MgsJester - FIRST DETAIL 2003 Honda Accord

M

mgsjester

New member
Hey guys. I posted a while back about the steps to detail a car and what products to use. Thanks for giving me lots of helpful info.



So this was my first detail. I did it on my dad's 2003 Honda Accord Desert Mist Metallic. I was kind of confused about buffing but I guess it wasn't that bad for a first detail. Sorry for the bad pictures. I've never taken car photos before.



Process:

Exterior -

1. Wheel - Eagle One All Wheel & Tire Cleaner

2. Tire - Armor All Extreme Tire Shine Gel

3. Wash - Meguiar's Gold Class

4. Clay - Meguiar's Smooth Surface Clay Kit

5. Quick rinse

6. Buff - Meguiar's Scratch X

7. Wax - Meguiar's NXT Tech Wax 2.0

8. Windows - Rain X



Interior -

1. Take the front seats out

2. Clean matts with Tuff Stuff

3. Vacuum carpet

4. Clean carpet with Tuff Stuff

5. Wipe down dash (just distilled water, I forgot to buy interior cleaner)

6. Clean seats with Meguiar's Gold Class Rich Leather

7. Clean windows (distilled water again, forgot to buy window cleaner)



These are most of the products that I used.

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I used UDM for buffing.

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I washed the matts first. These are some before and during pictures.

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And these are the afters when I was drying them outside.

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These are the interior before pictures. It was pretty filthy, especially when I took out the seats. Oh, and thanks guys for telling me how to deal with the wiring under the seats. Couldn't have done it without you guys.

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And here are the afters. It isn't real good because I only used distilled water to wipe down the dash.

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I didn't get any befores for the wheels but they haven't been washed since 2003 when it was first bought so there was 5 years of brake dust caked on it. These are the afters.

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These are the befores of the car. I really don't know how to capture swirls. Maybe it's my camera but I can see the swirls myself but when I take a picture, it doesn't show up. But anyways, there were a lot of swirls because this car has never been detailed.

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This is after I polished the right side of the hood. I was kind of disappointed because there wasn't a huge difference but I guess I have to learn how to use the UDM a little more before it will be better. Maybe it doesn't look different because it's gold and not black? I don't know...:sadpace:

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And these are the afters. I couldn't get good pictures because the sun was down already but I did what I could.

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This was my first detail. Comment on how I did good or bad. :nixweiss
 
Looks good man but trash the Armor All that stuffs bad for the paint the sling off can stain it but over all it looks good!:goodjob
 
Looks good! Are those new rims, the inside of them looks immaculate.



As for the Armor-All, I have never used it but if it does sling you could always use it for dressing wheel wells.
 
No. They are the original ones, they've never been changed. I jacked up the car and took the wheels off and cleaned the insides too. But if you look closely, there are black spots of stained brake dust inside of the spokes. But yeah, those rims took about 5 hours to clean. They have 5 years of brake dust caked on it. Haha.
 
That looks clean.



How was it using Scratch-X with a machine? I think you should use something that was meant for machine buffing. If you prefer OTC then you can get the Mother's Power Polish in most stores.



From your procedure it seemed like you used the leather conditioner without first wiping down the leather. If you have Woolite or some other mild cleaner around the house you can mix that into a pail of water and use a microfiber to wipe down your whole interior. If you want you can even wring out the towel well and wipe the head liner.
 
Oh really? I didn't know. I thought all polishes/compounds could be used with machines or done by hand. Haha.



I didn't know that either. :0



Thanks for the tips man.
 
my only problem with scratchX is it "fills" the scratches it dosent remove them. JMO
 
Yeah. I was actually told to get "1Z brand Paint Polish " by Accumulator but I didn't want to order it so I just got what was at my local Advance Auto Parts. I didn't really like it either.



Good lucky altez.
 
depending use Megs Heavy Cut Cleaner works great on those tough swirls and scratchs or Megs #105 Compound then go over with a coat of Megs Machine Glaze #3.



Heres my average Process



Wash with Megs NXT

Megs Clay bar

Megs Heavy Cut Cleaner

Megs Machine Glaze

Megs Deep Crystal Polish

Megs NXT 2.0 Tech Wax

Fast Finish Surface Enhancer
 
Looks good! You really made a difference on those mats and the carpet. Newbie here, too. Try Mequier's Hot Rims All Wheel Cleaner for those last few brake dust spots. Can get it over counter anywhere and it sure worked for me on my used Ranger when some other OTC products did not.
 
El Camino Kid said:
depending use Megs Heavy Cut Cleaner works great on those tough swirls and scratchs or Megs #105 Compound then go over with a coat of Megs Machine Glaze #3.



Heres my average Process



Wash with Megs NXT

Megs Clay bar

Megs Heavy Cut Cleaner

Megs Machine Glaze

Megs Deep Crystal Polish

Megs NXT 2.0 Tech Wax

Fast Finish Surface Enhancer
Click to expand...





Is Machine Glaze an actual glaze or is it a light polish? Because if it's a true glaze and you're following it with Deep Crystal Polish (DCP) then you're using two glazes.



MgsJester, IMHO what you did is basically good (for a first timer) except for the Scratch-X as a polish. It's meant to be more of a spot treatment for very light scratches and swirls and even then it takes elbow grease when using it by hand. If I were you I would either follow Accumulator's previous suggestion for a polish or if you want to find it local, look for the Mother's Polish as I mentioned or Meg's #83 or #80. If you don't have really bad swirls then you probably don't need a compound like the Heavy Cut cleaner. And if you aren't going to constantly apply the DCP then I think it would be useless in your process as it probably wouldn't last that long. And the process is more important than the products. And remember, sometimes fillers aren't all that bad as long as you are aware of the fact and the fillers in the product last a decent amount of time.



Also, what pads are you using?
 
Do the pads matter? I just used the one that came with the UDM. It was white. And then, I used this orange one that came with the UDM Starter Kit that I bought.



Thanks for the info. How do you guys memorize the Meguiar's #'s? Lol..anyways, I'll get a 'real' polish next time and see how it does.
 
Pads have Diffrent levels of Cut



Yellow is a Heavy Cut

White is the finest cut



Look it up on the search option over the forum
 
Heavy cut takes out those heavy swirls and scratches, machine glazes take out those remaining fine scracthes and swirls and I just like to use a polish just brings out the depth in the paint IMO.
 
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