# Seat Leon Evo - largest project on DW ever ?



## evotuning (Oct 16, 2009)

*Hello everyone

I would like to present You massive project of my own car. There are over 400 photos, so please take Your time while watching this thread  I've been owner of this car since December 2008 . Leon was always in pretty good shape, but recently I had little time and wiling to take care of it, so I neglected it a little bit. But recently I found some time to make this project, and restore my car to it's one and only right state  Here we go :

Chapter I - engine bay

Let's see, nothing serious to start with, maybe a little dust...



























































































Engine cover was removed to make better access:










Pretty clean, isn't it...




























Strong TFR was used to wash engine block:










After spraying, dirt is giving up :




























Much better 























































Under hood was washed , polished with AF Tripple and sealed with SV Autobahn :




























Swissvax Pneu was used on all trims in enigne bay :























































Engine bay done, now we are moving to interior

Chapter II - interior

A little dusty here  Fabrics have never been wet vaced, so they already show signs of dirt. Also plastics needed a bit of TLC.
































































Rear seats were taken out . I also planned to take out front ones, but it was going to rain this day, so I had to hurry and skip this :














































Trusty George was used to vet wac , along with Tersus and Valet Pro products :





































This is what has been pulled out :










Before/after :










Already better :























































Headlining before :



















and after :



















Now plastics, just a little dusty :























































They were washed with VP Citrus Pre Wash 1:20























































Steering wheel were cleaned with Swissvax Leather Cleaner and protected with Zymol Treat :




























Dirty...



















Flock were cleaned with SV Quick Interior Finish :




























Plastic face of dials was removed :










and corrected in two steps, using Scholl S17+ :










Results are clearly visible :










Plastics were treated with Gtechniq C6 :























































Pedals were treated with SV Metal Polish & SV Pneu :




























One more thing to do :










Spare wheel area washed with TFR :










Spare wheel itself was cleaned and protected with SV Autobahn & Sv Pneu :










Now it's time to do seals :




























Swissvax Seal Feed used to....well, feed them 









































































That's how finished interior looks now , :














































Chapter III - wheel arches and door shuts

Wheels were removed before this stage :



















Wheel arches before , quite a lot of dirt here. Well, it shouldn't be surprise for a daily driver :



















Washed with VP Citrus Pre Wash :










A bit better :



















Next tar remover was used to remove tar deposits :





































Wheel bolts , spacers and fronts of discs were painted to restore their look :










Removing old paint and rust :




























Much better :










Plastics in arches were treated with VP Dionysus Trim Glitz :



















Arches done, now door shuts and surroundings :














































APC and Autosmart Plus 10 were used to wash , with a little help from white vinegar to remove water spots :








































































































































Now side skirts, which were particulary bad. As we know, paint on these is pretty thin so I had to be carefull here. I used Scholl S17+ on medium pad to restore a bit of gloss.



























































































Deeper imperfections remained, but thankfully gloss returned :

On rear tailgate there were limiter which neede a bit of TLC. They were removed and cleaned, screws were painted :




























On door shuts I used GTechniq C 1.5 to protect , as it's very easy to get in tight areas :





































Plastic trims were protected with Raceglaze Color Enhance :





































Metal bits on pillars were treated with SV Metal Polish, as they already started to shown some signs of neglect :



















In the end that's how it looks :
































































Just one more thing - neglected paint on rear screen, which needed a bit of touch up :

























*


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## evotuning (Oct 16, 2009)

Chapter IV - wheels

*This one was suposed to be simple - wash, detarring, some cleaner and wax. But it came out that wheels are pretty swirled and lacking of gloss, so I decided to make machine correction on them.

First of all, washing. During this stage wheels were replaced with winter ones.










Washing with mild APC, nothing stronger wasn't needed :










Tar removal :










TFR was used to strip down tires :




























Wheels ready for further actions :



















There was plenty of paint on wheels, so I could move on to correction :










I've used Scholl S17 and Swissvax Cleaner Fluid Proffesional :



















Effects :





































I was pleased seeing this 

Where I couldn't get with machine, I ' ve used SV Cleaner Fluid Regular by hand :
































































Tires cleaned and dressed with SV Pneu :




























Wheels protected with SV Autobahn :





































Wax removed, wheels have been put on car, showing some signs of shine and depth 




























Chapter V - washing stage

Nothing to serious really :























































Roof trims were taken out , area underneath were deeply cleaned and trims were polished :




























Some prewash photos :





































Details washed with APC :























































Car was washed with AF Lather :




























Next was claying , I clay my car very often so clay didn't have much work :




























Protection pretty much stripped :










Drying :










Chapter VI - rear lights and trims

First issue with these were dead bugs, which I couln't handle with vac :










Removing :










As expected , a bit of dirt :





































Cleaned with SV CF, protected with Autobahn :









































































No ale robale przynajmniej się wyniosły, i lampy mocno przejrzały :



















These were also corrected :










Trims were done with Swissvax Nano Express & Pneu :
































































Chapter VII - paint

Last but not least - paintwork. There were some bad swirls and holograms left after recent respray, so some work were needed here to restore gloss to paint. On respray side level of correction is about 95%, on the rest of the car about 70.

