Conflicting advise

[Jeroen1000]

I am so confused that I simply had to ask. I'm not really new but I lost my previous account .

In this article, Mike talks about the fact the Meg's. DA polisher will not remove paint.

http://www.meguiarsonline.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1395

But in this article is does remove paint

http://www.meguiarsonline.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=2965

Can anyone explain this? It either can or can't.

Cheers,
Jeroen

[Michael Stoops]

Re: Conflicting advise

Wow.

You know, with some personnel changes and the rapid growth of this forum, we don't get a chance to reread a lot of the old stuff, even if it is a sticky!!

We're willing to be that even Mike Phillips has a different view point on the D/A buffer today (that thread is 6 years old now!!!).

Here's the bottom line: if you have a scratch in your paint, even a scratch as minor as a swirl mark, the only way to truly remove it is to level down some of the surrounding paint. And that means, quite simply, that you are removing paint to some degree. How much you remove depends on what pads and liquids you use with the D/A (or other tool, including hand work), how long you work the product and how aggressively you work it.

Can a D/A remove paint? It sure can, and it does. Is this something to be concerned about? Normally, no. Unless you start doing really crazy things with it. There is a lot of talk on the Internet about how it's impossible to damage your paint with a D/A and that isn't exactly true. When we recommend not doing things, like not using our W7xxx series cutting pads on a D/A, or not running a D/A on speed setting 6, it's because we want to minimize the risk of any damage when using this tool. But some people insist on ignoring these recommendations and we've seen them get into trouble. They've gotten so lulled into believing that it's impossible to damage paint with a D/A that they don't think about what they're really doing. So they grab a 4" cutting pad, load it up with a heavy cutting compound, run the tool at speed 6, use a ton of pressure and then focus the tool on one spot. One spot with a very bad scratch. And they damage the paint. It's not common, but it happens.

The D/A does have it's limits, of course. In almost all cases a rotary can cut through defects faster than a D/A (ie, remove more paint faster than a D/A can), but for typical swirl removal the D/A is an excellent choice. Meaning it can do an excellent job of removing swirls - which only happens when you remove some paint.