Just a quick bit of info... (in case others are considering this..)


After 12 months ownership and endless detailing the white appearance has always been limitted by the factory orange peel that all Mercs seem to have (amongst most other manuf).
Making white truly pop is always very difficult and has to start with very high quality polished surface.. (making dark colours pop is easy..)
Anyway this was giving me the ****s, so I decided to do something about it..


Process was:-
Car Pro Denim pads (5" 10 off and & 3" 6 off) with Juice Super C compound (SMAT) on a rotary generally around the 100-800rpm range..... using products such a Scholl S3 do work but are slow and gum up ans they are diminishing polishes.. not ideal for flatting.. Meguiars 101 also recommened.
Correction after flatting was using Scholl S3 (rotary Yellow and blue pads), S20 (DA scholl blue spider pad) then Jewelling Rotary (black finishing pad)with car Pro Reflect..
LSP was with Poorboys White Diamond (applied with roatry), and Collinite 845 applied by hand..


I was aiming to get about 90% of the peel removed as I wanted to maintain as much paint thickness post correcon as possible..
First image shows the improvement in the sharpness of the reflection.. not perfect but again I was trying to preserve paint thickness...
I'd only go flatter still on custom paint where i ahd additional clear to start with..


My car is factory (German) polar White. It is a single stage white (not clear coat for those unfamilar with paint tech). And certainly in my case is very very hard... (as in ridiculously hard.. )


Be warned this process is VERY labourious and time consuming on such hard paint eg. 3 hrs rr qtr, 4 hrs rear door, 5 hrs fr door, 10 hrs bonnet..
All in this wil have consumed 50 hrs and perhaps $300 AUD in materials..
(the denim pads get faily flogged...) getting this done professionally would be in the order of $2500.. (a huge saving I keep reminding myself..)


Wet sanding (2k, 3k, wool rotary then foam pads etc...) may be quicker but on such hard paint the scratch removal after flatting takes so long the intial benefit is lost.. be warned.. (this is not the case on softer paint so is likely the way to go..)


The key question is would i do it again.. the answer is NO, not on this paint.. on softer paint it would take half as long so the answer would be yes.. visually its a big improvement.. even at only 90% removal...


Hope I have encouraged those on the edge, and put off those who thought about it but weren't clear on what is involved..


All the best...

 

Nicely done! Do you want to come and do mine

 

Cheers....


If you ween't so far away... then.. not bloody likely....


Seriously I wouldn't bother with your colour.. it can look great swirl free with great reflections.. white needs every last bit of help it can get.. and still its only gonna look "good"....


Also I now have RSI and neve issues in my arms from the DA and rotry use.. its gonna take a coupla months to clear..

 

Great job, I can just imagine the amount of work you put into it. I detail my car as well and it does get tedious. Strangely though, there is still some joy of satisfaction while you are doing it (and cursing). Very well done though, something to be proud of.

 

Thanks for that..


The wife thinks i'm nuts for sanding a new car.. or any car for that matter..
My 2 little girls think its cool and the car looks "super shiney"..


I just think its what they all ought to be in the first place.. and i guess what i payed for.. if that makes sense..


Oh and for the record.. i'm still not happy with the hood so that'll be getting another go.. (i know i know i'll hit metal.. )


I enjoy detailing.. (different from car washing).. so its therapy in some ways.. also you learn alot about the paint and how to maintain it with something like this.. ie what it does and oes not reposnd well too.. process & product.. comes in handy down the road..

 

very impressive. I'm also a car detailing nut and try to do some good deep detailing when I have the opportunity.

Keep up the good work!

 

Nice work.

I can appreciate this, but could never justify doing it on my vehicle.

Going the extra mile does look better.

 

Hey Shadwell, that is one hell of a great job you did...very impressive. As I'm getting a little long in the tooth and have never detailed with a rotary, I usually take the easy way out with a new car: Claying, polish and sealants. Don't use wax as they don't hold up and offer the protection that sealants do.

My car is factory ordered and will be lunar blue. Actually, haven't had a dark car for a very long time (due to the fact that they show so much dirt) and I'm looking forward to getting some (don't need a whole lot, though) pop out of it. BTW, you reference how hard your paint was. Is that because the car came out of Germany (mine will be coming from Germany, also) or because of the color of the paint?

 

very nice work, hell of a job

 

Thanks again, having enthusiastic owners recognise the work and improvement is flattering..

The paint hardness is due mainly to it being factory baked single stage white. With the titanium oxide used in the pigment with tha baked factory finish it is typically very hard... Ironically when very polished it's also scratch sensitive ie it shows scratches....

For yours deciding points will be IF it has factory ceramic clear or not... This is a hardened er ultra thin layer within the clear coat... It needs special consideration... For general light polish and paint cleaning ahead of sealants something like car pro reflect with a fine polishing pad in a DA will lift discolouration and very fine scratches, refine the surface and improve gloss...
Honestly best advice I can give is get stuck into the how to do and forum points in Autogeek online... It's a huge wealth of great info..
End of the day always do a test spot.. Achieve the finish you are after THEN and only then role out across the whole car...
All the best and thanks again...

I just picked up some lake country purple foamed wool pads and more denim pads today... Still have the RHS of the wagon to do.... 20 more hours I imagine...

 

Thanks... It's still going
Maybe some more this weekend if I get a pass from the missus ...
Got to paint some of the house too...
Broken man 😁

 

What a dramatic difference, much respect as taking orange peel out is a time consuming process. I wish they found a way to reduce it at the factory level. I know it has to do with water based paint and other factors but obviously it can still be reduced/removed.