Polished Bliss: Evo FQ400...

[Clark@Polishedbliss]

This was a detail done over Saturday and Sunday on my mates new car, and seeings as he was offshore i had the bad luck of having to collect it and drive it out to the unit, i hate my job sometimes it fairly shifts once up over 140mph+ (only kidding steve :wave: )

Apparantly there was only ever 2 white FQ400's made and this one was a bit dirty when i got to the unit as the roads were wet:

So, onto the wash stage:

The car was firstly pre rinsed at high pressure with hot water (60 degrees) and i then cleaned the arches with Meguiars Superdegreaser and a brush.

The wheels were then cleaned with Meguiars Wheel Brightner (10:1), using a MF mitt for the faces...

And a new wheel brush Rich gave me to test for the inner rims...

This brush is a good bit better than the ones off e-bay as its slightly firmer so gives better cleaning ability :thumb:


I then washed the car with the 2 bucket method and Meguiars Shampoo Plus:

Door shuts/petrol cap were pressure washed as this is quicker than agitating them with a mitt or brush, and once you get the hang of it you dont get any splash back into the interior (Still have some of my old Valeting skills :lol: )

I then rinsed it off and took any small tar spots off with Autosmarts Tardis before putting it inside to clay, and for this i used Meguiars Aggressive Detailing Clay just to make sure it pulled all the dirt off the paint:

I then gave the car one final rinse at high pressure before sheeting the water off with an open ended hose, and used the leaf blower and waffle weave to dry it off.


Now back inside, i taped the car up ready for polishing and then set about taking paint readings.

This is where i ran into trouble, as it was a wee bitty thin to say the least...

Very rarely did i get readings above 80/85 microns! Part of the reason the readings were so low were due to the fact the car was only single stage paint, but after spending ages with the composite gauge it revealed that there were only around 15-20 microns of pigment (white paint) in some areas

Steve had just told me to do what i felt was needed on the car, and i had initially wanted to fully correct the paint, but i knew this wasnt going to be possible as the car was sporting some pretty hefty nicks and scratches:

Even if the paint had been around the 120 mark alot of these still couldnt be fully removed by polishing/sanding, so this was some what of a consolation i guess...

There were feint buffer trails in the paint too, which could possibly explain some of the low readings, its a pitty they didnt tape the badges up when whoever it was polished the car previously though:

The paintwork was pretty flat and faded in places (quite surprising as there isnt alot of miles on the clock) so i was hopefull that a fairly light approach with the machine would be able to lift the dead paint and give a decent level of correction, luckily this was the case - using a 3M Finishing Pad & 106FF @1800rpm's:

Not 100% correction due to the RIDS but pretty good considering, at least with it being white they aren't too noticeable and the clarity of the paintwork returned:

Paint transfer:

Some panels were really dull:

Left side polished, right side not touched:

There was a funny mark on the rear quarters, where there was a perfect square shaped area of nice shiny paintwork:

My only guess was that this was possibly from the protective wrappings that were on the car when new?

They polished up easily though

Luckily there was a bit more to play with when it came to polishing the carbon fibre rear wing, so i used 3.02 with a 4" polishing pad:

I used a 4" pad (@1200rpm's) for the front bumper and lights too:


Headlights before:

During:

After:

 

[Clark@Polishedbliss]

50/50 on the splitter:

Before:

After:

The b-pillars and door surrounds were the final bits left to correct, so they were taped up:

Before 106FA with the Megs G220 machine:

After:

Once the polishing was complete, i gave the car a dust down with another new product Rich had given me to try

These ones are much softer than the ones we were using previous and a good bit cheaper too :thumb:


At this point my Dad had turned up for a nosey so i gave him a few jobs to do

The wheels were pretty swirly so i showed him how to HD Cleanse and then apply the Wheel Sealant before he did the other 3, aswell as polish the exhaust, he'll have been wishing he'd went to the pub to watch the football now :lol:


I'd also washed the engine outside (after covering the MANY exposed electrical parts) and then applied 303 Aerospace Protectant, so i got my dad to give this a wipe down aswell as polish up the manifold heat shield with Blackfire Heavy Cut Compound and then Megs NXT. I was tempted to remove the shield and machine it but knowing my luck the bolts would have snapped so it stayed put!


Before:

After:

While Dad was doing his jobs i'd applied the Vintage wax with a foam applicator:

This was left to cure while the interior was detailed, no pics as it didnt need much so no great difference in the before and afters


The tyres were then dressed with Blackfire Long Lasting Tyre Gel (and buffed off an hour later) and the car was then jacked up so i could dress the arch liners (Meguiars All Season Dressing):

With all the jobs complete, all that was left to do was to buff off the wax and give the car a wipe down with Field Glaze.


And here's the final pics - Around 22 hours went into this one (i think!)

 

[Clark@Polishedbliss]

I even managed to get the car back nice and clean as luckily the roads stayed dry


Thanks for looking! :thumb:

Clark

 

[Wes G]

Wow...I`d love one of those as a weekend toy-superb work as ever Rich.:thumbsup:

 

[EssVier]

You make white cars look even better than possible!!

Nice car, buuuuut did you go out and give it some beans?? Com e on, you can tell us ;-)

 

[tjm69]

Hubby used to help out valeting for a Evo specialist garage and that was the only one he hated ...kept stalling it because of the twin plate clutch