H2

I was amazed at the look of Shane's red 928 after he clay-barred it. Even w/o wax it looks like it was freshly painted. What about using clay bar on acid rain damage or fading paint, or micro scratches....just how good is a clay bar treatment? How much time to allow for a complete car? Looks like a warm weather job too. My garage is not heated. What's your experience? (in addition to good music).

Harvey

Shane

Harvey make sure to get fine grade or at most medium grade clay bar, other wise you end up removing too much paint. Give yourself a couple of hours at least. A bucket of soapy water and a six pack. I used Mothers brand clay bar as that was what was available at Walmart. Take your time and you don't have to scrub, just work it over the surface of the car, and you can feel the clay removing the contaminents. Don't drop the bar on the ground as it will pick up a lot of dirt. BTDT Fold the bar over regularly as it gets dirty fast on what you would think is a clean car. When your done with the clay give the car another thorough wash and then apply your favorite wax. Then pull out the camera and start taking pics

H2

Dang Shane...I can't believe your paint! Has that car been a garage queen forever?

Harvey

AO

Clay bars are good for surface contaminants that normal washing doesn't always get off like small specs of tar, brid crap, etc. If you have staining on your paint (acid rain, bird crap stains), it can help remove some of it, but I've found the only real way to fix that is through wet sanding. Clay bars usually won't help with faded paint/thin paint - only new paint. One thing that is truly cool about clay bars is the baby smooth finish you'll have afterwards... simply remakable.

And as Shane said, if you drop it on the ground, it will pick up lots of dirt - better to throw it away at that point than risk the possibility of a grain of sand or dirt putting scratches in your car.

Shane

No far from it Harvey. I bought that car from a college kid who never knew what a car cover and a garage was. It sat outside for the two + years he owned it and it showed. Hell I'm still washing pine needles out from under the spoiler even after owning the car since early 2003. Just needed to be rescued and given lots of TLC.

michaelathome

Over the past two weeks I have been working on the 88 S4 and last night I decided to take a few pictures. This was after about 10 or so hours with an orbital polisher 3M fine cut polish and Maguiars gold. I will be picking up a 3 stage system to try to get rid of more of the hairline scratches but right now I am pretty happy with the outcome.

Now if all the panels were the same color I would be happy

Michael

IcemanG17

Michael
Looking good.....the color fading on the bumpers is quite common...I have seen some 944's (also in guards red) where the front bumper is almost pure orange...luckily mine where only lightly oxidized and have been brought back to nearly a 100% match with everything else....click on the link in my sig to see a pic

I also use the mothers clay bar...it seems to be a very mild clay bar, since it doesn't pull any paint on my car.

bd0nalds0n

Are the solid colors on 928s single stage? If not, why would anyone expect to pull paint, unless they went thorough the clearcoat first?

hinchcliffe

Red Porsche's have no clear coat. Wax your car once and notice how Red your rag turns.

IcemanG17

From what I understand, most of the base colors (non metallic) paints are base color only....at least Guards Red, Alpine? White and I think Dunkel Blau is too? The newer cars are all clearcoated

michaelathome

Thanks Brian,

My '88 has seen several body shops in it's life prior to my buying it from Fishey. I am sure that it was bought from it PO in NO like that. I think the only original paint left on it is the passenger side rear quarter. None of the reds are the same and I know that it is just due to age etc. I will live with the color differences for now, I am just really trying to get it to shine again. I am about 75% of the way there.

I hadn't used a clay bar before owning the VW. The Mothers bar worked wonders on the build up of tar and other "stuff" that was on it when I got it. Once we see some nice weather I will be breaking it out again I am sure.

Michael

Bill Ball

My 89 GP White is single stage. In some years it appears at least some of the solid colors were clearcoated. It's easy to tell from just a little polishing whether you have clearcoat.

dr bob

I've been using the clay bar now for more than a few years, and have a few thoughts to share:

-- The purpoise of the clay bar is to remove surface contaminants only. This is stuff that sticks up from the paint, like overspray from nearby painting, perhaps tree sap, road tar, etc.

