# Red 2011 Mercedes SLK detail



## OldskoolRS (May 5, 2011)

I had hoped to start a thread showing the progress as I work my way round a new (to us) SLK, but I've been pressed into doing some work early due to a careless window cleaner...

Somehow he managed to drag his hose across the front wing/windscreen pillar and bonnet leaving scuff marks, dirty water and a line of scratches on the wing edge/pillar.

I didn't want to be at the mercy of his insurers and some smart repairer blowing it over, so I decided to try a small area on the pillar which looked the worst. I figured that if it wasn't sucessful then I'd leave the rest of the damage for his insurers to see (and then push for a respray at the place of my choice).

I used P2500 grade with some Born to be mild shampoo to lubricate it. Then went over it with a Hexlogic orange pad using an older Menzerna polish (medium cut, not sure what the current equivalent is). I haven't put any glaze or wax on top of this area, but the plan is to DA the whole car and then use Poorboys Blackhole and Bilt Hamber Double Speed Wax as an LSP.

It came out well and at least I know that the various small marks that were on the car when we bought it will come out as nothing is as deep as these were.

I haven't got a photobucket account anymore, so for now I'll have to attach files, but hope you like them. :thumb:

I've already done some work on the inside as it was an ex-smokers car (amazingly we missed this as it wasn't too strong and the roof had been down when we viewed it). I used Airvidox and lots of cleaning to get rid of the last traces of smell, including changing the cabin filter.


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## mgtf (Feb 20, 2015)

Good work!

Have u done the rest of the car


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## OldskoolRS (May 5, 2011)

Only the interior, but that was more smell than anything I could photograph...I was waiting for better weather but I wanted to make sure this damage could be polished out.

I'll add more photos once I get into it properly; there are plenty of swirls and a limited number of light scuffs which should polish out based on the damage I'd corrected above.

I'm looking into photo hosting sites since Photobucket changed from being free as I guess it's better to have the photos embedded into the post. If anyone has a recommendation other than Flickr which I couldn't seem to register on as I already have a Yahoo mail account and got stuck in a loop trying to set it up.

EDIT: Adding the embedded photos from the first post:

Initial damage to windscreen pillar:









Wet sanded:









Then DA polished with Orange Hexlogic pad and medium grade Menzerna polish:


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## Fentum (May 1, 2017)

Nice work:thumb:!

I have a new (to us) Silver Blue SLK to work on shortly. The paint quality seems quite good.

BTW try imgur for hosting instead. It's free and relatively painless.


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## OldskoolRS (May 5, 2011)

Thanks for that Fentum (I've been reading and enjoying your E-type thread recently :thumb.

Let's see how these go with Imgur then. This was the treatment with Airvidox to get rid of the cigarette smell. It starts off with a wisp of 'smoke' from the pot:










Then after 5-10 minutes it became more of a 'fog':










Left it like this for 4 hours, then turned on the engine and air con to allow it to recirculate through the air con. However, since it's a new car to me I didn't set the controls properly at first so it didn't recirculate until I'd realised about 10 minutes later. However, once the chlorine smell went after about 5 days the smoke smell is much less in the car, only really noticeable after the car has been parked up for a few days. We make sure the top is down whenever we can which is helping get rid of the last traces of cigarette smell.


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## OldskoolRS (May 5, 2011)

Finally had chance to start doing some more detailing on this car. I've made a start on the main bodywork, but don't have access to those pictures on this laptop, so I'll skip to the work I did yesterday on the wheels and all 4 wheel arches.

The wheels were in pretty good shape and I suspect that they were refinished just before we bought the car due to the lack of bedded in dirt and some very minor defects under the lacquer on the back of some wheels.

I used Bilt Hamber Korrosol to lift the brake dust and grime, left to dwell while I cleaned the wheel arch it came from, then rinsed off, agitated with a microfibre cloth. As I already had some Poorboys wheel sealant I used that. It's probably not 'in vogue' on here these days, but it worked well on my previous car so I may as well use it up.

During Korrosol treatment:










In the meantime I used some diluted BH Surfex on the wheel arch area, agitated with a soft brush, then rinsed off. No before shots I'm afraid, but I've previously aimed my snow foam under the arches and pressure washed, so they weren't too bad to start with. This is one of the rear arches:










I dried the wheel off and applied the PB wheel sealant, then buffed off a little while later:










Cleaned up the wheel bolts to remove surface rust and blacken them up again, then refitted the wheel. I didn't have any tyre dressing as such, so just used some old 'Armour All' low sheen trim dressing instead, which looks good, but probably won't last, so I need to get a new bottle of something.

This picture was taken after we'd been out for a drive, so please excuse any slight signs of dust if you zoom in. Not bad reflections on the rear wing, though this has only had some AG rapid detailer applied to it waiting for me to get round to machine polishing it.










I've started some more wet sanding of small marks and given the bonnet and front wings an initial going over, but had to resort to my old rotary polisher to do much to the (very hard) paint. I'm investigating getting some Meguiars DA microfibre pads and compound to try out with my DAS 6 as it's easier to control (and not as hard on my back as the heavy rotary).


