any body do car body prep

[jellybaby]

I have a black PT cruiser thats covered in scratches bloody cats. T-cut just aint good enough so was thinking of the polishing mop thingys pros use. Does anybody on here do this and know a roun about price or where i can hire the kit from.

[gregster]

Hiya mate...
You can by a half reasonable mop for not a lot of dosh...the cheaper ones wouldnt put up with everyday bodyshop use but I have seen em for 30-40quid when on promotion....
Probably better to buy your own and then you have got it for good, wont be cheap to hire I wouldnt think...
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/CAR-POLISHER-SANDER-SOFT-START-6-SPEED-FREE-KIT_W0QQitemZ330384675020QQcmdZViewItemQQptZUK_Body_Shop_Supplies_Paint?hash=item4cec7610cc

I would recommend the farecle G-mop system for the pads and foams...always give good results...be very careful not to pick any grit up in the mop head or you will wreck the paint...washing the car first is a good idea to get rid of anything gritty off the paintwork...
Mopping compound, use farecle G3....keep it wet, squirty bottle with water in is useful...and watch out for edges and swages in the body as you will cut through to primer real quick...Try and wash off the splatters as you go...G3 dries like concrete on a sunny day...

Finish using a machine glaze to get rid of any swirl marks...the 3m glazes are good and give nice results...


THEN WAX IT STRAIGHT AWAY to give it some protection, after washing off the splatters..or it will fade in days...

Would say you can have mine....i rarely ever need to mop anything after painting it with the products available now..
but it is handy bringing laquer back after its been knocked back after burying metalflake!

Hope this helps mate...

Gregster

[jason]

That is cheap, i normally hire one cost about the same to by one
I think i am going to get one after christmas
Then all you need is a good cutting paste and good polish be careful not to cut it to much .

[jellybaby]

sounds like a lot of work and the fact i have issues with seeing a job through too the end. may be worth the extra cost paying a shop at least they will finish the job

[gregster]

It aint too bad to do mate...will take about an hour all in I reckon...
That kit on ebay comes with the pads so all you need is that and G3, machine glaze (you can do without this, but on dark paint it might look swirly if you look down the panels if you dont...most people wouldnt notice though...) a squirty bottle and some wax polish for after...

First job will be dear as need to buy all the materials...but that will be enough to do loads of cars, or last you ages...

They are a handy bit of kit to have...have made a few quid myself over the years simply buying faded red (pink!) cars and then mopping them up and reselling them for a profit!..

[jellybaby]

whats this machine glaze stuff then

[gregster]

[jellybaby]

ah so with the pads then there 3 colours is that different grades then. So i give car a really good wash get rid of any grit then use the mop and paste with plenty of water and dont keep it in one place too long. Also make sure i keep washing splatters off. then do i use this machine glaze on a mop or cloth.

[gregster]

You use the machine glaze on the mop, but using a soft foam pad instead of the hard(ish) mop pads that you will use for cutting...
You can machine glaze by hand, but its hard work as the product is designed to use with a machine that does 1/2hrs elbow grease in 2mins!

The three grades and colours of mob pads are for different paint types primarily...celly uses a softer pad than 2k which needs hitting harder to cut back..
Normally ..
Blue is for celly and acrylics...
white is for 2k solids and clears (like your car)
red is for final finishing and is soft, so you could use this with a glaze, but I prefer foams...

[jellybaby]

so the ebay kit come with everything i need then really apart from the cutting compound and glaze already got wax and squirty botles

[Grim_reaper]

[gregster]

Got agree grim-reaper that the 3m product is better than g3...but was looking at the cost factor that meant trying to do this as cheap as poss...
G3 is cheaper, is available in small quanities in tubes, and I would say more widely available...which was why I recommended it...
I use both products, g3 i tend to use for knocking back metalflaked paint when doing a total repaint so mess doesnt matter, following wet flatting and g6...
the 3m fast cut is far better when doing localised repairs as you dont smother the rest of the car that you are not touching...saving you a cleaning up job..

[MG Autos (Mark)]

Have one of the polishing mops that Gregster's talking about myself and have to say, it's a superb bit of kit for the money.

The following is not recomended, however when I was a bit strapped for cash recently and couldn't afford the 3m cutting compound I used normal T-cut diluted with a bit of water and then some cheap liquid polish to finish. Was no where near as a good a finish as the 3m products but still smarted the car up and removed the majority of the scratch's that I'd caused to my old SWB whilst off roading....

[rancidrich]

I use G10 alot (its finer than G3) and then several coats of Mer polish afterwards (best polish around i think but not cheap)and its all done by hand as i have a habit of "burning" the paint when using polishing machines
I have a polisher but no mop heads for it if any one wants it

[jason]

I used 3m on mine yesterday to get the green lane scratches out i did it by hand good stuff then followed by one coat of good polish (Turtle wax platinum rang) and one coat of high gloss comes up really good