# Refined Detail - Honda S2000 Major Enhancement Detail



## Refined Detail (Nov 27, 2006)

:wave: Hi, thank you for taking the time to view another detail from Refined Detail!

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I was contacted by the owner of this Honda S2000 shortly after he had purchased it. Unhappy with the overall appearance of the car's Monte Carlo Blue paintwork which was looking generally very dull and lifeless.

Upon initial inspection, it was clear to see that despite being a low mileage car, unfortunately the previous owner didn't know how to look after a car with the paintwork pretty heavily swirled. With Honda paint being generally pretty soft, a fully tailored 2 day detail was agreed upon - a major enhancement detail, along with the engine bay, hood and interior.










A month later I was back to work on the car, and typically the weather was pretty poor!





































The engine bay was cleaned and degreased using a mild mix of all purpose cleaner, a few small areas of heavier grease were shifted with a solvent based cleaner, before all being rinsed off at low pressure via the pressure washer.

A non silicone, water based dressing was later applied to all plastics and rubber, and the excess buffed off. Painted areas were hand polished.

On to the exterior:














































Door shuts were cleaned with all purpose cleaner and rinsed out at low pressure, these were later hand polished and sealed.

Wheels next. Treated firstly with CarPro Iron X to make a start on breaking down the large amounts of contamination present, before being hit twice with non acidic wheel cleaner (car rolled forward 1/4 turn after first hit of wheel cleaner to access the part blocked by the caliper) Tyres and arches were cleaned and degreased with all purpose cleaner.



















Next, the car was snowfoamed and left to dwell for around 5 minutes (although the heavy rain didn't allow it to cling all that well)










This was also applied to the hood which wasn't too dirty - the foam was enough to clean this. It was later reproofed to aid water resistance.

Iron X bleeding along with the foam took a little while to disperse! 










Paintwork washed using the usual careful Refined Detail wash routine; 2 bucket method, grit guards, lambswool mitt and PH neutral shampoo, and rinsed.

CarPro Iron X was used again - this time on the paintwork, and one more hit to the wheels:




























Rinsed, loosely dried, and a tar & glue remover applied - the worst hit areas were the wheel arches, which unfortunately I couldn't get 100% as they had been previously 'bodged' with satin black aerosols :doublesho



















Re-rinsed, then clayed using a medium grade clay, and finally rinsed again - paintwork showing zero signs of protection now:










Misted with a quick detailer and dried with microfibre drying towels.

By this time, the weather had finally cleared up. Engine bay finalised:














































Now on to tackling the paintwork. Paint readings had been carried out during the initial inspection. In general all as to be expected, apart from a low area on the bonnet which was down to between 80 - 90 microns, indicating that it has probably seen some form of machine work there in the past. The eagle eyed of you may also noticed the soft top has been folded away and the hard top fitted - this was also to be machine polished, so for ease, was fitted to the car.

With the sun now shining, I was able to capture just some of the defects I was faced with:























































I have been trialling the Meguiars DA Microfibre system for a number of weeks now on various vehicles and been very impressed with the results, after working with the rotary a fair bit recently, I fancied a break so decided to see just what sort of levels of correction could be achieved on this S2000 with the Meguiars DA system. The following 50/50 shots should help to illustrate it!



















A few feint hologrammes present, as I was yet to refine it.

Before:










After:










Colour difference, along with depth and clarity of the paintwork hugely visible even in the shade. Right side corrected:



















and under the Brinkmann - only a few deeper RDS remaining, which is to be expected with an enhancement detail anyway tbh.



















Mirror before:










and after:










More 50/50's














































This rear quarter came up particularly well!










All correction work was completed on day 1, back for day 2, and the weather was back to its old tricks, so the start of the day was spent in the garage, all paintwork was refined (again using the Meguiars DA system), wiped down with IPA, then prepped with Zaino AIO. Of course it would be rude not to grab a couple of reflection shots after this!



















The headlights were also looking quite hazy, these were brightened up using a Meguiars DA spot pad and the finishing wax:



















3 coats of Z-FX'd Z2 was also applied whilst the car was in the garage, other finishing touches were attended to whilst this was curing: glass polished and sealed, exhausts polished and sealed, wheels sealed, tyres dressed, arches dressed, rubber seals fed, door shuts dusted and sealed etc etc.