Before :








































































































































As You can see, some defects are clearly visible. On cutting stage I've used Scholl S2 , S3 , Menzerna and 3M polished with variety of cutting pads.




























Bad imperfection left after respray :
































































Under door handles :



















Car Pro Eraser was used to see true level of correction :










And without this excellent Zymol duster I wouldn't handle massive amount of dust created during polishing :










Well, there were some imperfections left , the aim was to restore general gloss, not to fight with every single scratch.

Thankfully , during finishing stage and waxing I could use garage, thanks to my friend. Big thanks !










Car was washed before being pulled in, and dried using compressed air :



















For finishing stage I've used the best finish polish I'm familiar with - Swissvax Cleaner Fluid Proffesional :










First hit on rear fender :



















Nice  However, SV CF Pro didn't behave as I've used to. It dried fast, dusted a bit. In the end I've even started adding normal Cleaner Fluid, to maintain oilyness during polishing :










I switched to small pads to make pillars with yellow Flexipads pad, and this was it - perfect. CF Pro once again started working like magic :














































I made rest of car with this combination, of course with larger pad 










So here we go :







































































































































































































A little dust was settling on car, so once again duster saved the day :










And now moment I've been waiting - waxing  One layer of Swissvax Insignis V2 was applied :



















Mirrors and front bumper were protected with Autobahn :










While wax was curing, I've done tires , trims ang glass :








































































































































Now it's time to buff off the wax :




























I don't know how about You, but I can see some gloss here 
































































Let's drive outside :

















*​


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## evotuning (Oct 16, 2009)

*Quick wipedown with Swissvax Quick Finish :






















































































































Sadly, no there was no sun these day  What's more, 2 hours after there was some very heavy raining. However, I managed to take some photos later on gas station, despite car being slightly dirty :




























And yesterday...sun ! 









































































For the record 










 

At the very end a bit of comparission, between my car when I bought it, and now :










And that's it. I must say I'm pretty pleased with results , even if not everything went the way I wanted to. Also , thanks for attention for everyone how managed to get so far, hope You are not tired  Feel free to comment and ask questions *​


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## McClane (Dec 9, 2010)

Awesome mate! I don't know if its the largest ever, but certainly lots of work gone into that! A real turnaround - and not just superficial either.


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## avit88 (Mar 19, 2012)

wow awesome!


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## john2garden (Nov 16, 2006)

Immense, fantastic work!!


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## steve from wath (Dec 12, 2008)

nice post
lots of attention to detail there

cant belive it just had another dw at mine tonight ,we looking at getting the very same car sorted out
hope our results are as good as yours
this one though is on porche rims,coilovers, just needs a deep clean


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## j3ggo (Dec 7, 2011)

That's insane.


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## David Proctor (Mar 6, 2011)

Stunning job and great attention to detail.


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## Titanium Htail (Mar 24, 2012)

A fantastic job, well done you. Thanks.

John.


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## AaronGTi (Nov 2, 2010)

Superb write up, nice work :thumb:


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## Prgreer (Jul 10, 2012)

That's amazing.


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## Herby (Oct 2, 2009)

Awesome job. Brilliant post too:thumb:


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## Prgreer (Jul 10, 2012)

Amazing job


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## LittleMissTracy (May 17, 2012)

Great Job, Looking at all the pics and checkin out what you did. I forgot to drink my brew and it went cold, rear that I let a brew go to waste.
:thumb:


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## G51 NAV (Jan 14, 2007)

Mate when you clean a car, you clean a car! Did I miss the bit in the text which said how long this actually took, all in? If not, how long did it take, in your estimation?


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## evotuning (Oct 16, 2009)

Oh, I forgot about it ! About 50 hours in total, plus few more spent on doing this thread  Thanks for all comments


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## jubileebug (Jan 25, 2008)

fantastic work there!


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## Zetec-al (Feb 28, 2011)

Fantastic work mate.


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## Nally (May 30, 2012)

Spectacular. What are those little foam sticks you used on the grill ?


