Wax on, wax off...

[57Ford]

I have great admiration for a properly clean and well looked after car, but while I like my car to look good, I’ve much more interesting stuff to do in my life than pamper my old daily driver. I’ve used the local auto car wash and wishy-washy guys each weekend for the last few years but I’d like to do something more as long as it’s relatively painless. As I’m being mithered as to what I want for Christmas, I’m wondering about a car polishing machine but I’m not sure about this whole ‘detailing’ thing.
I don’t want to spend hours with a claybar (whatever one of those may be), three different grades of polish, sealers and then wax every two days for the remaining lifespan of my car, I’m simply wondering if I can successfully brighten up the appearance with a 4 or 5 hour attack with a machine every six months or so. (I also don’t want to burn the paint so as a newbie is there something safe?)
If I use a polish on my 2008 XF, will it mean that after a good dose of wax the paint will simply be thoroughly cleaned and restored back to original shininess for the next 6 months or is it the case that the wax will be washed off when I throw it through the local automatic car wash for its weekly cleanse thus exposing all the tiny scratches? If it’s the latter, obviously I’ll leave well alone but I’m just looking for a bit of direction as to what products and price may do the job I’m looking for, if any.

[smele]

My daily driver gets washed every 6 months or 10,000 miles, which ever comes sooner.

However, I have put my hand to the odd bit of detailing. The clay bar only takes a short time, but makes a massive difference. 20-30 mins max for a car. Used mainly on the horizontal surfaces, feels like you have waxed it after use.

Got myself one of those dual action buffers with a dozen or so discs and some polishes. It's hard work, but can be satisfying. Don't start watching youtube videos or you'll be buffing your sump with graphite.

[amusingduck]

57Ford said:

I don’t want to spend hours with a claybar (whatever one of those may be), three different grades of polish, sealers and then wax every two days for the remaining lifespan of my car, I’m simply wondering if I can successfully brighten up the appearance with a 4 or 5 hour attack with a machine every six months or so. (I also don’t want to burn the paint so as a newbie is there something safe?)

You run a clay bar over the car to pick up bits of crap that are stuck to the paint.

You want an Dual Action (orbital) machine, as they are much safer for beginners. You don't need to wax and seal every 2 days, build up a few coats of good quality wax and it won't need to be waxed again for 6+ months.

57Ford said:

If I use a polish on my 2008 XF, will it mean that after a good dose of wax the paint will simply be thoroughly cleaned and restored back to original shininess for the next 6 months or is it the case that the wax will be washed off when I throw it through the local automatic car wash for its weekly cleanse thus exposing all the tiny scratches?

The polish removes paint (and thus, scratches). I don't really see the point in polishing it, if you'll bung it back through a car wash, and put the scratches back into your (now thinner) paint.

There are safe methods to wash the car which will avoid putting the scratches back. It's simple and straight forward, and not really any more time consuming that washing the car normally.

Detailingworld has all the info you'd ever need.

[JimmyConwayNW]

Dual action buffers are completely rubbish.

Just use a normal orbital buffer and make sure you lightly mist all the panels before operating and don't press really hard on the buffer.

It's relatively easy.

[BIGYIN1314]

JimmyConwayNW said:

Dual action buffers are completely rubbish.

Just use a normal orbital buffer and make sure you lightly mist all the panels before operating and don't press really hard on the buffer.

It's relatively easy.

Dont agree with this at all. Infact I'd suggest this to be very poor advice.

DA polishers have thier place, especially for beginners. The damage that can be caused with a rotary in the hands of someone that doesnt know what they are doing can be significant. A rotary polisher demands a certain skill level that needs to be learned, which takes time & practice, neither of which I suspect the OP wnats to do.

A DA, which I agree will take longer to achieve similar results, is a far safer prospect as the likelihood of damaging the paintwork is minimal.

That being said OP, if you're not looing to spend much time detailing, perhaps you'd be better off putting the money towards paying a professional to work on your car and learn proper washing technique to mitigate any futher damage (i.e. swirls etc) in the future.

[BIGYIN1314]

JimmyConwayNW said:

Dual action buffers are completely rubbish.

Just use a normal orbital buffer and make sure you lightly mist all the panels before operating and don't press really hard on the buffer.

It's relatively easy.

Dont agree with this at all. Infact I'd suggest this to be very poor advice.

DA polishers have thier place, especially for beginners. The damage that can be caused with a rotary in the hands of someone that doesnt know what they are doing can be significant. A rotary polisher demands a certain skill level that needs to be learned, which takes time & practice, neither of which I suspect the OP wnats to do.

A DA, which I agree will take longer to achieve similar results, is a far safer prospect as the likelihood of damaging the paintwork is minimal.

That being said OP, if you're not looing to spend much time detailing, perhaps you'd be better off putting the money towards paying a professional to work on your car and learn proper washing technique to mitigate any futher damage (i.e. swirls etc) in the future.

[mneame]

JimmyConwayNW said:

Dual action buffers are completely rubbish.

Just use a normal orbital buffer and make sure you lightly mist all the panels before operating and don't press really hard on the buffer.

It's relatively easy.

^ funniest thing I've heard in a while!

[57Ford]

Thanks for the replies chaps but as far as 'learning better washing techniques' goes, my current one of 'let the foreign chaps at the carwash do it at weekend' is ideal in my eyes. I know it's sacrilegious to some (which is the reason I posted in GG rather than B&D) but all I was really after was an idea of whether removing the dull/dead paint with polish would be ok or would it do more harm than good. Ie, if I were to polish it today, after 4 weeks of carwash abuse would it look better or worse than it would have anyway?
As far as machines go, I'd need the most numpty-proof one available because I'd hate to end up with a car with lines of swirls and as you can tell, I'm a total novice! Finally, what model machine, pads, polish and wax should I be asking Santa for (if at all) and roughly how much will they cost him please?

