"How To" detail videos!

[luvmybravada]

Here is a great website with nice instructional videos for any novice/ intermediate detailer. Hope you guys like it!

www.adamspolishes.com/t-videos.aspx

Maybe this could even be a sticky?


*** link location updated *** -scottydl

[95mushroom]

Cool, but they can't seem to play for more then 7 secs w/o having to buffer. Good stuff though.

[erw38]

95mushroom said:

Cool, but they can't seem to play for more then 7 secs w/o having to buffer. Good stuff though.

Works for me (no buffer problems). Good stuff.

[auroralover]

Works for me (no buffer problems). Good stuff.[/quote]

Works here too, nice info to have.....

[Aurora40]

Meguiar's also has several videos:
www.meguiars.com/video/

And general how-to:
www.meguiars.com/howtocenter/

[Aurora40]

Meguiar's How To Polish Paint video: www.bettercarcare.com/articles.php?articleId=31

I have this on VHS, and it is an excellent guide to polishing paint. I've watched it several times.

[luvmybravada]

Thanks for all the extra links. There's some good stuff out there.

Have you also heard of www.autogeek.com ? A great place with detailed info on various products, which is best, etc.

I think we need to gather these various detailing references and sticky them for people who may need the help.

[flintoid]

These are awesome, I just hit my car with Caranauba and my arm was sore for a week. Now at least I can investigate whether a polisher will speed up the process.

Meanwhile, can you tell me whether it's safe to soap and hose down the engine bay on an Aurora? Adam never really explains why some cars you can and some cars you can't.

[stickking1]

flintoid said:

These are awesome, I just hit my car with Caranauba and my arm was sore for a week. Now at least I can investigate whether a polisher will speed up the process.

Meanwhile, can you tell me whether it's safe to soap and hose down the engine bay on an Aurora? Adam never really explains why some cars you can and some cars you can't.

Personally, the wax is the only step that I prefer to do by hand. I've used plenty of liquid waxes applied by machine when I was pressed for time, but nothing quite compares to a hand application for me. If you want to make it easier and faster, I would suggest grabbing a wax that can be applied and buffed off right away...such as S100, easily obtained from any Harley dealer. They label it as motorcycle wax, but it's exactly the same as the company's "car" wax and 10 bucks cheaper. IMO, it's the best out there for the price....what is it these days, 12 bucks or so for a container? The trick with this stuff as opposed to many other carnaubas is that you apply to a small area, say 1/4 of your hood, and then buff it off right away, then move to the next section. Since it sort of breaks up the buffing job, it's a bit easier on the arm.

And as far as the engine bay, I detail mine at least 2 or 3 times a year. I don't spend a great deal of time on it and it keeps looking great all year. Here's my routine:

Before I wash the exterior, I pop open the hood and give it a quick blast with the hose (some would say to cover some of the areas of the engine, but I have stopped doing that a while ago). Now that everything is wet, I cover just about everything with a diluted spray of Castrol Super Clean, my mixture for this is about 6:1 water/Castrol. Let it sit for a few seconds, then take a wash mitt with regular car wash and give everything a quick once over. Rinse well with the hose and close the hood. Then I move on to the full wash and detail of my car, which takes 2 or 3 hours generally. Remember to have a seperate wash mitt for your engine and for the exterior of your car!

By the time that I'm done with the exterior, the engine is pretty dry. I hang a couple towels on each side of the engine bay to protect my freshly washed and waxed quarter panels and grab my trusty spray bottle of Mop 'N Glo...yup, you read right. I used to use and love Meguiar's Engine Kote for this, but they stopped making it and for the time that they had no new product, I went back to using this stuff. It's been around for years and still works fantastic....and without the sour-milk smell that Engine Kote used to have. Give everything a nice light coat and put the hood back down...go back in 10 minutes or so and give everything another light coat spraying from a different direction. Check for any areas where the Mop 'N Glo has pooled and dab it with a towel. It's white when you spray it on, but will dry clear and very shiny....but if you let it pool and dry, it'll make little white rings. That's why the light coating is important.

The work on my engine is pretty swift since it's already in pretty good shape, but you may have to repeat the wash/rinse once or twice until you like what you see. Don't try and fill the engine bay with water. :-) I never cover anything in mine and have never had a problem, but only use the water you need. By the way, Mop 'N Glo works great with wheel wells too if you're as picky as I am. Make sure to invest in a nice spray bottle. When you need a fine mist, nothing is more annoying than a spray bottle that just won't cooperate. Good luck!

[stickking1]

My engine


And a couple shots of others I have done this way.



Before and after



Don't be fooled by the extra glossy look...this stuff dries to a hard finish, so it's isn't sticky or anything like that. In fact, if anything it makes it easier to clean on subsequent details. After it's been treated, I skip the Castol part the next time I clean...Only soap and water is needed.

[Aurora40]

Looking great Brian! I need to keep up with my engine, I haven't cleaned it in over a year... I managed to score an extra gallon of Engine Kote recently, so let me know if you want some. I don't really use it much anymore, mostly just on wheel wells. The ZR-1's engine is not really suitable for the Engine Kote treatment, it's all metal and such.

I supposed cleaning an engine would give me a good excuse to try out my foam gun with some APC+ to see how that works!

[luvmybravada]

Wow, Mop and Glo. Who would have guessed. Your engine bays really look terrific. Nice tip.

[blondie]

This is the first time I have ever checked out this part of the forum... and I'm glad I did. Looks like this is going to be a good weekend

[stickking1]

luvmybravada said:

Wow, Mop and Glo. Who would have guessed. Your engine bays really look terrific. Nice tip.

Happy to help...Sorry I had to use the tiny pics, I'm about 1,000 miles away from my home computer, but still could get a hold of these ones on the web. ;D

[younghova]

How is that Adams stuff? The car he detailed in the vid looked great when he was finished.

[mysqlquery]

Wow.

I've never cleaned the engine bay, in ANY vehicle.

If I understand you correctly, you just take it to one of those quarter-powerwash setups, and spray away in there?

Do you avoid any parts (I mean, obviously, you don't AIM at the coil packs, for instance)?

Hrm. I've got a honda that's scheduled to become a cube this week.... I'll have to try it....

(Pardon my paranoia... I'd hate to do anything to hurt my second-most-prized possession... Especially since I haven't had her for a week yet...)

[Aurora40]

mysqlquery said:

Wow.

I've never cleaned the engine bay, in ANY vehicle.

aurorah.proboards47.com/index.cgi?board=Exterior&action=display&thread=1155084787