Polishing

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WTM75

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I don’t have a DA and I was wondering what everyone’s favorite hand applied polish is before putting on their wax/seal coat. I’ve been looking at Meguires Ultimate Polish

https://www.amazon.com/Meguiars-G19216-Ultimate-Polish-oz/dp/B004HCOE8Q

I’m not looking for paint correction or swirl removal, just something to bring out the shine before wax/sealant.
 

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If your not interested in swirl removal or correction IMHO you should look at a "glaze" instead of a polish. If you don't remove the swirls and scratches you will be able to see them through the sealant/wax you use. Very few sealant/waxes will fill the scratches and even if they do it will not be long lasting.
Jay
 

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Looking to clean up the orange peel on my truck. Any recommendations or should I just accept it?
 

yillbs

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Looking to clean up the orange peel on my truck. Any recommendations or should I just accept it?

Orange peel is an entirely different beast. You'd need to wet / color sand it out, then compound / polish it. It's a very very very tedious / time consuming process. Unless you're skilled in the art of paint correction, I'd advise against trying to do this yourself.

to the op. I use the same polish, but careful with it, it's a polish and to much to often can cause issues in the future for your clear coat. Every time you polish, you're eating away at your clear a little bit. Personally, I polish about once every six months or twice a year. If you're washing your car properly, their should be minimal swirls to need to polish out anyways.
 

BWL

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I know it's a big job. Mostly afraid I'll use up a lot of clearcoat and still not get it perfect. There's a lot of real estate on these trucks so I could see it being a couple days to get it done.
 

yillbs

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I know it's a big job. Mostly afraid I'll use up a lot of clearcoat and still not get it perfect. There's a lot of real estate on these trucks so I could see it being a couple days to get it done.

Their are really only three steps to achieve it.

1. Wet Sand the paint to where it's flat. You're going to eat through some clear, but you have to. Think of orange peel as waves, and you're just cutting the tops of the waves down. MAking them more flat, which in turn leads you to see them as much less or not at all.

2. Remove your sanding marks using a wool pad with an aggressive compound. I would suggest a rotary buffer, though, you can do it with elbow grease, but good luck on that one :p

3. Follow your aggressive compounding step with less aggressive steps, I.E a stage 1 2 and three polish perhaps. As you start to polish the compounding you did you'll start to see what works for you.

Again though, i'd advise against this if you've never done paint correction before. Or, you could always go get some sheet metal, put a coat of paint on it, clear it up, let it cure, then practice on that!
 

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I've done it, but it's been years since I've been aggressive with it. Have an air rotary polisher, but may pick up a new electric DA for the job instead if I do it as it's a bit safer.
 

yillbs

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I've done it, but it's been years since I've been aggressive with it. Have an air rotary polisher, but may pick up a new electric DA for the job instead if I do it as it's a bit safer.

Good luck, take before and after pics!
 
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WTM75

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If your not interested in swirl removal or correction IMHO you should look at a "glaze" instead of a polish. If you don't remove the swirls and scratches you will be able to see them through the sealant/wax you use. Very few sealant/waxes will fill the scratches and even if they do it will not be long lasting.
Jay

The reason I not interested in swirl removal is because I already had it done and now I am just trying to maintain the look. Right now I’m just trying to get the most shine out of it. Down the road if it becomes necessary I’ll do swirl removal.
 
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WTM75

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I may be using the wrong terms, I’m not looking to do any paint correction, i already had that done and I very happy with that.

At this point, I really looking to get the most shine out of the paint. Before applying more wax.

This was last weekend after using Meguires Quick Detailer. I think it looks great, but I think it could be a little better.

3C9909BF-93AA-4E45-8AAA-D3425C749500.jpeg

E548A769-19AA-4E8B-A679-15E5010DF23C.jpeg
 

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A good glaze will really bring out the "shine" and is usually a step before sealant and or wax. I think before the wax I would use a good sealant(because of the longevity)then let it sit overnight and then use the wax of your choice over the top of the sealant. Lately I've been impressed with Polish Angel products--I know they are pricey but the results are OUTSTANDING. Look at "autopia" and the threads about Polish Angel and look at some of the results that professional detailers have been getting--pretty amazing IMHO.
This is the results of Polish Angel--altho it is a coating I think you can still see the results.
https://www.autopia.org/forums/clic...e/189604-corvette-polish-angel-cosmic-v2.html
Jay
 
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WTM75

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A good glaze will really bring out the "shine" and is usually a step before sealant and or wax. I think before the wax I would use a good sealant(because of the longevity)then let it sit overnight and then use the wax of your choice over the top of the sealant. Lately I've been impressed with Polish Angel products--I know they are pricey but the results are OUTSTANDING. Look at "autopia" and the threads about Polish Angel and look at some of the results that professional detailers have been getting--pretty amazing IMHO.
This is the results of Polish Angel--altho it is a coating I think you can still see the results.
https://www.autopia.org/forums/clic...e/189604-corvette-polish-angel-cosmic-v2.html
Jay

Would this be a good hand applied glaze?
 

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Most glazes can be hand applied however just like most polishes it is much easier on the user if you use a buffer. If you go to autopia and go into the store and type in "glaze" you will find a number of different product manufactures offer them. If you check out the specific product, there should be a brief description along with a recommendation on how it is best applied.
Jay
 
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WTM75

WTM75

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Most glazes can be hand applied however just like most polishes it is much easier on the user if you use a buffer. If you go to autopia and go into the store and type in "glaze" you will find a number of different product manufactures offer them. If you check out the specific product, there should be a brief description along with a recommendation on how it is best applied.
Jay

Thank you for the information.
 

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I'm really not trying to overload you with information, i'm just trying to point out some alternatives.
Jay
 

Kinetic

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You'll get a better finish using a polisher, even a cheap Harbor Freight DA will work. A finishing polish or an AIO is very good at extracting the most gloss out of your finish but it won't remove all of the defects.
 
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WTM75

WTM75

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You'll get a better finish using a polisher, even a cheap Harbor Freight DA will work. A finishing polish or an AIO is very good at extracting the most gloss out of your finish but it won't remove all of the defects.

A polisher is in the future, but not this week. :)
 

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I know you don't have a polisher, but when you do get one I'd suggest using Menzerna Super Finish Plus (SF-3800). Menzerna's a super fine finishing polish leaves a great shine with a blue Lake country finishing polishing pad. Yes, you need a random orbital polisher (got the Griot's 6" polisher), but once you have one, polishing and sealing/waxing are much easier/faster...Ram's have a lot of real estate to cover. Menzerna also has some very good paint correction products...but there's a lot of good ones out there by a slew of manufactures. I know it sounds like an ad, but I did a lot of research to get (in my opinion) the best stuff for the $$ I wanted to spend. But it's like beer, whiskey or fishing equipment, everyone has their own preferences.

There's a great series of utube videos by Junkman (search on the name) on paint correction, polishing, sealing/waxing and Autogeek has some fantastic how-to's also.
 
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