Thanks very much for your patience - I do appreciate there are folk who probably think I'm a bit half-hearted about this, but really I only want a slight improvement for my few hours once every few months.

[Chris_VRS]

It sounds to me that all you need to do given how it will be washed is use a filler heavy polish (autoglym super resin polish, chemicals guys black hole, autosmart topaz) and then a layer of a ease to apply/remove, durable wax (bilt hamber finis, finish kare 1000p or collinite 476s).

Not much financial outlay, it won't take you a huge amount of time & will give you the result you desire.

Sometimes cleaning/detailing can be made far to complicated and I'm firmly of the belief that each car and usage/cleaning scenario should be taken into account before advising a generic answer.

Happy Cleaning!

[ch427]

For a very good 1 step operation try autosmart mirror image. Im the same as you and don't have the interest to clay/polish /wax and find this is a very good product that beads well for weeks afterwards.
Ive recently read some good reports on the farecla clay mitt too which can be used in the shampoo solution you use to wash the car saving even more time!
Autoglym super resin as suggested is also a very good product that can be used on its own.

[BIGYIN1314]

57Ford said:

Thanks for the replies chaps but as far as 'learning better washing techniques' goes, my current one of 'let the foreign chaps at the carwash do it at weekend' is ideal in my eyes. I know it's sacrilegious to some (which is the reason I posted in GG rather than B&D) but all I was really after was an idea of whether removing the dull/dead paint with polish would be ok or would it do more harm than good. Ie, if I were to polish it today, after 4 weeks of carwash abuse would it look better or worse than it would have anyway?
As far as machines go, I'd need the most numpty-proof one available because I'd hate to end up with a car with lines of swirls and as you can tell, I'm a total novice! Finally, what model machine, pads, polish and wax should I be asking Santa for (if at all) and roughly how much will they cost him please?

Thanks very much for your patience - I do appreciate there are folk who probably think I'm a bit half-hearted about this, but really I only want a slight improvement for my few hours once every few months.

To be honest mate, if you're going to continue using the 'chaps at the car wash', you'll find that most of your hard work will be decimated after the first wash, let alone 4 weeks worth. The main issue with these types of car wash is that they dont use 'proper washing technique'. The brushes incur swirls and minor scratches, the blasting of the dirt drags it across the paintwork, again causing swirls and minor scratches.

I agree with the above, a heavy filler polish followed by a coat of wax will have the car looking good. It only takes a few hours of work and is very low cost.

[amusingduck]

57Ford said:

Thanks for the replies chaps but as far as 'learning better washing techniques' goes, my current one of 'let the foreign chaps at the carwash do it at weekend' is ideal in my eyes. I know it's sacrilegious to some (which is the reason I posted in GG rather than B&D) but all I was really after was an idea of whether removing the dull/dead paint with polish would be ok or would it do more harm than good. Ie, if I were to polish it today, after 4 weeks of carwash abuse would it look better or worse than it would have anyway?
As far as machines go, I'd need the most numpty-proof one available because I'd hate to end up with a car with lines of swirls and as you can tell, I'm a total novice! Finally, what model machine, pads, polish and wax should I be asking Santa for (if at all) and roughly how much will they cost him please?

Thanks very much for your patience - I do appreciate there are folk who probably think I'm a bit half-hearted about this, but really I only want a slight improvement for my few hours once every few months.

It would look better than if you didn't polish it at all, but as BIGYIN1314 said, the carwash will be putting swirls and minor scratches back, undoing your hard work.

Dual Action polishers are much safer, but are less efficient. You can see the difference here:


These machines are ideal for beginners: http://www.cleanyourcar.co.uk/polishing-machines/d...

Based on what you've said though, I'm not sure a polishing machine is what you want. IMO, to make a machine polisher worthwhile, you would need to invest a decent chunk of time initially to remove the scratches from the car. Then another decent chunk of time to build numerous layers of wax. Once you have put in the initial work, you would only need to wash the car (with a shampoo that does not strip wax, and a safe washing method) to keep it looking great. Once the wax loses it's effectiveness (6 months+ for some), you would strip the wax and re-apply.

Polishing is only for removing scratches and restoring the paint finish, once it's done it's done.

I think a middleground may be to apply a polish that fills the scratches, by hand. This would need to be done more frequently to keep it looking good, and the carwash would simply strip it off if you took it there.

Hope this helps.


Edit:
This nicely illustrates why you should not take your car to a carwash if you want to prevent scratches. Before polishing on the left, After on the right:

Edited by amusingduck on Wednesday 17th December 07:40

[Craivold]

I think if you're not up for washing it yourself with a safe method (or paying someone to do so) after the machine polishing then it's not worth the outlay on polisher/polishes and the time spent learning and carrying out the work. You should either pay a good local valeter/detailer to do a wash, clay, filler polish (like Autoglym SRP) and wax or buy the products and do it yourself. This can all be done by hand and takes a few hours total. If you get a good wax and wash the car safely the look can easily last months but if you use a local car wash it can fade much quicker. I got these results on my 12 yr old/120k mile Impreza using the method described above;

(excuse the dirty arches!)





Wax I used was Dodo Juice Supernatural Hybrid - lasted ages and protected well. Happy cleaning whatever you decide!

[57Ford]

Cheers guys, I think I'll steer away from machinery then and just look towards the filler polish. With the amount of scratches it's got, I'll be buying in industrial quantities. Good excuse to see pics of your nice shiny cars though!
Have a good Christmas all