Bringing my paint back to life?

[e30pwr]

Well, I'm wanting to take care of this "haze" that seems to be on the hood. I've tryed the basic wash and wax, I'm probably going to be selling it soon so I want to have as much of the car straightened out before I sell it. I've been thinking about claying the whole car and then waxing it but I don't want this haze to take away from the rest of the shine.

Any ideas people? And yes I know the car is dirty, I was hoping for an idea before Memorial Day so I can wash it on memorial day.

[e34john]

Give it a clay bar then cleaner wax then regular carnuba wax. That will be easy to do and not cost you too much money while making the car look better.

[td325ic]

is that Schwarz? Or what is the color? It should clean up nicely after you clay bar and polish it.

What detailing tools and products do you have? How much are you willing to spend on products?

You probably don't need to spend much to bring the gloss back, just need to remove the embedded dirt with the clay bar and then a paint cleaner or light polish to remove the oxidation. By hand you're not going to be able to get out alot of swirl marks (light scratches) easily so I'd just try and get it glossy again.

If you're doing it by hand, then pickup a few of the Meguiar's yellow foam applicators and some microfiber towels. Be careful with or remove any tags or rough edges on the cloths or applicators.

For a polish, I don't know what's available to you, but you could try a Meguiar's product, just look for a light polish, something that says it can be applied by hand. Start with something light, then go more aggressive if it's not satisfactory.

By hand you may have to work your ass off before you start seeing results though. But if you want a locally available product that will bring your hood back to a high gloss by hand then you can try 3M Perfect-It II Fine Cut Rubbing Compound. Just be warned that it is pretty aggressive so use it carefully until you get experience with it. Before I got my Porter Cable polisher this stuff was the only way I found to bring back a high gloss shine to severely dull paint. Also the compound residue is hard to remove from trim if it dries so either mask off trim or clean it up immediately.

http://www.autogeek.net/3mperllrubco.html

Then use a light polish or swirl mark remover, then wax. You could probably go right to wax but it's up to you how thorough you want to be.

I think they carry 3M products at Napa auto parts. I don't think they have it at Autozone or Kragen's.

Anyway, this is just some basic advice for doing it by hand with products available locally to you. If you ever got a Porter Cable 7424 and some foam pads then there are alot of good products that will bring back your paint to a swirl free finish.

Oh, here's a thread that might help you out too:

http://r3vlimited.com/board/showthread.php?t=91064

[Leeroy]

My suggestion is Nu Finish, Its a restoration wax that you only have to put on once a year and i had great results when i put it on my car. And its only like $8 a bottle.

[e30pwr]

color would be lapisblau. Its a super dark blue and almost every one of my friends think my car is black. I'm willing to spend anything under $35 for products and waxes, I might buy a cheapo random orbital. I was tempted to buy a mothers powerball. I have most of the mothers line of stuff.

I'm going to take a trip to the NAPA to find that 3M stuff tomorrow.

And I assume by using a fairly aggressive compound I could see results like so:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KoDXryd19Bk

I just found that the local autozone has this random orbital. It's no Porter Cable but I think It'll be better for my noobish self for trying not to burn my paint.

[e30pwr]

Well, after 11 days and taking multiple trips to Autozone/NAPA I have had some success. Here's the results after a "paint cleaner" wax. I washed, clay'd, and now have half the car "cleaned" with the paint cleaner. When I get it fully done I will post up a new thread. But for now here's a teaser. I used that cheap random orbital that I posted above and I think it was well worth the $20 I spent.

[jw 325ic]

nice those cheap ones work fine if you know how to use it. made a huge difference.