08 Expedition, Etched Hard Water Spot Removal

[Rollingrock]

After monaplaizing the shout box for a spell thought I would tell you abut my day, night and morning.  Just finished and yes I took some video that is loading on YouTube as I type. 

Today I stopped by Wash Solutions and "Smitty" happen to be there. He is the Megs rep for the South so I got to pick his brain for info.

His suggestion for hard water spots was to use Wheel Brightner cut 8:1.  Or WetSand with 3000 grit...so I got both. 

No real before shots but know that my first attempt to fix the water issues didn't go as planned.  I had tried M105, then the Chemical Guys Hard Water Spot remover, also didn't work, 

The process today was:
Wash
Use 8:1 Wheel brightner (While the surface was clean and wet) let it dwell some then scrubbed with a bug sponge as recommended by Smitty.  Not sure if it worked...but gave it a shot.
Rewashed
Dryed
Wet sanded the entire roof and hood
Wet sanded trouble spots left over from last detail
M105 wet sanded areas
M205 entire surface (tried Black Lake but went back to White and started over)
Opti-Seal roof
Wet Obsession on roofline and down
Water spots are 98% gone...and I am much happier with how it looks and by the looks of it...the Web Obsession is very nice.  Easy on easy off. 

Will post some photos in this post after the youtube up load. 

Ok some pics
Here you can see the hard water spots.  Now this section doesn't look too bad but imagine the entire surface like this. 


After


Another shot of the spots  (they may be hard to see)


Hood after Wetsand and 105 and 205


rear gate, before wetsanding too


Other side of rear gate


After


Another after of the rear


After LSP...More later


Added photos today:












last one

[Kitzy]

Looks good.  I don't think I could bring myself to hit the paint with sandpaper yet.  I'm sure once I do I won't be such a chicken.  Nice work.

[Rollingrock]

Looks good.  I don't think I could bring myself to hit the paint with sandpaper yet.  I'm sure once I do I won't be such a chicken.  Nice work.

I thought the same thing but, it wasn't a big deal at all.   

I did a video that is 9 min and 41 sec long.  The video camera does a way better job of showing the water spots however when I did the video you cannot see all the junk in the paint but you get the idea...   If anyone makes fun of me, they will go to -1000 posts at the cafe.  LOL 

Here is the video, (edited 3/30/09)
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34Kbf4MmqCc" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34Kbf4MmqCc</a>

[Kitzy]

Haha.  "I don't know if I'm doing this right but it's been working on the other panels so that's what I'm doing."   :hammer:

Nice plug on the Superflys.

And I just realized that the PC is just as annoying to listen to on video as it is in person.

[Obsessive Detail]

Nice work Jason!  I have to admit, that was a rather nice plug on the Super Fly towel!  :thumbsiup: 

As for the Wet Obsession, what did you think of looks?

I really like to wetsand.  It is like therapy wetsanding and then bringing the paint back to life again!

[Rollingrock]

Nice work Jason!  I have to admit, that was a rather nice plug on the Super Fly towel!  :thumbsiup: 

As for the Wet Obsession, what did you think of looks?

I really like to wetsand.  It is like therapy wetsanding and then bringing the paint back to life again!

I thought you would like that plug....hard to believe I didn't say anything about the Cafe?  What the hell was I thinking?  (I may voice over edit it and repost it)

As for the WO...I just put a second coat on it.  I am very impressed...it reminds me a lot of S100 but better.  Easy on easy off.  No white residue.  Home run there for sure. 

How long should it last? 

[Obsessive Detail]

Sweet!!


I've had customers getting up to 6-8 weeks with it.  I can't wait that long before adding more coats though!

[guitarman502]

what pad are you using with the 105?

[Rollingrock]

what pad are you using with the 105?

I used the 3.5" Lake PFW pad and the 4" Lake CCS Orange pad for spots.

[Rollingrock]

I modified the video..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34Kbf4MmqCc

[Too Stroked]

I haven't watched the video yet, but I've got to hand it to you. You've got far bigger balls than I have. I just cannot bring myself to get that aggressive. Looks awesome though! Funny how you tried it on the wife's vehicle first though. Hmmmm.

[Obsessive Detail]

Wet sanding is pretty scary at first.  Once you get used to it, wet sanding isn't that bad at all.  You want to make sure you are using a block so that you are sanding evenly, use a lot of water, and try to sand in the same direction.

I get a bucket of warm water and put a drop of soap in there to give some lubricity and let the sand paper soak for about 15 minutes.  I usually sand a small area and then use a squeegee to sheet off the water and check my work.  I've had some jobs where I had to do a ton of wet sanding.

[Rollingrock]

Wet sanding is pretty scary at first.  Once you get used to it, wet sanding isn't that bad at all.  You want to make sure you are using a block so that you are sanding evenly, use a lot of water, and try to sand in the same direction.

I get a bucket of warm water and put a drop of soap in there to give some lubricity and let the sand paper soak for about 15 minutes.  I usually sand a small area and then use a squeegee to sheet off the water and check my work.  I've had some jobs where I had to do a ton of wet sanding.

What he said...I asked those same questions?

Same direction?
What about a block?

Smitty and the other guys at Wash solutions said you can get away with doing without a block and they didn't seem to think that sanding in the same direction made any difference.  I disagree, and now having done it on most of the truck, if I have to do it again, I will be getting a block and going in the same direction.  What I did just caused a little more work with the DA after wetsanding. 

But to echo what Justin said, don't be scared, I was for about 5 seconds then I was like, "this is it"?.  I had soaked the sheet for about 1 hour before using it.  Just like using a QD vs wash, use your head and you will be fine...ok that being said I was using 3000 grit, i am sure there are there oh chit moments with more aggressive grits. 

As for doing the wifes car first...yeah it has the freshes paint so that made me feel better and secondly, websanding was the ONLY thing that was making a dent in the water spots.  You guys may think I am being crazy about the spots but I had the body shop look at it too and they said it was one of the worst they had seen in many years.  So I feel good about how I got it done.   

Not to totally kiss up to Justin here but if you guys haven't used Wet Obsession, I would give it a go...I was very impressed with it.  For you cold weather area folks, I would still use 16 or C845 for the winter but when it gets warmer having some around wouldn't hurt.  I have WAY too many LSP's as it is but this stuff is pretty good. 

[Obsessive Detail]

Yeah I've always sanded in the same direction, that is how I was taught many many years ago. lol  As far as the block goes, I think it is more of a safety measure.  You are more likely to sand unevenly by using your hands.  The only time I wetsand without a block is if I got a tiny area to do.

3000 grit works pretty good if you are dealing with light imperfections or just finishing up.  If you are dealing with worse areas don't be afraid to step up to 2500 or 2000.  You just want to check your work more often.  I kind look at the same way as I do with polishing, start out with the least aggressive method and work your way up. 

[Kitzy]

I was trying to think about LSP I want to use when I ge around to detailing the Expedition next.  Like the rest of you, I have quite a few.  Some which I have not even tried yet.  I keep wanting to try one of the ones I haven't tried yet but I really want to use Wet Obsession again.  I think I got even longer than the 6-8 weeks I kept hearing about.  The hood was beading up for quite a while.  Through plenty of washes and tons of bad weather.  The wierd thing, and it may just be in my head, was that it seemed to look better to me as time went on. 

As for wet sanding.  I really want to try it.  I might try it on my hood this spring or even if I get around to doing my Expedition in the garage at work this winter.  There's a spot that is decently deep but I don't think it's through the clear and nothing has touched it yet.  Plus, I plan on getting a new hood soon so...