New car advice please...2014 Dodge Journey

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I washed my new Pearl Black 2014 Dodge Journey for the first time the other day and I see three rows buffer swirls on each side of the center line of the hood. The first thing that comes to mind is why a new car needed to buffed in the first place. Now I would appreciate opinions on what course of action to take. I could either attempt to restore the finish myself - by hand or take it back to the dealer and have them clear it up. All this knowing that they screwed it up in the first place and may not be competent enough to handle the task again.

Thoughts?
And if I were to do it by hand can you recommend some product typically available at a B.M. store?
 
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I suggest getting a machine, even a cheap one. You'll achieve far better results than you could hope to achieve by hand. A machine such as below costs less than a decent polish so there's no reason not to have a machine if cost is an issue as you'll pretty much get unsatisfactory results by hand or if you pick the wrong polish, such as a diminishing polish, might even make the problem worse.

http://www.harborfreight.com/6-inch-compact-palm-polisher-90219.html

These also often go on sale for like $16 or if you have a coupon. You will get much better results using it and a decent polish rather than investing in some of the more expensive hand applicable stuff that's strong enough to remove by hand but won't leave a haze.

Get that buffer above and Meguiars Ultimate Polish available at Pep Boys, Autozone, and even Walmart. Walmart also sells a cheap 6" polisher too. Use a microfiber bonnet and the Ultimate Polish, run four thin lines in an asterisk shape over the microfiber bonnet and polish small sections of the hood at a time. In between sections be sure to brush out any caked polish on the bonnet, a rough bath towel rubbed against it with the machine on works well for this. Remember to wax the polished sections afterward, use a real wax, don't be lazy and think a spray wax will cut it.

You have to go little slower than what you see online with DA machines because they're not very high power. Apply firm pressure but not enough to bog the machine down significantly and move the polisher about 15-30 seconds per foot. The slower you go the more correction you'll get. But the long work time of Ultimate Polish will let you really correct well even with such a low power machine. And it'll be better than what you'll do by hand, on top of removing less paint than using a compound by hand. As usually by hand you end up having to use stronger polishes or compounds which don't finish as well and uneven pressure and movement will inevitably cause marring or other visible marks when the sun hits it right or in a well lit parking lot at night.
 
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Oh and the big reason why I'm suggesting getting a machine, black shows everything and that includes marring and swirling you'd likely leave behind trying to remove damage by hand. Likely you'd never see those with a lighter color metallic paint like silver.

And new cars are buffed because while they sit outdoors on the lot, they get washed and dried regularly by your standard lot monkey who thinks nothing of wiping the cars down often with a dirty bath towel that's wiped down 25 cars and picked up lots of leftover dirt from a less than thorough wash. In a big lot these guys often wash 50 cars a day or more. They're not gonna two bucket and blot each car carefully with a newly washed microfiber drying cloth. Hence pre-delivery there's a detail monkey that polishes 'er up before you get it. And again not the most professional guy, he needs to probably get 5-8 cars done per day. And neither the lot monkey or detail monkey get paid much more than minimum wage, and sometimes less as I'm sure a lot of them work for cash because of questionable legal status and unethical business practices of the car lot. A shady car lot? Who'd of thunk it?
 
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Some do come with a microfiber bonnet, some don't. Depends on which one you get. Unfortunately I'm not familiar with the Harbor Freight one's contents, but I do know they definitely sell microfiber bonnets at Harbor Freight.

Even better would be to tear off the original foam backing pad and soak the remaining glued on foam in gasoline to remove it leaving just the plastic plate. Then get some sticky backed velcro and stick it on the plastic plate. Then you can buy the 6" foam pads from Harbor Frieght. These really will let you finish out as good as the professionals with the finishing pads, and the polishing pads will actually have enough cut to remove even moderate damage when used with a compound.
 
How heavy are the buffer trails?

If the buffer trails and holograms are light, they should not be hard to remove. Sometimes they do not come out too easily.

Whichever approach you take, be sure to wipe-down an area that you do with a 50% Isopropyl Alcohol mix several times...and pull the car into the sun to confirm that the holograms and buffer trails are indeed gone. Ultimate Polish does have oils, so it can/will mask the trails that you do not remove.
 