Finally the weather cleared up again, so the car was wheeled back outside to allow me to work on the interior:





































Nothing horrendous. A thorough hoover and dust down, plastics deep cleaned and dressed with a non silicone, natural look dressing. Carpets shampooed, leather cleaned and conditioned:





































Just as this was completed, but before I was able to apply the finishing touches a heavy shower fell. Of course before I dried it off again, it would be rude not to capture the Zaino induced beadage!























































So, re-dried, followed by a final Zaino Z8 wipedown, and small areas of plastic trim dressed with a natural look dressing left the following results:


















































































The wheels do need a refurb, but they are in a considerably better state than they were prior to the detail:


















































































and of course, the seal of approval to a now far glossier, healthier looking S2000!










Thank you for looking, further information on my services can be found on my website

Rich @ Refined Detail


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## alan_mcc (Oct 28, 2008)

Stunning work.. :thumb:


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## Beau Technique (Jun 21, 2010)

Looks mustard now matey. That Meguiars microfibre system seems to be of use for sure.


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## matt_83 (Apr 28, 2009)

Great work & fantastic improvement! :thumb:


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## meraredgti (Mar 13, 2011)

so so nice - cracking job pal
david


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## -Kev- (Oct 30, 2007)

looks great now 
did Honda laquer these wheels at all? my mats S2K has the same wheels and they're in a much worser condition than those ones..


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## tonyy (Jul 26, 2008)

Looks very nice..great beading shots..


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## DMH-01 (Mar 29, 2011)

Cracking job mate.


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## Boomer (Jul 2, 2011)

great car in a fantastic colour - now with added depth. excellent work!


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## Refined Detail (Nov 27, 2006)

Thank you everybody for the kind words, much appreciated 



Beau Technique said:


> Looks mustard now matey. That Meguiars microfibre system seems to be of use for sure.


Cheers Scott  It's definitely a handy bit of kit to have in the armoury. That said, it hasn't got quite enough bite to tackle everything, and you still get numb wrists from using a DA all day :lol:



-Kev- said:


> looks great now
> did Honda laquer these wheels at all? my mats S2K has the same wheels and they're in a much worser condition than those ones..


Thanks Kev  These ones were definitely lacquered as they were all suffering from lacquer failure - the wheel pictured predominantly being the best of all 4. Always the issue with this style of wheel though unfortunately - especially when not particularly cared for over the years.


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## Stu_RD (May 1, 2011)

Cracking Result Rich!!!


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## -Kev- (Oct 30, 2007)

thanks Rich, he's having them refurbed at some point in a different colour. the cars only done about 40k miles iirc but looks like the wheels have never seen a proper clean


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## Superspec (Feb 25, 2011)

Stunning


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## Leemack (Mar 6, 2009)

Top job bud - Looks great


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## Dave KG (Feb 23, 2006)

Big improvement there, and nice to see another happy user of the DA correction system, and one of the few using the Finishing wax (which I am guessing is what you used for refinement?)... I personally prefer rotary and a finishing polish to this for refinement, but the Finishing Wax is still a good product, certainly smells nice.

Good looking results, as you say an enhancement so you'd expect deeper RDS to remain, but the finish achieved from the DA system of what is possibly soft Honda paint is very good.


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## Refined Detail (Nov 27, 2006)

Wow, thank you for all the comments and feedback! This is the most I've had on a thread of mine in quite a while!  :lol:

Dave - yes it was the finishing wax. I have read plenty of people saying they don't feel it is quite up to the job, but I personally disagree. I didn't mention it in the write up, but will now, both sides were actually originally refined with Megs 205 via the rotary at the end of day 1, but coming back on day 2, looking at it again with 'fresh eyes' I wasn't happy with the finish left, so decided to opt for the finishing wax instead, which provided a better finish 

Some of the RDS that were remaining on the car - particularly on the bonnet would have been near on impossible to remove without compromising clearcoat levels too dramatically tbh, but for an enhancement I don't think the correction levels can be sniffed at


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## 888-Dave (Jul 30, 2010)

And that... is how it's done :thumb:
The DA systems good isn't it, especially on something like a Honda. It'll never fully replace the rotary but has a firm place never the less.
That typical Zaino finish looks really nice. You must be going through Z2 by the gallon nowadays.
Another customer needing sunglasses


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## samuir1974 (May 3, 2011)

Very very nice work there mate. Cracking effort and great car. :thumb:


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## minimatt1967 (Aug 29, 2011)

Very impressive, love the 50/50 shots!


