Clay bar or polish?

[jamiemce]

Bought a milano red DC2 at the weekend and the paint is starting to fade slightly and has a lot of swirls.
What would give the best results in beggining to restore the paint, clay bar or polish? Then a wax to finish.

Cheers, Jamie

 

[^Joe]

Clay bar doesn't restore the paint, it lifts embedded contanimants off the paint. Use the clay bar, then polish it. then finish it off with a sealant or wax.

 

[jamiemce]

Ok thanks, I'll have a busy Saturday then!

 

[Allen_]

My mate showed me a clay cloth on the weekend.

Said it works just as well but speeds the job right up.

http://www.theclayclothcompany.co.uk

 

[jamiemce]

My mate showed me a clay cloth on the weekend.

Said it works just as well but speeds the job right up.

http://www.theclayclothcompany.co.uk

Never heard of those before. Watched the video on the site looks pretty good.

I've just bought T-cut clay, polish and wax there so might give that clay cloth a go next time

 

[Shifty]

T-Cut is a heavy hitter man, and modern cars don't have as much paint on them as they did in the old days. Use with caution. Quite often people complain after using t cut that the paint fades again fast. It just removes too much. If I were you I'd get stuck in with some meguiars or autoglym or other reputable brand products designed for 'paint restoration' or 'paint cleaning', or 'compounding', then go again with polish. Then ideally get the wax on top to protect your lovely new finish.

 

[Markyh91R]

If you have a DA polisher use menzerna polish to bring it back then seal it with wax or synthetic sealer would be better. If your doing by hand pick up some meguairs color restore!

 

[celica]

Clay bar first
polish
wax

 

[jimbothemagnificent]

I've recently used Tcut colour restorer on my EP3, it's done a great job of clearing up the swirls and light scratches. As Shifty said USE WITH CAUTION. I only used it because mine was in a bad way, I don't expect to be selling it anytime soon and it's not worth much anyway. It's great on NHB, I don't know about Milano.

My spring clean:

Wash
Megs clay with quick detailer
Tcut very, very gently!
Autoglym polish
Two coats of Mer wax

 

[celica]

T cut has colour fillers I think

 

[jamiemce]

Clay, polish and waxed at the weekend. Pretty pleased with the results! Never got rid of much pink colour but took out a lot of the swirls in the paint so I'm happy enough ...

 

[^Joe]

As with many of the milano reds... the paint has faded UNDER the clearcoat, so that will never go through polishing

Looks good though.

Nice evo

 

[jamiemce]

Ah ok I never thought about that. It's not mine it's my girlfriends dads I'm 21 so bit young for an evo!

 

[scruffy_]

As with many of the milano reds... the paint has faded UNDER the clearcoat, so that will never go through polishing

Looks good though.

Nice evo

Any red car really, the pigment in the paint is very prone to bleaching and there's little you can do save for a respray. Plus it's a bitch to match, so you might as well do the whole car whilst you're at it.