Dan's Garage - Audi A3 Opticoat - Mech81

[Caffeine Fiend]

This weekend I worked on a 2001 Audi A3 recently purchased by Mech81's partner and Dennis booked it in for a bit of TLC and Opticoat treatment.

They've had the car only for a couple of months and whilst it was picked up for a bargain, it wasn't hard to see it'd had a hard life in terms of its paint.

The previous owner had the car outside for several years and it had built up a reasonable layer of oxidisation, which had faded the metallic blue somewhat.





Without even stripping the oxidisation, there were already signs of some severe paint marring waiting to be uncovered (apologies if these are a bit hard to see. The oxidisation had dulled the paint to the point where it had also dulled the scratching underneath..... a concealment technique I must admit I'd never thought of )



Scratching starting on the passenger side front guard:


Continuing to not so light scratching above the passenger side door:



and still more scratching on the passenger side rear door:


Finishing with yet more scratching on the C pillar:



It was a similar story on the driver's side.

Front guard (scratching just above the corner of the headlight):


Driver's side front door:


VERY deep scratching on the driver's side rear door:


Another deep scratch on the driver's side C pillar:


More scratching on the driver's side rear quarter:



Oxidisation had dulled the once prominent four rings:


Wheels just looking "tired" (pun intended )



Two rounds of decontamination to start the process:


Then a wash and some all purpose cleaner in the guards:



Now we're starting to get somewhere:





A little attention to those four rings:





And of course to the rest of the car to start chipping away that oxidisation:



"Plates off" for this one methinks:


Clearer already. It's amazing what a little "special" acid will do lol (no I'm not joking):

[Caffeine Fiend]

Pulling the car into the garage and inspecting under the lights showed yet more oxidisation that the acid failed to shift. Also getting a better view of the scratching and marring around the car:












After just claybarring the bonnet:



After a three-stage paint correction lasting several hours, we're starting to see some reasonable results:







Opticoat down:





Still not perfect. There were a lot of scratches there that were simply too deep to completely remove. They were minimised as much as possible:





Got almost all the scratching on the rear C pillar though:


And also on the rear guard:


The Four rings restored to their former lustre:









Time Taken: 16Hrs

Thanks for reading

Dan

[Yeldarb]

Who needs the gym Dan, 16hrs of buffing get's you...buff (pun certainly intended).

What an effort. The photos don't do it justice (especially the blue hue to the photos), but the scratching has certainly come down a lot.

Now work tomorrow...I can see why you love your coffee

[SarcasticOne]

jesus.... i have found thee
that's an incredible job dan

[Caffeine Fiend]

Lol cheers Brad

Decided to try out the camera on the new phone, and whilst it's better than the iPhone, it's not quite up to par with my digital camera

Worked about 12hrs on Sat to get the Opticoat down, so it could begin curing overnight (8am to about 10pm with a couple of hours for breaks). And about 4 hrs on the Sunday working on plastics, headlights, rubber surrounds, wheels and tires, glass etc while the Opticoat continued to cure.

EDIT: Cheers Sam (you posted while I was replying to Brad hehehe)



Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk

[mech81]

So much work put in and the "after" was in Dan's words a "bazillion times better"

We had a nervous moment on the way home where we encountered a hailstorm - very short but did bring up some anxious moments

Thanks for everything Dan!!

[AlanC]

Dan is THE man!

[Caffeine Fiend]

So much work put in and the "after" was in Dan's words a "bazillion times better"

We had a nervous moment on the way home where we encountered a hailstorm - very short but did bring up some anxious moments

Thanks for everything Dan!!

Hail storm.......

Glad to hear you made it back safely mate. Let me know when you're in a position to have the MPS done

Al... cheers mate

[dru]

Quality work mate!

[DisturbedDave]

Amazing work Dan!