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## Demetrios72 (Jun 27, 2011)

Really nice work there matey :thumb: A sweeeeeet looking buggy.


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## Dave KG (Feb 23, 2006)

Refined Detail said:


> Wow, thank you for all the comments and feedback! This is the most I've had on a thread of mine in quite a while!  :lol:
> 
> Dave - yes it was the finishing wax. I have read plenty of people saying they don't feel it is quite up to the job, but I personally disagree. I didn't mention it in the write up, but will now, both sides were actually originally refined with Megs 205 via the rotary at the end of day 1, but coming back on day 2, looking at it again with 'fresh eyes' I wasn't happy with the finish left, so decided to opt for the finishing wax instead, which provided a better finish
> 
> Some of the RDS that were remaining on the car - particularly on the bonnet would have been near on impossible to remove without compromising clearcoat levels too dramatically tbh, but for an enhancement I don't think the correction levels can be sniffed at


Interesting that 205 on a rotary was not delivering a crystal sharp finish - what pad were you using for that? Always been one of these finishing polishes, regardless of how soft the paint is, that has absolutely shone for me, but sometimes you can get odd-balls... Key has always been very light pressure for long refining stage of the set to really maximise 205's finishing abilities.


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## Mr Face (Jan 22, 2009)

Beautiful finish and gorgeous colour. I have one to do for someone who deserves their car looking its best even though he has totally abused it for the last eight years. (the defects have to be seen to be believed and initial inspection was two years ago now :wall 

Can I ask what you did under the bonnet ? brush and cloth or PW ? which area's did you mask up and if so how ? 

Many thanks : nice post :thumb:


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## Refined Detail (Nov 27, 2006)

Thank you everybody for taking the time to read this write up and post your comments 



888-Dave said:


> And that... is how it's done :thumb:
> The DA systems good isn't it, especially on something like a Honda. It'll never fully replace the rotary but has a firm place never the less.
> That typical Zaino finish looks really nice. You must be going through Z2 by the gallon nowadays.
> Another customer needing sunglasses


Cheers Dave!  I have to admit, if we hadn't chatted about the Megs system a while back, I probably wouldn't have given it a go still yet! Agreed it will definitely not replace a rotary 100% (as yet anyway!) but certainly has a purpose in my artillery. I still don't seem to get through that many bottles of Z2 actually! Seems to be a very economical product considering!



Dave KG said:


> Interesting that 205 on a rotary was not delivering a crystal sharp finish - what pad were you using for that? Always been one of these finishing polishes, regardless of how soft the paint is, that has absolutely shone for me, but sometimes you can get odd-balls... Key has always been very light pressure for long refining stage of the set to really maximise 205's finishing abilities.


205 is my 'go to' finishing polish these days, but I have now trialled it on my own car and this S2000 after the Megs DA compound and it just doesn't seem to work quite as nicely as the Megs Finishing wax does (in my own opinion of course - but then that's what pretty much everything detailing wise is - opinion based) I was using a 3M blue pad which is what I always use with it as I am a big fan of the 3M pads 



Mr Face said:


> Beautiful finish and gorgeous colour. I have one to do for someone who deserves their car looking its best even though he has totally abused it for the last eight years. (the defects have to be seen to be believed and initial inspection was two years ago now :wall
> 
> Can I ask what you did under the bonnet ? brush and cloth or PW ? which area's did you mask up and if so how ?
> 
> Many thanks : nice post :thumb:


Thanks very much! Indeed it's a stunning colour (and in fact the owner thought it was a solid colour until mid way through the detail!) Love the way it changes from a deep blue to almost purple then bright blue depending on how the light catches it.

Engine bay was misted with APC, agitated with brushes and rinsed off at low pressure with the Kranzle. Nothing was covered up, just care taken around obvious 'danger areas' ie. fuse box, alternator, air intake etc.


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## veb (Mar 13, 2006)

Really good review of the DA system from megs, wicked turnaround and nice write up, lovely work:thumb:


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