Id also recommend the harbor freight to try due to cost and ease of use...if its ur first time I dont recommend micro fiber pads or bonnet...get a couple foam pads, some hd or optimum polish and call it a day..autogeek has a nice selection of 5.5 pads
 
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Tomorrow is my lucky day. HF has the 6" polisher for $19.99 and they just emailed me a 25% off coupon good only on one item on Easter.
Wowee!
 
That's a great. I can't seem to find the 6" microfiber bonnets on the HF website though. The 7-8" one is not a polishing one, it's a buffing one meant to remove wax or polish by machine. If you use it it won't fit and will simply absorb all your polish.

I do know Autozone and Pepboys carries them.

http://www.pepboys.com/product/details/9486313/01461

Those bonnets and Ultimate Polish ought to take care of light swirls and buffer trails quite easily. With microfiber remember to prime the bonnet evenly with polish before polishing. That way you'll maximize the cut the machine is capable of.

Also here another tip, if yours comes with a wool bonnet, put the wool bonnet on and then put the microfiber bonnet on top of the wool. The wool acts as a cushion and helps create even pressure for the microfiber to polish extra gently.
 
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The thing is that's an extremely low res cell phone video. Cell phone cameras are bad enough but cell phone videos certainly aren't going to show what's left behind after those two polishing steps.

The video is showing using a cutting pad to hand apply a compound. Ultimate Compound is not a pure SMAT polish, it will initially leave behind marring that the Ultimate Polish likely won't remove by hand. The Ultimate Polish will reduce it for sure, but on a black car in real life unless you can remove all the left over marring from Ultimate Compound, Ultimate Polish which by hand with a finishing pad would take a really long time, you'll have reduced the finish quality especially considering the OP's car is brand new.

It's an improvement sure in the video but that's from basically a severely damaged car as is. Almost anything would be an improvement. And the amount of material Ultimate Compound removes by hand is entirely unnecessary in the OP's situation.

The OP's situation is a brand new car, you shouldn't be compounding a new car to begin with. You'll still get better results and less material removal using a finishing polish to remove buffer trails than using a compound and polish by hand. Not to mention buying those 4" pads, and holder plus Ultimate Compound AND Ultimate Polish will cost more than the 6" buffer and a wool bonnet, microfiber bonnet, and Ultimate Polish. You can forgo the holder but try to use a thin foam applicator with rubbing compound and you'll be either working for a really long time, or like most people increase the pressure to get the work done faster at the cost of marring the paint and uneven correction.

So if you've got a buffer, you're better off just using the buffer and Ultimate Polish instead of Ultimate Compound and Ultimate Polish.

Believe me years ago I tried doing mobile detailing by hand, it's no picnic and the results are always less than satisfactory if you're expecting any decent correction.
 
Well, I got my buffer and the Ultimate Polish so based on recommendations I am going to try that before some aggressive attack on my hood just to remove a buffer bozo's hologram and swirl marks. I plan to have this car a long time and truly desire to leave the clear coat on for at least the first year. Ha Ha.

Thanks to all for their replies.
 
RE: querty

You are absolutely right. I completely overlooked the "new car" part of the question! I need a dope slap :-(
 
Originally Posted By: dave180
Well, I got my buffer and the Ultimate Polish so based on recommendations I am going to try that before some aggressive attack on my hood just to remove a buffer bozo's hologram and swirl marks. I plan to have this car a long time and truly desire to leave the clear coat on for at least the first year. Ha Ha.

Thanks to all for their replies.


Excellent be sure to post results. If you write up your technique I can definitely help you to refine it to get excellent results consistently and give other tips and tricks on how to polish using a cheap wax spreader.

You might be surprised at just how much you can accomplish with such a cheap polisher. Mine's going on 10 years now and has done literally hundreds of cars, it was even used in my mobile detailing business. After the foam finally disintegrated last year or so, applying velcro to the plastic backing plate and using 6" dedicated DA polishing pads really ups the results comparable to a real DA, albeit like I said, it just takes longer.
 
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