Restoring the luster of a Miata

Sun, 29 Oct 2006 09:49:17 GMT

Yesterday I spent 3.5 hours detailing a friend's Miata. I did it because I enjoy doing that stuff (I did my own car in preparation for winter last week). The car started out in pretty bad shape, having not been washed in several years. Once I got all of the grime off (and clayed the paint), it was clear that the paint had oxidized quite a bit, as many older cars with red paint don't have a clear coat for whatever reason (oddly enough, the car was devoid of swirl marks -- I assume that's because she never washed it). I had initially just planned for a wash and wax, but this called for more drastic measures. So, out came the non-abrasive paint cleaner. That cleared up the oxidation problem pretty quickly, though I did have to break out my random orbital polisher to remove the excess cleaner. As an aside, I generally prefer to do things by hand, as fingers can get into smaller places than a big buffer. I only used the polisher to remove the excess in this case because the paint needed so much work that the cleaner just didn't want to come off (no wax for years == very rough paint that likes to hold onto everything).

After the paint cleaner, I followed up with a hand polish. That really brought out the color, so it was time for some wax. I had initially planned to do two coats, starting with a longer-lasting polymer-based wax (since Suzy's not likely to wax the car often in the future) and then follow it up with a more conventional carnauba wax to make the paint really pop, but at that point I had run out of clean applicators and was quickly running short on clean towels (the cleaner and polish steps used up what I had planned for the carnauba step) so I left it with just the polymer wax. It still looks 1000% better than before, and Suzy was very happy. I did get a free dinner out of it, but that was totally unnecessary. I did it for love of cars, and to show her that the Miata is still a great little car while the rest of my friends are buying Porsches, Audis, Bimmers, and Benzes.

I applied the finishing touches by polishing up the tailpipe, cleaning the interior and top with vinyl protectant, cleaning the insides of the windows, and blacking the tires. Since I rarely use the vinyl protectant or glass wipes on my own car, I went ahead and gave those to Suzy for maintenance cleaning, as well as throwing in a couple of nice cotton towels to use. I would've also thrown in some speed shine / quick detailer, but I didn't have any to spare (I'm running low on speed shine myself, and will need to get another bottle probably this spring).

You can see pictures from the process in my photo albums here. Apparently my camera is crap and I suck at taking pictures, because a few came out blurry. It's a little hard to see the difference between the steps, but trust me, the car at the end of the process was barely recognizable as the one I started with.

Tales of a Gadget Developer: Hobbies

Restoring the luster of a Miata