I had this '01 in for some finish work and strictly finish work- just the exterior paint. It was in desperate need of attention, with alot of swirls, webs and a few scuffs and major scratches (all of which i was able to eradicate successfully). It's got a star shield kit on it so i had to take some extra steps there to work with that. I don't have any really solid pics of the finish before or after as i was on a truncated time table, but i plan on taking some when the car comes back for the rest of the work. The basics were - dish soap wash, clay with megs instant detailer, cut it with optimum compound, initially using orange but ended up both 4" and 5.5" yellow pads on some of the more abused surfaces to really get the correction i needed. I then used an orange pad and some optimum poli-seal (love this stuff!) to refine the compounded surface and get the sealing started, washed with my normal eagle soap and warm water, and then applied one coat of opti-seal to finish the job. he claims it is absolutely the best the car has ever looked- he got it a few years back with 2500 miles. it is stunning, i must admint. he's scheduled for the rest of the job this week, which will entail interior, correcting the wheels, doing the tires and wells, and engine bay clean up. i want to remove the wheels but my powerclean and some coaxing with some brushes cleaned the inner wheel area very well so he'll get a break there...

 

My goal is to work on at least one $100k+ car by the end of this year. Way to go builthatch!!! You still got the Mazdaspeed3? No more solvent pop I presume lol?

 

Nice! Cant wait to do my first true exotic! :D

 

lol...good memory dude. nah, it's still there. they did redo it at that time, but they didn't take the base down enough so there is slight residual divits in the base. the actual clear isn't affected though this time. it's just the base. it's pretty hard to see, and it's in a very few select spots. they also didn't refine (sand) the skim coat and primer over the OE waves toward the back of the sheetmetal with a fine enough grit, so you can see the scratches in certain light. it's hard to see because the clear is perfect above it. it's something that only a very seasoned person would see, or someone like me who has studied it under my garage lights countless times, but you know....that place screwed me SO royally, and i paid cash. i am tired of chasing people down for ripping me off, so i figured i'm just going to leave it, as i have, because it looks good compared to even some factory finishes, OR if i even keep the ms3 for a while i'll just have a person i really trust redo the roof the right way. i have a long time friend who was a rep for basf but now reps ppg and is a FANTASTIC painter. the reason i didn't go to him initially was because he's rather far away, but at this point, if i make the investment, considering what i went though, it will be well worth it to get the **** done right. i'm going to jinx myself saying this, but i've had my car almost a year at this point and it's practically perfect- i mean, i can count the repaired slight chips on one hand, so that makes me even more pissed about the roof.

re: the ferrari, i decided to take the high road here with my aspiring side business plans. i am going to only do high end ****. these uber corrective detail sessions are very exhausting, and to find someone to pay 35+ an hour will be hard unless we are talking about a car that is over 50k, atleast around here. i live in a resort area that has a decent amount of exotics, especially in the summer, so if i can do one or two a week come spring, and one every other week now, i can supplement my income pretty well while still having fun detailing and leaving enough time for the other **** i do in my life that means so much to me.

plus it's fun to see the reaction of the people in my middle class neighborhood when something like a 360 or gallardo is parked in my driveway and/or in my garage all day.

 

Thats always the best! You wouldnt believe the looks i got even with a NSX in the garage! Mind you it was red and probably LOOKED like a ferrari! What is this solvent pop your speaking of?

 

solvent pop is a painting thing- my understanding is it occurs when the painter doesn't allow the paint to fully evap all of its solvents before covering it with add'l coats and the clear, so what happens is the solvent, esp when baking and/or curing, will sort-of bubble up and cause little baby teeny weeny bubbles in groups under the clear coat. i had this all happen because i tried a DIY chip repair on my roof earlier in the year and ended up wet sanding through the clear, so i had to have the whole dang thing refinished. then, the shop ended up denting my roof and causing this pop condition. they didn't accept responsibility for the dent, but offered to repair it and correct the pop. the problem was, the mazda3 wagon/ ms3 has waves on each side of the roof toward the rear in factory form. it's easy to see why when you look at the sheetmetal and how it's formed. anyway, they told me that the dent i accused them of making (they did it, trust me) could not be properly fixed without addressing the factory waves because of the proximity to the factory waves. i checked with a few people and they confirmed this theory, so i ended up having them take the dent out and take out the waves when they refinished the roof the second time.

a total mess. the whole thing ended up costing me, i dunno, over 1k cash when it was all said and done and it was still not done right. i had to get new roof rails because they fvcked up the areas going into the gutter area, i had to rent a car twice because i didn't have my montero at the time for a 3rd car....

the guy was such an arrogant *****, and the worst part about it is he has a monopoly on my area because he has no other competition, really. i always knew he was a **********, ever since i was a teen and smoked him out of the tolls with my juiced y7...he was driving his nsx. he refuted the notion that i smoked him and lied to everyone saying it never happened...this was 10 years ago. i should have known better when i had a friend refer me to him because he paints all of his race cars. i thought i couldn't go wrong with the recommendation but man- was i wrong. not too long before this, i had chased down the owner of driveshaft shop for screwing me with some set of axles, so i was just tired of yammering and bitching about getting beat, so i left this guy alone, but rest assured i have spread the gospel truth about how much of a scum bag this guy is.

to illustrate how much of a **** this dude is- he was telling me about all of his cars when i was there the first time, and he claimed he had what we know as a challenge stradale, a specially prepared f360. the problem is, he called it a freakin' "CHALLENGER". he said it multiple times, and i was thinking to myself "how retarded is this dude". i should have walked the fvck out of there at that time but i didn't, and i paid big time for that poor decision.

 

HAHAHA! Yeah, should left just then while you still could! Sucks about your whole roof issue though!

 

Molorik

 

Damn dude that sucks I hate hearing about almost-quality work when you were promised perfection the FIRST time. There's tons of stuff that bothers me about my car no one else ever notices. Live and learn, right? Chunk a deuce and keep moving.

Well good for you then. I'm glad you have that option. I wish I did. I'm slowly working my way up there but you need a BIG reputation to break into that demographic around Houston. Unless you've got a rich uncle that can introduce you to some people lol. If I kept seeing Ferraris pull up in my neighbor's garage I'd start getting really curious I'm sure its the same there. Keep an eye out for my work I'll be posting stuff as I get it. Should be getting a really good camera for before and after shots soon. Hopefully for Christmas. Later bro!!!