What Pads To Use?

[mhtsa]

Hello Everyone,

I am new to the forums here and also fairly new to detailing as well. I have been doing a lot of research on how to detail and what products to use and such. My question is what pads should I use along with M105 and M205 with a rotary? I know first off some of you are going to mention that a person new to detailing probably should stay away from a rotary and use a DA or the like but I am confident that if I am careful, I should be okay with a rotary. The car that I will be detailing is a BMW which are known to have fairly hard paint. I have been reading so many posts on what to use and I am getting confused. If anyone has any input on which pads I should use for this application please let me know.

Thanks!

[thepanchmx]

If you are planning to buy the rotary ill go for a DA and the mf system, i own both, and its been a while since i dont need the rotary, the mf system is very strong and safer than the rotary. But for rotary polishing pad and finishing one eill work.

[Michael Stoops]

Re: What Pads To Use?

Since you already knew that someone was going to say this, we'll be the first: attempting to teach yourself how to use a rotary buffer, and on your BMW to boot, is really not a great idea. The heat you can generate with foam pads on this tool, and the speed with which you can generate that heat, can get you in trouble in the blink of an eye. Things you can do with a DA buffer that will cause zero issues will send you to a body shop if you do them with a rotary.

The recommendation that thepanchmx made for opting for a DA with our Microfiber Correction System is a great idea. Even on very hard paint it tends to work beautifully (and not all BMWs have paint that's as hard as you may think, by the way). You can approach near rotary cut levels and correction this way, with all the safety and short learning curve of a DA.

Nonetheless, we'll address your pad selection question directly: If you're going to use M105 on a rotary then either a foam polishing pad or a light cutting wool pad would likely be your best choices. A wool pad will cut faster but won't generate the heat that a foam pad will. Depending on the paint, however, the wool pad may leave a lot of swirls behind. If that's the case then you may need a foam cutting pad for severe defect removal, but that pad will generate crazy amounts of heat in very little time and can be very tricky for a novice to come to terms with. M205 can be used with either a foam polishing or foam finishing pad. With a finishing pad at slow speeds (under 1000 rpm) M205 on a rotary can do amazing things for the clarity and gloss of any color paint and, in all honesty, it's kind of hard to mess up with M205/foam finishing pad/600 rpm on a rotary. There's virtually zero heat generation and the pad glides across the paint even when totally flat.

[mhtsa]

Re: What Pads To Use?

Thanks for the input guys. The reason I want to use a rotary is because I was given one as a gift. Had I not received a rotary as a gift, I would have purchased a DA polisher. Is the learning curve really hard to learn on a rotary? What would you guys recommend. While I do want to use the rotary, the last thing I want to do is damage the paint on the car. Thanks.