-- If you have noticeable tar or tree sap, use a chemical solvent cleaner first, so the clay will not get fouled by the sticky stuff.

-- Most clay treatments recommend that you use one of their products as a lubricant. Meguiars, for instance, says to use their 'Final Inspection' product with their clay. Expensive! I make a thick foamy wash with some Dawn dishwashing detergent instead. It helps dissolve any remaining wax, tar, etc without fouling the clay.

-- The clay is used with only light fingertip pressure. Form the clay into a little pancake, and glide it over the paint on a film of detergent. If the clay starts to drag on the paint, you are pressing too hard or your lubricant film is going away.

-- Like any polishing effort, move the clay front-to-back on the car in a straight-line motion. "Polishing" with a circular motion risks leaving circular scratches, especially if you are pressing too hard. Remember that the clay is not a polish, so don't try to make it do the job of a polish.

-- As others mention, any stains or contamination that's found it's way into the paint will need to be removed with another method. The clay only tajes off the stuff that sticks up from the otherwise-smooth paint surface.


I can 'clay' the car in less than 10 minutes, as part of the clean-and-wax process. I wash the car first, then go at it with the clay, wash again to remove all traces of the detergent, dry, and inspect. Only with all the wax and surface contamination removed can you evaluate paint condition, and decide how many steps it will take to restore the shine. FWIW, my black car looks the best after the paint cleaner, polish, and glaze steps. Adding wax actually dulls the reflection slightly. Wax does provide some very essential mechanical protection for cars that are driven, and it's a must for cars that are exposed to sunlight. If my car was never exposed to sun or the SoCal 'atmosphere', I'd seriously consider waxing it only when it was to be driven.


I buy the big jar of Meguiars 'Detailers Overspray Clay" at the auto paint supply store. It's way cheaper getting it that way, compared to most retail packages that have just a little clay, and force you to buy a spray bottle of their lubricant. I haven't priced the Mothers package at Wal-Mart yet. They are typically way cheap on what they carry, besides the convenience factor.


HTH!

docmirror

'87 and up Guards red is two stage. Base coat clear coat. I don't know about 86.5 and below.

Depending on the quality of the original paint clear coating, clay bar is a bad plan. The thickness of the clear is about 3-4 mils on early paint jobs from most mfg in the mid '80s, I don't know what Porsche's specs were. Early clear coat materials were hard to apply correctly, and often sagged, and ran with very small changes in temp and humidity. Many clear coats are differing thickness on different areas of the car, with the top getting a fairly thick coat, and any vertical surfaces (fenders) getting much less. Even on so-called machine painted cars this is true, because the robot was scheduled to move the arm faster on the vertical paint swipes.

So, that fact, plus the added cost of the clear coat led Ford and Toyota, GM and several others to under spray the cars. That's why many of them have flaking, or bubbled clear coat. Adding too much clear resulted in the orange-peel surface finish we've all seen on '90s cars. They just didn't get it right for a while.

Anyway, using a clay bar makes the paint shine by removing a thin layer of paint on a non-clear coated car. On a clear coated car, it'll help for a while by removing the top layer of clear, and also removing all the old wax, mild atpmospheric acids, haze, dirt, and oils that accumulate. The more you use it, the more clear you will remove, until you go right through the clear and into the color coat. You can tell you are removing clear coat if you have a sensitive nose, and you smell a kind of sweet, cotton candy smell. You may also see a small amount of white, toothpaste like powder come off. That's a byproduct of the ketones and esters used in the catalyst stage of the coating being evacuated by your clay bar.....

Doc

Dennis K

I agree w/ Dr. Bob here. The clay bar by itself is not going to make the paint shiny or new-looking. It's purpose is to pull the overspray & contaminants from the surface of the paint. It's part of the paint cleaning process. After that, polishing and glazing will remove the light scratching and swirl marks and make the paint really gleam.