My CF hood had got so so dull that i considered binning it and buying a new one, nothing i tried on it worked and i just thought it was beyond ever looking good again. A friend of mine suggested 2000grade wet paper, followed by G3 compound using a mechanical buffer followed by some coats of polish wax. I had nothing to loose so set at it today and i'm stunned at the results, it looks as good as new again. It took me less than 2 hrs in total and that included giving it 4 coats of meguiars deep crystal carnuba wax/polish. The hood looked so good i had to polish the whole car as the paint work was starting to look dull after the winter. I'm well pleased with the overall results!









In case anyone wants to know how to do this, heres how.
Get 2000 grade wet/dry sand paper and a bucket of warm soapy water. I done small sections at a time to make sure i wasnt rubbing too much in one particular spot. I also used a rubber blade to wipe away any excess water so that i could see which sections i had done and which needed more as the soapy water obscures what you have/havent done. Once i had the whole hood done, i hosed it down and dried it off with a shammy cloth. Then i got out my power buffer with an M3 compounding head and wet it thoroughly and buffed sections with G3 compound. I kept a bottle of water close to wet it now and again to make sure the buffer didnt dry out and scorch/burn the lacquer. Once i had the whole thing finished with G3 i again hosed the hood off and dried it off (so that i could see any areas that needed going over again) Then it was purely a matter of polishing it. Off all the polishes/waxes i have used on the hood, Meguiars deep crystal wax is the easiest to put on/take off and doesnt leave any white residue on the hood. Job Done!!!


Modified by mugenracer at 7:04 PM 5/5/2006

 

That looks very good

 

Great info, thanks.

 

Looks great I :heart: that hood

 

There's a REALLY GOOD write-up somewhere on here for restoring CF hoods. They used different compounds though, but the results made the hood look brand new.

Your method looks good too

 

wow, your car is t3h s3x <---

- Cory, who is adding this to his HT favorites

 

looks great man

 

This is something I really need to do to my 8 year old SPOON hood! Maybe I'll have time to do it before EXPO. Oh so much to do, so little time!

-Victor

 

I've seen some great carbon fiber hoods brought back to life. Just light wet sanding with a very fine 1000 grade sand paper and reclear usually makes it good as new. Any cracks in the epoxy can usually be dremeled out and fixed as well.

 

are you kidding me!

 

holy batman. zombie thread.