Proffessional detailer or my amateur skills

[YUSUF_1977]

As a beginner i like detailing my car myself very much as a relaxing method and its good for my car also for my pocket as well .

Many people thinks that it is not enough to protect car myself and not the same service you get from a proffessional detailer garage .

I wonder if its true? everything seems quite ok with my car at the moment as i am trying to do my best.

Things came to my mind when i ve seen a proffessional detailer working with a rotary buffer on BMW M3 and he was so hard pushing the roof was waving i was shocked and silently get out of that garage and decided to do everything myself

I am not sure giving my car to other hands

What do you think about that ? Do i have to go to a proffessional detailer after 2 years again as i had paint protection bonus when the car was new?

[FinalTouchDetail]

Re: Proffessional detailer or my amateur skills

As a beginner i like detailing my car myself very much as a relaxing method and its good for my car also for my pocket as well .

Many people thinks that it is not enough to protect car myself and not the same service you get from a proffessional detailer garage .

I wonder if its true? everything seems quite ok with my car at the moment as i am trying to do my best.

Things came to my mind when i ve seen a proffessional detailer working with a rotary buffer on BMW M3 and he was so hard pushing the roof was waving i was shocked and silently get out of that garage and decided to do everything myself

I am not sure giving my car to other hands

What do you think about that ? Do i have to go to a proffessional detailer after 2 years again as i had paint protection bonus when the car was new?

First, the "paint protection" from dealerships is a scam.

Second, a good detailer will know what they're doing and take great care of your car.

If you haven't claybarred your car, then yes, it needs to be claybarred (this is easy to do yourself though).

If you have minor swirls/scratches in the sunlight (and you do if you've never polished your car) then it could also use a good polish.

Whether you "need" to take it to a detailer is up to you, but no one ever NEEDS to have their car detailed. It's just about how they want their car to look.

I would say that the best is to have a professional detail it to get it to it's highest level and then properly maintain it yourself.

OR

Learn to use a machine polisher and follow the 5-steps of paint care to the letter.

[YUSUF_1977]

Re: Proffessional detailer or my amateur skills

Thank you for a good reply. Thinking the same as well.

[Michael Stoops]

Re: Proffessional detailer or my amateur skills

A professional detailer can do wonders for the appearance of your car. But many amateurs or "weekend warriors" as we like to call them, can do an equally outstanding job on their own vehicles. It all depends on how much time and effort you are willing to put into learning proper technique so that you do things right. But even a "weekend warrior" with only moderate skills is going to be better for a car's finish that a so called professional detailer who is "professional" in name only but really has very little skill. Unfortunately we see far too many of those. There are too many cases of "pro detailers" leaving a car looking worse than before they started work on it. Unless you can search out a true professional and are willing to pay him what he really is worth, you may be better off learning how to do it correctly yourself.

Some people have no interest in doing the work themselves but demand that their car look darn near perfect all the time. For them, there is no substitute for a genuinely skilled professional detailer.

[Ravi_1992]

Re: Proffessional detailer or my amateur skills

Things came to my mind when i ve seen a proffessional detailer working with a rotary buffer on BMW M3 and he was so hard pushing the roof was waving i was shocked and silently get out of that garage and decided to do everything myself

Some cars have soft roofs ( easy to ripple ) , I was polishing my cousins nissan pickup truck with a PC and just the weight of the machine was making it ripple.

[Mr Miyagi]

Re: Proffessional detailer or my amateur skills

Yesterday I couldn't even spell professional...Today I is one.

JKv :0

[ClearlyCoated]

Re: Proffessional detailer or my amateur skills

If you accept money for a detail, you are a professional detailer. So the real delineation is competence.

Just reading these forums and applying the invaluable advice received here makes you more competent than many professional detailers who never learned to recognize or correct their mistakes, no care to.

[Matt Majeika]

Re: Proffessional detailer or my amateur skills

If you accept money for a detail, you are a professional detailer. So the real delineation is competence.

Just reading these forums and applying the invaluable advice received here makes you more competent than many professional detailers who never learned to recognize or correct their mistakes, no care to.

Agree 100%

Being a professional just means you get paid. It's a skill level that we're working towards. The more knowledge / experience you have, the better YOU are as a detailer. Stick to doing it yourself. If you don't know how, just stick around here! You'll learn.....

Matt

[FinalTouchDetail]

Re: Proffessional detailer or my amateur skills

Another piece of advice, and something I did myself that was quite valuabe to me...

Get a GOOD detailer to tackle your car and sit out there asking questions and watching how they work. You will learn so much more than you will by just reading the forums.

The only way to get very good at detailing is practice, and a good start is being able to watch someone work and understand how products break down, arm speed, pad selection, etc...

[J. A. Michaels]

Re: Proffessional detailer or my amateur skills

I think there are a lot of weekend warriors that do a professional job. Too often on forums you see a hologram detail from a so called professional. Does that make it right? No of course not.

I tend to look at the final results and the persons knowledge before I call them one thing or another.

[Brad7]

Re: Proffessional detailer or my amateur skills

So many "Professional" detailers in my area do a sub-par job. I spend at least 30 minutes a day on these forums and can make a car look better than they can. Having the right knowledge paired with the right products(meguiar's) is the key to producing excellent results.

[C8N]

Re: Proffessional detailer or my amateur skills

I had my car's exterior detailed at a local car wash.
When I picked it up, the car looked great but as the wax started to fade off... started to see the swirls.
To be completely fair, I did run the car through an automatic car wash once after this detail.

[Marc08EX]

Re: Proffessional detailer or my amateur skills

They could have used a glaze to cover up the swirls.

Car wash detailing can't be really considered proper detailing. All they care about is getting your car in and out as fast as possible. How long did it take?

[Detailing by M]

Re: Proffessional detailer or my amateur skills

Auto car washes use very harsh chemicals to clean your car.
So what ever wax they used came off quicker then if you washed your car with higher quality soap.
Requarding swirls, if you didn't pay for paint correction then they didn't do any and the auto wash helped make some more.

[C8N]

Re: Proffessional detailer or my amateur skills

They could have used a glaze to cover up the swirls.

Car wash detailing can't be really considered proper detailing. All they care about is getting your car in and out as fast as possible. How long did it take?

I dropped off the car at 8AM and picked it up at noon.
I picked this particular place because they were the only one in my area that uses clay.
Anyways... never again.