This weekend saw me working on a very nice 23 year old Artic White Merc 300 CE-24. I've always been a fan of coupe Mercedes and this one, whilst still quite pretty, was showing it's age, particularly in the paint department.
It's current owner, who's only had it for a relatively short period of time, is quite meticulous when it comes to keeping his cars, and I know that he's been bothered by the swirls on this one for quite some time. So he finally decided to do something about it and booked it in for a paint correction.
Initially it was also going to be a sealant based paint protection, but the rock-hard 23 year old Euro paint was about as tough as a WWII bunker. So after a quick chat with the owner, I spent the two days on paint correction alone.
The owner also had realistic expectations. He knew the paint wasn't the best and indeed in a number of areas it was flaking, so needless to say, much caution was exercised regarding working around those areas.
A couple of pre-wash shots:
The car was first foamed (no pics sorry), then hand-washed, taking particular care around those badges (I need a new brush too ):
The car was then clayed. There was only a small amount of oxidisation present over the car:
Now time to really look at what we're dealing with....Welcome to Swirl-Fest 1990 :
A number of paint depth readings around the car revealed some healthy paint levels. Variances from 140 microns to up over 230:
Correction initially proceeded as per normal. The harder Euro paint necessitated the HD Black Wool pad and Ultimate Compound II. Then moving to LC Orange with Compound II again. Then LC White with Optimum GPS to finish down.
Roof completed
There were some very deep rids in the roof that were unfortunately there to stay but I estimate I achieved roughly an 85-90% correction