Cutting Pads with the PC - Good idea?

[tinkz]

Re: Cutting Pads with the PC - Good idea?

thanks heaps Mike! looks like i got lots of reading and practise to do.

[radicalrev]

Re: Cutting Pads with the PC - Good idea?

do need to mist the pads when it is dry/first time using it for that detail??

[Murr1525]

Re: Cutting Pads with the PC - Good idea?

No, you dont have to mist them.

[Holden_Caulfield04]

Re: New to detailing

If you re-read what I wrote, I think I already answered your question.

In fact, this entire thread is based upon your question.

I haven't worked on Mustangs but I would say that black paint = soft, more often than not. I agree that you should always try the least aggressive mode possible, but it won't always work.

So, what if someone has a BMW with a hard clear and only a PC with minimal knowledge? Do you recommend that they seek a professional or just try and work with a polishing pad?

One more possibility is to move from a 6.5" pad to a 4" pad. Less rotational mass means more friction and polishing power from the same machine.

[Mike Phillips]

Re: New to detailing

I haven't worked on Mustangs but I would say that black paint = soft, more often than not. I agree that you should always try the least aggressive mode possible, but it won't always work.

So, what if someone has a BMW with a hard clear and only a PC with minimal knowledge? Do you recommend that they seek a professional or just try and work with a polishing pad?

One more possibility is to move from a 6.5" pad to a 4" pad. Less rotational mass means more friction and polishing power from the same machine.

If you're working on a clear coat finish, you're not working on black paint you're working on clear paint and thus pigment type doesn't have an effect on the resin used to make the clear coat.

If you read what I wrote, I said we can fix most everything that comes our way using good technique and the right pads and products, this includes all cars and that means it includes BMW's.

If a person can't remove ALL of the defects using the products we recommend then usually it is time to seek out a professional for help, use a rotary buffer or learn to live with the defects.

You may have more experience and a higher skill level than most and if you do then that's good for you, but most of the people coming to this forum are coming to learn to use a machine, than after they get some experience they often advance to the rotary buffer.

Before you keep posting to this thread, you might want to read this thread...

PC + 83 not "Cutting" it! (The Limits of Dual Action Polisher)

[Holden_Caulfield04]

Re: Cutting Pads with the PC - Good idea?

I doubt it they just released their own new polidher this year. Click on thread below for a review.
Meguiars G100 DA Polisher
Cheers

Yeah, it's based on the UDM. I know it's rather expensive to retool and market another product but the Flex has been phenomenally successful and it may be a smart decision for Meguiars. On the other hand, the profit is quite small compared to chemicals like compounds, waxes etc.

[Mike Pennington]

Re: Cutting Pads with the PC - Good idea?

Yeah, it's based on the UDM.

In reference to your above quote regarding our new G110...

Not sure where you got your info from, but it couldn't be any further from the truth

The G110 was drawn up from a blank sheet of paper, and we started this process about 2 years ago.

Just to clear up the confusion again.....Our new G110 is in no way a redesign and/or affiliated at all with the UDM.

Mike

[EAT HEMI]

Re: Cutting Pads with the PC - Good idea?

The initial reason I joined MOL is because I used a cutting pad (7006) on my baby and got micromarring of the paint and I freaked out once my detailer told me that was a no-no (i hadn't even noticed the micromarring at that point).

I used the pad only due to poor note-taking during a detailing class I took. Adding to my false confidence, I successfully used it on my daily driver too.

I saw only a few posts when I joined where others had fixed the cutting pad induced micromarring. After reading many, many articles, I was able to remove the micromarring successfully with a #80, #83, and follow-up #80 procedure - with a #8006 pad.

Thus, my post is first hand experience why not to use the cutting pad:

Reason 1:
#80 and #83 are amazing products when used with a 8006 pad that really do what I wanted in the first place

Reason 2:
I believe my saving grace was when I used a 7006 pad, I only used it with #9

Reason #3:
Most importantly, I have now had to polish the car 5 times to get the results I wanted.

Polish Round 1: 7006 with #9 (wrongly) - micromarring of paint
Polish Round 2: Using the 8006 with #9 - some damage was undone - but I needed to step it up
Polish Round 3: 8006 with #80 - fixed damage, but didn't get cobwebs - my original intended target
Polish Round 4: 8006 with #83 - cob webs gone/reduced, some more marring
Polish Round 5: 8006 with #80 - marring gone - paint looks awesome... finally.

[Mike Phillips]

Re: Cutting Pads with the PC - Good idea?

Thus, my post is first hand experience why not to use the cutting pad:

Thanks for sharing... and what color is the car you've been doing all this cleaning and polishing work to?

[EAT HEMI]

Re: Cutting Pads with the PC - Good idea?

Thanks for sharing... and what color is the car you've been doing all this cleaning and polishing work to?

