanded a bit more thought to the levels of polish being used. A bit of variety providing some new learning.
Some of the during pics to show progress
Still a little bit of fine tuning on the bonnet to complete, as you can see from the above pic
Working front the front OS you can watch the progress:
Some others:
Sadly, by the time the HD Cleanse and Carboning had been completed, the clouds had obscured the sun. Heres some final whole-car shots to finish off anyway, who needs the sun to show off a 365bhp stage-3 beauty like this!
Cheers,
JOHN
