Having detailed Jamie's previous car and winter prep'd the RS one month prior to the detail, he booked in for the full exterior shake down. Having chatted to him at length about finishing on lighter colours, we decided on multiple layers of Zaino. The aim; to correct, spend more time of finishing with the machine and apply as many layers of Zaino in the permitted time - three days.
Having received a phone call from Jamie saying he was going to be late, he sent a picture illustrating why...
So having made it, he looked very happy to be with us... All be it with a very dirty, snow covered RS!
A few pre detail pictures of the general dirt, grime and snow on the car...
At a glance, I thought Jamie had colour coded the tail pipes to match the Suzuka, but on closer inspection, it was very bad salt build up!
On to the wash down.
Having winter prep'd the car only a month before hand, finishing with collinite 915 sealant, the car had already been clayed so a strong mixture for the soak would be more than suitable.
Only having a hours window where the temperature was just above freezing, proved to be only just enough amount of time...
Once washed down and rinsed, the RS was moved inside for a thorough drying stage and finally some heat...
Once ready for the correction stage, it was time to inspect the paint.
On first thoughts, the defects didn't appear to be very bad at all, fine swirling with one or two deeper scratches. On closer inspection the upwards facing surfaces (bonnet, roof, wing and boot) were a lot worse. Mostly being deeper scratches which would need extra work.
Having spent time on test patches the perfect pad + polish combination was finally found; 3M yellow polishing pad coupled with Menzerna 3.02. This gave enough cut to reach 95% of the deeper defects whilst leaving a satisfactory finish which could be refined. The sides were a lot less work, only requiring 3M yellow pad with Menzerna 203s and half the machine time.
Defects - hard to picture on lighter colours...
Correction with pad and polish...
Once corrected the paint was beginning to sparkle and pop whilst the pearl colours were appearing well.
Whilst this paint is called 'grey', it is in fact a base colour of white, with a grey/pink pearl over the top.
Defect free
Pearl and warmth appearing from the paint...
Once the paint had been corrected and refined to a high gloss finish, it was time to layer on the Zaino. With it being cold and Zaino having a long curing time even with the accelerator, it meant that we were limited to the number of layers possible. Having chatted with Jamie to explain, the aim was four layers with a extra day later on to add a few more layers.
Products to be used:
Couple of layers on...
With the long curing times, this gave us the chance to carry out the other jobs..
Jamie had brought over a standard set of TT-RS 18 inch alloys for us to paint in the OEM titanium gloss finish. These were to be used as winter wheels to go with his pre ordered winter tyres.
As you can see the colour match is perfect! Winter tyres on the left - Michelin Pilot Alpin PA3.
Summer wheels off, for cleansing and sealing...
Time to clean up the calipers and hubs - hubs were polished up with peek metal polish and grade AAA steel wool.
During...
After...
Back down on its feet in winter mode...
Detail completed. Finished pictures.
Thanks for reading.