It is a TorRed 2006 Dodge Charger Daytona R/T. Basically a fire engine red color.

I left a portion of the C-pillar untouched from my mess-up. I'll provide a comparison shot when I get a chance.

[Mike Phillips]

Re: Cutting Pads with the PC - Good idea?

It is a TorRed 2006 Dodge Charger Daytona R/T. Basically a fire engine red color.

I left a portion of the C-pillar untouched from my mess-up. I'll provide a comparison shot when I get a chance.

Thanks for adding this detail.

To anyone that's read this far into the thread, keep this in mind... the kind of hazing or micro-marring caused by using an aggressive pad, be it wool or foam on a DA Polisher can be hard to see if you're working on a light colored paint system, it's pretty easy to see on darker colors and especially black paint.

We've read posts where the person using a cutting pad on a DA Polisher and also recommending this type of pad was also working on a light colored car, so it could be they just never saw the damage they were doing.

Always do a Test Spot. Make sure the pad and product of your choice will remove the defects and leave the paint looking clear and glossy before going over the entire finish with your products of choice.

If your products and pads of choice cannot make a small area look good they're certainly not going to make the entire car look good, so test first and once you have a pad and product combination dialed-in that gives you the results you're looking for on your car's paint system, then duplicate the process over the entire car.

Make sense?

[EAT HEMI]

Re: Cutting Pads with the PC - Good idea?

Thanks for adding this detail.

No problem.


Adding one thing:
I did not notice the cutting pad micromarring until pulling it out of the garage on a sunny day. (I did a test spot in my garage with 1000 W Halogens and didn't see anything)

[andyo]

Re: Cutting Pads with the PC - Good idea?

what would i use to get wetsanding scratches out with the g100?

[Mike Phillips]

Re: Cutting Pads with the PC - Good idea?

what would i use to get wetsanding scratches out with the g100?

First you would start your own thread with your own topic instead of tagging your question on to this thread which is called taking a thread off-topic.

Just a friendly tip.


Second of all, you wouldn't sand down a car with the idea that you're going to remove all the sanding marks using a DA Polisher, it's the wrong tool for the job, the right tool would be the rotary buffer as discussed numerous times on this forum.

Not the answer everyone wants to hear because what everyone wants to do is have the DA Polisher be as powerful as a rotary buffer but without all the risks of a direct drive tool and you can't get that kind of power out of a tool with a clutch that stops the pad from spinning when too much pressure is applied, the kind of pressure required to remove sanding marks.

On another note, we-sanding is a process almost always done in the context of a NEW paint job, a paint job that is still somewhat soft. People on the Internet seem to not understand this and get the idea they can wet-sand the factory baked on thin clear coat on their car and then quickly and easily buff out the sanding marks using their DA polisher and it just isn't going to happen.

It's alway easy to wet-sand a paint job, wet-sanding is removing paint by sanding and one of the by-products of this process is instilling scratches into the paint... now follow me on this... it's easy to put scratches into the paint.... the challenge comes when it's time to remove them and that's where the difference between freshly sprayed paint and factory baked on paint becomes very apparent in that sanding marks will buff out fairly easily out of fresh paint and in most cases it will be very difficult to remove them out of factory baked on case-hardened paint.

Yet people read posts about this on other forums and then think they can do it to.

Just so you know, you can wet-sand paint and then make the paint shiny again by buffing it and it can still have hundreds of thousands of sanding marks in the paint, but to sand back a ways and look at the surface of the paint it can be shiny yet still have lots of sanding marks.

How do you know that this isn't what someone's paint job looks like after they've tried removing the sanding marks using a DA Polisher? A photo on the Internet won't show the sanding marks, just shiny paint.

So don't believe everything you read about wet-sanding and buffing using a DA Polisher, it's a lot more difficult than what most people that have never done this before understand.

[Mike Phillips]

Re: Cutting Pads with the PC - Good idea?

Another example of an orange cutting pad hazing paint...

http://www.autopia.org/forum/car-detailing/107487-help-swirls-after-polishing.html

Before you use any company's cutting pad on a DA Polisher to remove swirls, here's a suggestion... first do a Test Spot

That is, take the pads, the chemicals and all your skill and use all the products and pads in the process you've come up with and work on just a small section.

Then inspect this SMALL section in as many kinds of light as you can to make sure you're happy with the results. If you are, then continue around the car. If you're not... aren't you glad you only did a small test spot?

Now you can troubleshoot and try to find out where the problem is in your process and come up with a new combination of pads and chemicals until you can dial-in a process that first gives you great results in a small area and of course later, over the entire car.

Test Spot
Test Spot
Test Spot

Inspect and insure your results
Inspect and insure your results
Inspect and insure your results


Do it right the first time and you won't have to do it a second time.