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## aldouk (May 6, 2012)

Excellent, I think some of the pictures in the wrong order but I'm not surprised with so many

Very nice work


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## mkaras1980 (Nov 3, 2010)

Fantastic work mate! Great effort!

Pozdrawiam!

:buffer:


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## alfajim (May 4, 2011)

i'd call that detailed.
fantastic work :thumb:


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## ITSonlyREECE (Jun 10, 2012)

Fantastic job! I can't believe how many photos there are :doublesho


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## ABC Detailing (Jun 29, 2010)

So much effort mate, congrats on the results!


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## Derekh929 (Aug 28, 2011)

Tremendous amount of work that paid of great result


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## deni2 (May 4, 2011)

Great job carried, beautiful end result :thumb:.


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## Wout_RS (Jun 13, 2012)

damn what a work you put in this car! but the result is impressive!


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## DMH-01 (Mar 29, 2011)

Great job there mate :thumb:


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## evotuning (Oct 16, 2009)

Thanks  these foam sticks are made by Valet Pro, they are sold in 5 packs


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## DetailMyCar (Apr 19, 2010)

Fantastic write-up and great to see so much dedication! The car looks 100 times better now and I'm sure it feels it to drive too 

Looks better then new!!


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## horned yo (Feb 10, 2009)

really like this. stunning work


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## toni (Oct 30, 2005)

Great write-up with fantastic results! Top work :thumb:


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## Jason123 (Feb 11, 2011)

wow nice work


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## JBirchy (Oct 9, 2010)

Amazing, i really enjoyed reading all of it. Thanks so much for sharing!


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## Marky-G-66 (May 31, 2012)

Well done mate... absolutely fantastic work:thumb:


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## cbred (May 9, 2011)

Great write up. You really do have OCD. Your car is fab, not much else to say


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## grayz (Feb 2, 2006)

Amazing dude, inspirational attention to detail!


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## Miguel Pestana (Feb 16, 2012)

fantastic job and a very nice write up aswell, the car looks fantastic :thumb:


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## lisaclio (Sep 6, 2008)

great write up, nice work


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## tonyy (Jul 26, 2008)

Fantastic work,and attention to all detail:thumb:


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## elsad-140 (Dec 27, 2011)

:thumb::thumb:fantastic job


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## Black Magic Detail (Aug 17, 2010)

nice work ,now thats clean


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## VenomUK (Oct 13, 2011)

Thats bloody amazing!! Some time and effort and not to mention detail has gone into that!! Top marks!!


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## Soul Hudson (Jul 5, 2011)

Epic work. Whats the seal feed like to work with? I'm choosing between that or Gummi Phlege.


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## evotuning (Oct 16, 2009)

It's very easy to work with, a little goes a very long way. Seals regains natural matt look  Very good product, however, also quite expensive.


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## Brammer (Mar 9, 2012)

Very impressive i wish i had the amount of products and patients to do this to both of my cars


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## s3 rav (Apr 30, 2008)

Great work that.


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## R9SH G (Mar 14, 2011)

That's a lot of detailing!


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## Ian2k (Apr 13, 2009)

Great job, worth all the effort and good write up


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## craigblues (Jul 24, 2011)

Fantastic Job!


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## Otter Smacker (Jun 19, 2012)

Brilliant work OP! That's some cleaning you've just done there:doublesho:thumb:

Car's looking fantastic!:thumb::thumb:


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## VWman (Mar 26, 2012)

Niiiiice


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## horico (Jul 17, 2010)

I knew this reminded me of something!

















Good work, lots of effort put in and a great result!


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## cheffi (Apr 12, 2008)

very nice work!


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## tontsy (Apr 19, 2012)

seriously impressive!

cheers for the good read, and the flake has popped to an insane level.


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## Keir (Aug 31, 2010)

Nice work, fantastic attention to detail.


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## B-mah (Oct 4, 2011)

Fantastic piece of work there mate. :thumb:


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## evotuning (Oct 16, 2009)

> I knew this reminded me of something!


Thanks for all positivie feedback and a bit of laugh in the morning


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## Demetrios (May 8, 2011)

Fantastic job! Great write up, many pictures for each step and lovely finish. :thumb:


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## bazz (May 15, 2007)

fantasic wright up fella enjoyed reading that.
and how much better does it look after a good bit of tlc and the flake pop just wow.
top job


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## david_pupu (Sep 19, 2011)

great job, very detail


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## FiestaDan (Jul 10, 2012)

totally stunning job mate


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## fethead (May 12, 2007)

The best write up I have ever read. Congrats at your perseverance, attention to detail and the format. Awesome work.


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