Detailing tips for retaining your cars value.

Searching the internet as car nuts do, I came across this little article on one of the better car detailing websites (Autopia.org). It's written with Americans in mind but if one was to substitute Las Vegas for Roto-Vegas it could apply just as easily to Kiwi's.


By: Sarah G

Depressed about the down economy and even more your car’s depreciating value every day?
Yes each car has it’s own reasons for depreciating. Let’s briefly discuss, what is depreciation? When you buy a new car and drive off of the dealer’s lot your car loses it’s value which is more than what a car loses throughout the year which is anywhere from 15 percent to 20% of its value.
With the exception of vintage, rare, and collectible cars, it is important to mention what factors that affect car depreciation. The model, brand, condition of the car including scratches, dents, dings, maintenance, production quantity, mileage, and many other factors are what can impact a car’s value. The more something is used, looks worn, or old it’s bound to have a lower value and is less desirable.
Take two cars- same model, same year. Car A has a lot of scratches, water spots, swirl marks, carpet stains, leather marks. Car B, on the other hand, looks like a brand new car, newly detailed, clean carpets, no water spots, scratches, velvety soft leather. Car B definitely looks better and would be worth more.

Here’s what you can do to retain the value of your car.
1. Keep a routine maintenance schedule of your car. Most cars come with a schedule where the oil needs to be changed, tires need to be rotated, and the transmission needs servicing. If you have excessive wear and carry on driving without any maintenance you might blow your transmission or break your engine, which are costly to fix.
2. Regularly clean the inside of your car. Keep your carpets clean from any scuffmarks, dirt from extreme weather conditions, or other spills using a carpet spot remover. Maintain leather and vinyl by cleaning it and using a leather and vinyl protectant, it is important to pay attention to this in locations that have higher heat. As upholstery is like a sponge, absorbing anything that comes near it, you must pay extra attention to keep it clean and free of any odor and spills. Try not to smoke in your car as this will cause for a much lower resale value since it is a tough smell to get rid of. But if you do consider using an odor eliminator and improve the scent with an air freshener. Also, avoid eating and drinking in your car to avoid spilling on to the surfaces which may very likely cause stains; in addition, it’s not safe to do anything when driving, other than driving,
3. Wax and detail the outside of your car. Most all cars get scratched and attract foreign particles through regular use, it’s inevitable. Every time you open your doors and your fingernails come in contact with the paint, put a grocery bag on top of the trunk to find your keys, lean onto your car, and driving on the road through dust, dirt or other road fallout your car’s paint job will scratch and absorb any small particles especially during warmer weather, since the paint softens, the dirt sticks, and when the temperature gets cooler it will re-harden with these particles.
All cars can rust if you do not wax, detail, and wash your car regularly. How can a car rust, you ask? Living near the ocean causes a lot of salt to be immersed in the air, which will eat away the exterior paint, causing corrosion and chipping. Each time a car breaks, the break pads cause metal shavings that fall on to the road, and when you drive through the road and the weather is hot it will stick and harden with the paint later. As time goes on this is why some people wonder, “Why is my white car are yellow?” This is due to the metal particles from the road have rusted on the paint’s surface. Therefore, remember to wash and wax your car regularly to protect the appearance of your car, remove scratches, and swirl marks. Always remember to use a car sealant to protect the paint to prolong your efforts, otherwise your efforts will go to waste.
4. Protect your car in an enclosed area or away from the sun. This will prevent your car’s paint and interior panels from fading, which significantly diminishes the look and value of the car.
5. Add even more value to your car by adding accessories and features. While it costs more to install navigation, a DVD player, high-end stereo system, rims, or custom paint job it will ultimately increase the resale value of your vehicle as your car will be unique and have a cutting edge in the market.
6. Minimize excessive and unnecessary use of your car. A car with lower mileage will have less wear and tear; therefore, drive it as little as possible, if the weekend calls for a spontaneous trip to Las Vegas, consider renting a car. Why? Less miles equals higher value.