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## Andyblue (Jun 20, 2017)

Looking good


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## OldskoolRS (May 5, 2011)

This is from last Friday, after I did some localised wet sanding of a few scratches on the bonnet and grille area, followed by my rotary with some Menzerna FG500. I polished the bonnet, grille and front wings, refined with my DA and a yellow Hexlogic pad and more Menzerna polish of a finer grade.

I gave the front end a coat of Wet Glaze 2.0 and then sealed with some Bilt Hamber Double Speed Wax. Pretty pleased with the result, just need to work round the car panel by panel over the next few weeks.

Closer shot of the bonnet and OS front wing:









Nearside angle of the whole car:


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## Ruairi (Mar 30, 2017)

Beautiful


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## OldskoolRS (May 5, 2011)

After (far too much) research I've ordered some Meguiars DA microfibre compound and microfibre pads so I can use my DA rather than my heavy rotary as I work round the rest of the car. The paint is so hard that my DA was barely touching some swirls, let alone some of the wet sanding marks I made getting a few scratches out.

I'll try to take better before and after shots with my DSLR rather than my iPhone as the previous ones. There are still a couple of areas in the middle of the bonnet that I'm not happy with, so I'll go over them again too.

I'm sure there are other options for compound/polish to use, but after watching so many different videos I figured I had to pick one and try it...no doubt someone will tell me I should have bought 'X', but I had to make a choice otherwise I'd never order anything.


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## Guest (May 11, 2018)

"I figured that if it wasn't sucessful then I'd leave the rest of the damage for his insurers to see (and then push for a respray at the place of my choice)."

No wonder insurance premiums are so high.Would you like it if someone expected a full respray because you had accidentally scratched one small area?


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## OldskoolRS (May 5, 2011)

aka.eric said:


> "I figured that if it wasn't sucessful then I'd leave the rest of the damage for his insurers to see (and then push for a respray at the place of my choice)."
> 
> No wonder insurance premiums are so high.Would you like it if someone expected a full respray because you had accidentally scratched one small area?


I didn't say I expected a *full* respray, just that I would have expected the damaged to have been resprayed at the place of my choice. It was the *windscreen pillar*, the edge of the *front wing* and I've since found other *areas on the bonnet* that were damaged by his carelessness, so not just 'one small area'. I also didn't want to end up having a substandard 'smart' repair done that would leave me with problems in the future, so I would have pushed for a proper respray of the affected panels if I hadn't been able to polish out the damage. As it is I'm left with thinner paint and a potential for issues in future, so please don't paint ME as the bad guy. 

If I was some kind of insurance scam person then I wouldn't have even attempted to wet sand and polish out the damage that SOMEONE ELSE CAUSED.  I don't think it's unreasonable to expect it to be put right since the car was parked on my own drive and only the stupidity of the cleaner's apprentice dragging a grit covered hose across the car caused it. As it was the cleaner himself was very grateful that I'd made the effort to sort it out myself and we came to an agreement about the charges for cleaning our windows over the next few visits.

FWIW It was his business insurance rather than motor insurance, so it wouldn't have had a direct impact on your car insurance premiums either.


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## OldskoolRS (May 5, 2011)

Moving on...

I ordered some Meguiars DA microfibre correction compound and some microfibre pads so I could have a better go at removing the various swirls and any sanding marks from localised wet sanding. This arrived today, so I got on with the drivers door, rear wing, back bumper/numberplate area and the roof pillars on the driver's side.

I did a little localised wet sanding to remove some small scratches and some fingernail marks under the door handle. Then went over it with the Meguiars compound, followed by Menezerna finishing polish and a yellow hex pad. The finish is now really clear (didn't really need to do the finishing polish stage as I couldn't really see any further improvement).

I gave it a coat of Bilt Hamber DSW to protect my work so far and will continue over the next few days working round the rest of the car. I'm so pleased with the improved finish, that I will go over the bonnet and front wings again as they don't look as good as the bits I've done today, especially in bright sun.

(I'll add the photos later as I can't get to Imageshack on this laptop).


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## OldskoolRS (May 5, 2011)

Photos of today's polishing:
Close up of the rear OS wing after two stage polishing and a coat of DSW:









Rear wing and driver's door:









Full view of OS, front wing previously done with Menzerna, so needs redoing with this new combo:









Rear numberplate area close up:









Rear bumper area:


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## OldskoolRS (May 5, 2011)

Had another session today. I got the boot lid and the whole nearside 2 stage polished with Meguiars DA microfibre compound and Merzerna finishing polish, followed by 2 coats of DSW. I still have a few areas that I want to go back to on the boot lid and bonnet, but it's mostly there. This was about 6 hours work today, in addition to about 5 hours yesterday and 5 hours last Friday. I'm not a Pro, so I guess it will take me a bit longer, especially by the time I've gone back to redo those other bits.

I also need to 2 stage the roof panel (currently just had some Wet Glaze 2.0 and a coat of DSW for now). At least it can be convieniently polished by opening the boot when the roof is down. 

