Hey,
Will my 92 RS look better than it already is if it is detailed? A guy at work says he will professionally do it for me, he gave me his card and everything, he says that detailing cars can get some scratches out and stuff like that. Is this true, or is he blowin a little smoke up there just to get me to go with his idea. The pic is below, the car looks good from far, but from about 5 feet you can see little scratches and chips(I know can't be taken out from detailing). I want to know what to do to get rid of these, any suggestions !!???

 

Did I forget to mention a boatload of swirl marks?

 

depends on the price he was asking.i dont know how much a good detail job goes for from a professional who really knows what hes doin,but personally i would just do it myself.go get a good set of car care products,i.e. CAR wash liquid,good wax,tire cleaner and tire shine,wheel cleaner,automotive window cleaner,vinyl protectant,cloth cleaner,and ALOT of premium terry cloth towels.i have everything,and keep it in a backpack in the back of my car.i dont have the trust in other people to do that kind of stuff for me,and if you own your car and really treat it as your pride and joy,you will find yourself wanting and actually liking detailing your own car.and if you want to get rid of those swirl marks,atleast the minor ones,get Zaino products.ive heard nothing but good about their stuff,and im going to use it when spring gets here and my front end is all painted and i got my stripes on.sorry for the long post.i guess i just always have alot to say!

 

I'm gonna have to aggree with the previous post. I work for a detailer after school everyday. Most of the cars we do are dealer cars that came from auction so they can be pretty nasty. Basically if we're really busy we just get them looking presentable. I'm not saying we don't do a nice job, just every car comes out differently. Some scratches will come out but most will not and stone chips definitely won't. I'd say do what I did. Get some zaino and try that first. I'm very happy with mine especially because I drive my car everyday. If you drive your car alot you might not want to spend 140 bucks or so for a full detail because after a month or so you'll realize that you're right back where you started.

 

Yeah, I agree with them. Last spring, I detailed my RS myself, a minor detail job though. No Zaino, but I washed and polished it, scrubbed the wheels and wheel wells good, did all the glass, used Tough Stuff interior cleaner on my seats, removed the seats and vaccumed, took a small brush to clean my vents, my seats had some rust where they bolt to the car, so I sanded it off and spray painted the rails black again, Armorall-ed everything, and wiped down the engine compartment. I forgot how long it took me, but it actually felt good to do it all myself. I can't wait to do the IROC this spring, and I'll be Zainoing it, putting POR-15 on the bottom (even though I have no underbody rust) and polishing my rims. I don't even like other people washing my car, let alone detailing it.

So to sum it all up, do it youself

 

I am a part-time detailer, I mainly do showcars and the like. My advice is to visit the appearance section of this board and camaroz28.com as they offer GREAT information!
You can do this yourself it isn't very hard to do!
Detailing your car takes out most swirl marks (if done right, with good products such as Zaino Brothers www.zainobros.com) and makes the paint glossier looking.

First what you do is wash the car. Then you'll need to claybar it (do a search for claybarring under appearance section) it is a piece of clay and what you do is take the lubricant (no laughing) that comes with it, spray a fender or something and glide the claybar over it smoothly. It picks up any dirts, contaminents etc. that are on your paint. After you clay your car your car will be SMOOTH as a baby's bottom because you've removed all contaminents.

Next what you do is wash the car again, and dry it this time so there are no watermarks on the paint. NOW you begin the all-important polish/protectant procedure.
Checkout www.zainobros.com for the run-down on this.

My best advice to you is to check the boards and read some posts... it's a great way to learn and it doesn't take much at all. Learning how to detail is great esp. if you're on a tight budget and want your car to look MINT.

Good luck

Garett

 

ditto on the zaino

 

i detail cars and it all depends on what kind of scratch you are talking about if it is a deep scratch then it proably isnnt going to come out but if its no to bad it will come out. as for swirl marks a detailer wil defiatleytake them out bu you can do it yourself with a good polish

 

Yeah- whatever you can do yourself makes it look much nicer without costing you anything. When I bought my 88, i took out all the seats and vacuumed under everything. You wouldn't believe how much gross, disgusting, smelly stuff I got out from under the back seats. Not to mention $4 in change under one of the seats.
I also took a wire brush to the seat brackets and painted them black- much better. Armoralled the entire interior and let an ozonator sit in there for an hour. Those machines take out any smell you've got.

If you can buff out your paint and give it a thick coat of wax, go for it. It'll look awesome!

 

ok here is the deal.
i am a professional detailer. and if he just buffs the car not all the scratches come out, but if he sands down some of the smaller scratches (only if there dont go through the clear) then he buffs out the sanding scratches, your car will be almost scratch free.

all paint jobs that are done after the factory are sanded so dont worry about that.

and if he does detail your car, tell him he has to:
use touch up paint and touch up any chips, let dry.
then sand the scratches that he can,
then buff out the whole car.
then machine glaze the whole car
then wash the car and get all of the water out all everywhere with an air hose.
then hand glaze the whole car
then get any and all the hand glaze compound or buffing compound out of any cracks.
then clean the interior with INTERIOR cleaner then shine the interior with something besides armorall.
then clean all the glass
clean the rims and shine the tires.


that is what i do on a detail job.

and the price varies on the car and the customer.

for everything 100% it could vary between $150-450
and the upper end is when you have to sand the whole car down because of orange peel or it was just painted. or the guy is just that picky.

i have had corvettes where i just buffed and glaze then touched up with some paint, then put some paint protectant on and cleaned the car for $250. just matters on the customer.

have fun and ALL cars look better after a good detail.