This weekend I decided to tackle the polishing of my silverstone S2000. I recently got the PC. The first try I was not happy with the hood, I used the white Lake country pad with swirl remover. This weekend I washed the car, from top to bottom with dawn, and went to it. I used Megiuars swirl remover with the yellow pad. Still quite nervous but I had it on 3-4 speed. Polishing and Waxing the car took me 2 days.. about 12 hours. I am slow and quite meticulous. I am including before and after pics, plus one from 2 years ago, however it is really hard to tell any difference. The difference is there especially in person.

A few thoughts. I have the yellow, white and black pads. The swirl remover is hard to get off. I used the yellow pad and polished until I thought it look ok. Then I hand removed the polish. This took alot of elbow grease. Polishing took the most time. Then lastnight before I turned in I applied the Zaino detail spray, then the precleaner and one coat of zaino wax. Left it to dry overnight, since I have the old kit before the ZFX came out. I attempted to remove the zaino the next morning, and it was a bugger to get off. I tried to hand remove it and it was not going well. I decided to use the black pad and the PC to remove it. No luck. So with lots of detail spray I got it off by hand. I have never had this much problem removing Zaino before.

I then put a coat of Meguiars hightec highgloss carnuba wax on. I put this on by hand, as I didn't know which pad I could use to apply it. I removed it with the black pad. I am totally exhausted, but it was worth it.
2 years ago
Before (Saturday)
Before
Before
After (Today)
After

 

wooo! congrats! looks great!

 

yup, looks good to me too!
really hard to get photos of silver-
but your aft pics have a bit more "pop" to them, imo.
wondering why you applied zaino spray before z1/z2?
might be the reason that it was hard to get off, or maybe you had a bit too much product...
in any case that shine will last, especially with the carnuba over it!!
to maintain, i suggest covering (car cover) as much as possible- dust it when it needs it and hit it with the detail spray after dusting. will keep that freshly detailed look going a bit longer

 

The reason for apply the detailing spray prior to the Z1/Z2.. is the swirl remover gave off lots of dust.. so I wanted to clean up the dust before apply the zaino. I didn't think it would hurt, and then again after because the zaino was so hard to remove. Lots of detail spray on car I know the humidity was 90% over the weekend, so maybe this caused the trouble in removal. All in all, it does have more POP in person

 

It looks like it was 12 hrs. well spent, car looks good.

 

Gotta love silver. It looked good in the before pics.

 

White Pad ? Hmmm ? could be part of the prob of elbow grease. I've burned my LC's out.. I'm using Sonus with a smaller backing plate 5" and find the flex works muuuuuch better. So do keep that in mind.


Did you use DACP or something else ? 3-4 speed is a little too slow IMO to get the proper mix in/out of product into paint. I normally use 5. Or 6 and let it spin to "dust." This could be the reason it was hard to remove. As well, maybe the pad got saturated and there was too much product applied. I can't stand DACP for that.

I've noticed the yellow not as aggressive as the Orange Pad. When I use Yellows, I tend to spritz it with just a bit of water, misting it really. That brings is almost to an Orange Pad feel. Your black pad is really for applying a final LSP.. Check to see there is no particle breakdown. Be sure to wash 'em well afterwards too.


Yup, NO ZFX with the old Zaino formula will be painstakingly long with a lot of elbow grease.
A wet or damp MF towel does the trick as well.


Looks Great Though and Congrats and welcome to the world of the porter cable.. and feel free to PM me if you have any further PC questions..