In parallel with this polishing I had also given the car a second 'Airvidox' treatment due to my mistake with the air con last time. I made sure that the gas went through the heating/cooling properly and I left the 'pot' in the car for 24 hours as well. Currently just smells faintly of 'swiming pool', so it'll take a few days to see if I've finally got rid of the last trace of cigarette smoke: Given the choice I wouldn't buy an ex-smokers car again...

This is typical of the whole car, swirls caused by (I guess) an automatic car wash as the paint is so hard it must have taken a concerted effort to get the paint to this state. 










To be honest, a coat of Wet Glaze 2.0 and some DSW hides a lot of this, but obviously my aim was to correct as much of this as possible, so that it looks good even in direct sunlight.

The car is in the shade in this shot, but I've pretty much achieved my aim down the whole nearside now when in full sun:










Also, just remembered that I haven't shown any underbonnet shots: It was pretty clean anyway, but I gave it a dose of BH Surfex a while ago and a wipe over with some AG quick detailing spray so it looks really clean now. I'll take some photos another day.


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## streaky (Dec 2, 2006)

Nice to see the megs pads working well for you


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## OldskoolRS (May 5, 2011)

Got chance to DA polish the roof today, interupted with a downpour...My Meguiars DA microfibre pad is getting a bit worn (the foam is coming away from the microfibre partly just fair wear and tear, but possibly due to me using it in the heat last week made it fail early.

I found a brand new green hex pad, so I used this after a quick attempt with the microfibre DA compound. I used some Menzerna FG500 with the green pad, though it made quite a bit of white dust, so maybe I didn't prime the pad properly.  I gave it a final going over (after the downpour) with some Menzerna finishing polish on a yellow hex pad, then a coat of BH DSW.

I'm really pleased with the end result: I spent about 1.5 hours doing this relatively small panel, which had a number of swirls and a few light scratches. These have all gone bar one deeper scratch, which is very much reduced. I think the extra stage with the FG500 and green hex pad helped, so I think I'll go back over the boot lid and bonnet with this combo at some point as there are a few areas I'm not 100% happy with.

The sides of the car are good, apart from some scratches under the door handle, but I'll go back to them as I now have some foam cone polishing tips to try out.

I rinsed off the white dust from the FG500 after applying some DSW, so this is my first attempt at beading shots.

The Roof done today:










The bonnet which has had 2 coats of DSW after a 2 stage polish last week, of course still beading nicely:


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## OldskoolRS (May 5, 2011)

I didn't want to spoil Dode's disc and caliper thread, so I thought it better to delete my post and ask for opinions on my own thread:

I want to clean up and paint the brake calipers and hubs on this car. I was thinking I'd do the calipers in red to match the car, but seeing some replies on Dode's thread makes me think I'd be commiting some fashion faux pas. 

I haven't got a decent picture of the wheels/arches now they've all been removed and properly cleaned/sealed, so this is one from the original sale advert (the disc looks much better now the car has been driven, plus new wheel centre caps fitted):










So...red caliper or silver/grey?


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## rlmccarty2000 (May 31, 2017)

Silver please.


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## OldskoolRS (May 5, 2011)

I'd previously used BH Surfex in the engine bay when I was doing the wheelarches a few weeks back. Today I had a bit of a wipe around and treated the plastics to some Armourall matte finish and buffed up the areas of red paint with some QD spray:



















I also treated the roof rubbers with some Gummi Pfedge before fully lowering the roof. Seems a shame to hide my nicely polished roof panel in the boot, but it looks good. 










Of course I've already had the old 'you'll polish the paint off it' and 'you'll make it rain' (well I did yesterday ) comments from the neighbours...


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## streaky (Dec 2, 2006)

I think a nice grey would look a little bit different for your callipers


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## OldskoolRS (May 5, 2011)

I had a bit of time today, so I intended just to do a couple of small bits; polish the exhaust tips and have a better clean/polish around the front spoiler and grille(s).

Having done these bits I noticed some scratches/marks on the NS front wing that the bright sunlight showed up, so I thought I'd have a little go at them again. Since my microfibre pad is worn out, I used a 3" hard white foam compounding spot pad instead with the Meguiars compound. This worked really well at just doing the areas where there were marks (and of course I kept finding other ones that weren't a obvious, so it went on). I then went back over the whole wing with PF2500 polish and a softer pad to finish it off and a coat of DSW...it's now like glass and has the deepest shine I've ever managed, even looking good in full sun. I went back to the boot lid and did a small section on that as I'd spotted some marks under the petrol station floodlights. I've only done a part of the boot lid, but this is getting much better too. Just need to find time to do the rest of it.

I'm really pleased with how this has turned out now.

Front wing using the flash on my iPhone:









Same view flash off. Previously there were some lines across from the point where the street light is reflecting in this shot...completely gone. A slightly deeper scratch on the wheelarch just about where the reflected car's wing mirror is has been massively reduced and can't really be seen in this shot now.









Further back flash off:


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