Maintaining the value of your car is not easy, it takes time, but you will reap the benefits in the long time. Just a simple wash, wax and detailing can maintain your car’s value. And remember our other tips to enhance a car’s value.

To link to the original article http://www.autopia.org/forum/content/122-detailing-tips-retain-your-car-s-value.html

Mothers Wax Attack Polisher Test.

Recently I had an opportunity to get my hands on the 'Mothers Wax Attack' orbital polisher. I'd seen it in action a few times at car shows and was really quite keen to see just how useful it might be or whether it was, as I'd heard many indicate just a fancy (and possibly gimmicky) wax applicator.

The Mothers Wax Attack Kit

I was hoping to be objective and I really wanted to approach a test with an open mind. The Wax Attack was never designed to be a tool that is used everyday in a detailing situation or to be used as a serious paint correction tool so I didn't want my experiences with more commercially orientated tools to let me prejudge it.

I must be honest; the thought of using 'Mothers' products of any description felt a bit naughty, almost like an extramarital affair, considering the long term monogamous love of Meguiar's products that I've had. I reconciled it with myself with the realization that it's a product developed by the Kiwi Mothers team and it doesn't actually have a Mothers sticker on it Haha! so no cheating after all. (not that there's anything wrong with Mothers waxes and polishes of course it's just that well... )

I was also hoping to be able to determine whether it was a machine that I could recommend to my customers when they quiz me about ongoing Car Care. Many of my customers are real enthusiasts and once their cars have been given a Final Touch treatment they are keen to spend the odd weekend polishing, detailing and generally enjoying their vehicles to keep them in top condition.

The Wax Attack is designed for a home enthusiast, it's priced accordingly and it comes supplied ex Mothers in a kit format with some polishes and some nice soft pads that are very clearly designed for wax application only - so it's marketed as a wax applicator with things like speed, comfort, even application, ease of use etc... as selling points. All great aspects when it comes to applying/removing wax but the people I'd be recommending it to (if it ever came to that) would be wanting to do more than just wax their car with it. They'd want to know if they could polish out minor wash marring, micro scratches etc... so it was time to put it to the test...

First an appropriate vehicle had to be selected. We found a 3 year old Ford Territory with dark bronze coloured metallic paint that was just about to go back on a lease return. it had been well looked after but it had it's fair share of carwash scratches and micro-marring with a generally dull appearance without too many deep scratches. We felt that it was a pretty good example of a typical Kiwi everyday car.

Cobb-web effect and carwash scratches are quite evident under lights

The standard Mothers pads were never going to be firm enough to do anything other than gently caress the paintwork so we put them to one side for later when wax would be called for and opted for something with a bit more bite. We tested a 2 pad combo with a Meguiar’s 6" 7000 red cutting pad followed by a 6000 yellow polishing pad - both closer density pads than the Mothers pads and both readily available. Meguiar’s ScratchX was chosen as a scratch removal compound; I was tempted to try a heavier commercial product but thought that most consumers wouldn’t have access to it. ScratchX seems to be the ‘go to’ product for minor paint rectification for lots of Kiwi car enthusiasts.

We ran some masking tape down the centre of the bonnet and began the test, The Wax Attack is very easy to use, comfortable in your hand and easy to manage and powerful enough that you know it is working for you yet not so grunty that you feel that there is any danger of it causing damage. The orbital action is gentle enough that you could possibly polish all day without over polishing (not that I would recommend that of course). After a few passes with the polisher using the ScratchX and the red correcting pad we were keen to see some results. After peeling back the tape we were pleasantly surprised. There was already a distinct difference in the gloss and depth of colour and many of the small scratches had been removed.

Already you can see a distinct lift in colour depth

Quite a noticeable difference under lights

Getting back into it we worked the ScratchX thoroughly with both the cutting pad to give extra correction and the polishing pad to ensure we left a nice smooth even finish and we were quite pleased with the results. Not everything was removed but i would have been very surprised if it had. Meguiar's does have a product called Ultimate Compound that is more aggressive than ScratchX without being too intense and I couldn't help but wonder if it would have made an even greater difference to the scratches.

With a little time and effort we achieved a great result, with a significant lift in paint finish.

Considering the extent of the scratching the correction was quite remarkable.
I was a bit concerned that ScratchX might have just filled the scratches so I gave the panel (both sides) a good solvent wash with Wax & Grease Remover to remove any polish residues and the correction remained which was reassuring as the last thing we wanted was a temporary fix.

All in all excellent results without expecting total perfection. Most of the scratches worked out and we didn’t do anything that any enthusiast could do. Finally we used the gentle Mothers Pad to apply a nice coat of wax for the final step.

A great, result with a nice deep shine and very few remaining scratches.

While the last thing I want to do is cut myself out of business with regards to ongoing polishing I’ll definitely be recommending the Wax Attack to customers who want to spend the time maintaining their own paintwork. I wouldn't want to overwork it and wear it out too quickly as it was never designed for heavy duty correction but it has proven itself quite capable of performing minor correction

We'll have the Wax attack at Speedshow later this month so please ask us about it, we'll even give you a go and Mothers have indicated that they are happy to supply them as a machine only so we can build our own paint care kit around the Wax Attack to ensure that you get a safe easy to use polisher that will fulfill your needs without the cost of a full commercially capable tool.

With that in mind I think it's time to try the Mothers Powerball and Powercone for polishing 'difficult to get to' areas. Maybe I'll be impressed again?

Careful Car Washing. - The 2 Bucket Method.

After a trip recently along some very wet and muddy metal roads my work ute was left in a state showing more mud than paintwork. It was always going to be a bit of a mission to clean up again but it got me thinking about the best techniques for washing cars without causing extra damage to the paintwork.
A lot of the swirls and scratches that you see in paintwork are actually caused when the cars are being washed. They severely dull the paint finish and can take quite an effort to properly correct.

With this in mind we'd like to help our car loving customers with their ongoing paint protection by providing a quick run down of the very popular 2 Bucket method.

Basically it's one shampoo bucket and one rinse bucket, the rinse bucket allows your wash mitt (or car wash brush) to release all the grit and grime before picking up the next load of shampoo - Greatly reducing the risk of adding swirls and helping ensure a longer lasting protective shine.
I'll let one of the experts explain it in more detail below and see if I can source a few of the 'Grit-Guards' that he shows us.

Aston Martin

We had a call this week from one of our very good customers and they'd taken delivery of a brand spanking new vehicle that had arrived from the factory in quite a state. We're at a bit of a loss as to why such a premium vehicle might have such swirls and dull patches in the paint; we suspect it is to do with curing periods of new waterborne paint systems but we've really got no idea. We're just excited that we are the team that gets called to enhance the finish.

The swirls are quite dramatic, but not too serious, a high quality polish from a team that knows just what they're doing can bring things back to the way they should be.

I love the way this paint looks when it's properly polished. The black is so deep that you could drown it it and the metallic flakes seem suspended in space between the clear coat and the black beneath. By far my favorite colour.The finished vehicle, all ready for the showroom. Cars don't get much cooler than this.

Custom Painted Javelin

Recently we were asked to do a custom paintjob on a Javelin to be used for this years athletic season and hopefully to qualify for the upcoming Comonwealth games. It was a pretty fun project and we're pretty sure it will look the part flying through the air as it goes for gold.
We tried to hold it in keeping with Kiwi colours and emblems, there's some little silver ferns ghosted underneath the black towards the front that become visable in direct sunlight. I was pretty happy with the effect as it was the first time I'd attempted it.
This sot of thing's a lot of fun, I'm looking forward to developing some real skills in the future.


It came to us primed and basicaly ready to spray.

The spiral will hopefully help it climb a little higher as it spins.

The silver fern's NZ represent. Under the black are some more ferns that fade out further down the shaft.