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BMW E92 M3 Ultimate Wetsand By KDS

206K views 206 replies 156 participants last post by  G4V JW 
#1 ·
Hi to All this is my first post in the studio section and the start of many many more.

Been around detailing in some form and another for 18 years and only really got into photos and videos some 2 years ago.

Some people will know me very well and never heard of me so,

Firstly i will say Hi to the people and companies i know and spoke too in the past . :wave:

Dom - Dodo Juice,
Clark - Polished Bliss,
Matt - OYM's,
PJS,
Brian - Drive and shine,
Rob - Gleammachine,
Tim - Clean Your Car,

Sorry to anyone i have missed out .

Due to being very busy and working later and later through the night as always, i will post this write up for speed by copying and pasting from a Pistonheads write up many months ago of the E92 M3 wet sand carried out for a pistonhead member.

So here goes, sorry for the lack of description, for the latest details i have starting logging and taking photos in more depth in readiness to post on DW for the future :thumb:

As dropped of by the owner





Dye transfer from blue Jeans on the leather seat's



Gloss readings before any wash process

roof



rear bumper



boot lid



bonnet



orange peel before wet sanding



Rear quarter panel



Rear quarter panel



bonnet



some products used to wash car ready for detailing process



First wash down with snow foam







This is after leaving the snowfoam to dwell for 5 minutes



after 7 minutes



complete car was rinsed, then all edges washed with all purpose cleaner and degreaser around grills and badges etc .

Then clean wheels with acid free alloy wheel cleaner .

Then another wash with snowfoam

one final rinse of complete car , then move car indoors and blow dry car with compressed air and drying towels .

The clay section next





Was surprised too find not much debris compared to must cars i detail



Car was drove back outside to have a very close look at the interior mainly the leather , the leather dye transfer cleaned off ok using standard leather cleaning products .



Here you can see the blue dye on the cleaning cloth



Now getting into the reason you pay to have a professional detail , as well as the equipment needed .

First thing is too inspect the paint for flaws and but more important is to measure the paint depth to build up a map of the car's varing paint depth giving the detailer the information needed to be confident the car can have the wet sand and machine polish process.

The measurments where taken all over the cars panels to gain an average figure .









The readings are taken by using 2 different methods of paint depth gauges , one measures on Ferrous and non Ferrous metals only and the total paint depth only



If you only have this gauge then the best way to work out the amount of top coat (laquer) there is , is to measure an area under the bonnet with no top coat take a reading then subtract that from the reading on the outside of the car this would give you a rough guide to the amount of top coat , or you can measure in the door shuts too where there would be one coat of laquer again to gain an idea of how much top coat is on the car !

This gauge measures using ultrasound which can be used on all surfaces as well as measuring in layers too ,



Because the paint depth will vary over a very small area measured the best method of repeated readings is to use this method of marking the panels ,

A mim tripod holding a laser pointer to mark the bonnet





mark where the ultrasound gel has been used to take a reading



and the same for the boot





The wing was measured with a large tripod using this method



Here is the wing reading just the top coat

108 microns of laquer (which is very thick )



here is measuring 2 layers base colour coat and top coat



Now to the wet sanding stage

some of the equipment and materials used for wet sanding



I found the paint too be very hard , i would normally wet sand by hand starting with 1500 grit wet and dry moving through finer grades , but this was so hard that started with 1200 grit , here is a video showing how hard the paint is after using 1200 grit by hand





here is using a machine for wet sanding



again with 1200 grit and did not touch the paint really



After days of work in the first rough sand the car ends up looking like this , and this is when the customer has kittens if they see their car ,







The car was sanded in 1200, 1500 , 2000 , 4000 grit .

before the machine polishing stage started i took more reading round the entire car to show how much material has been remove to lose the orange peel ,

bonnet before reading again



bonnet after wet sanding readings



bonnet after machine polish final stage



100 microns in depth is the same as an expensive sheet of A4 paper , so a removal of 10 microns of top coat was needed on that measurment to get perfect flat paint , which really shows the small amount of materail that was removed .

here shows the average amount of material taken from each panel to get no orange peel , you will notice that the rear bumper had a much lower reading than the rest of the car so was machined polished only not wet sanded , you will also notice that say wing to wing , door to door the after paint depths are closer than before the wet sanding .



now to the best pictures the results

gloss readings after

roof



rear bumper



boot lid



bonnet



after shots

































and my favorite shots







Reflection shot of the workshop (or lack of reflection)



After reflection shot of workshop



Before reflection shot of bonnet showing skylight



after shot of bonnet



This is what paint can look like after 80 hours work





Here are 2 videos too





I hope you enjoyed my first studio thread and maybe picked up and learnt something along the way :thumb:

KDS Detailing , Kelly

www.kdsdetailing.co.uk
 
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#64 ·
Very nice indeed and glad to see proper care being taken with the paint depth readings through out the wet sanding stage - absolutely essential when you consider the paint depths being removed (I'm inferring 15um from your graphs). How would you say this process has affected the longevity of the clearcoat? Afters show a mirror like shine :thumb:
 
#65 · (Edited)
Very nice indeed and glad to see proper care being taken with the paint depth readings through out the wet sanding stage - absolutely essential when you consider the paint depths being removed (I'm inferring 15um from your graphs). How would you say this process has affected the longevity of the clearcoat? Afters show a mirror like shine :thumb:
I guess another thing to also consider is how long people keep their cars. If you change it every three to four, then years even if you do significantly reduce the longevity, if you don't keep the car long enough to see those effects then having it look good can be more of a priority.
 
#72 ·
Fantastic work and result :thumb:

I agree with what a couple of people have already written, £500 for this work is too cheap, 80 hours equates to over two weeks work (at the average 38 hour working week), add in the cost of your overheads, power / lighting etc and your premises, and it's way under priced.

How were the edges dealt with, by hand?

By edges I mean the areas next to masking tape, I noticed on the picture below you didn't run up to the tape when doing the main areas of the panels.

 
#127 ·
That picture is not of the finished wet sand bonnet during and looks like 1500 grit or maybe 2000 grit , then would go closer to edges with 2500 3000 4000 to finish .

I guess this is the danger with posting pictures unless i take a photo write down what it is there and then for me to remember .

I took over 1000 pictures of a ford GT detail and did not even wet sand , this alone would take weeks to process and write down step by step for each picture i would go bust with in a few months with all the staffs time taken up producing fancy photos and write ups:wall:

The tape is not there as a guide to how far to wet sand to ,as wrote somewhere maybe on another of my threads its to stop the waste water running into gaps and staining the car , marking plastics etc , nearly all of my wet sanding is done by hand as i have better feel and control to what i am doing than you will ever have using a machine , this M3 i had no choice but to wet sand with DA sanders to knock down most of the orange peel before jumping over to hand method just because the paint was like granite .

Again i am sure i have wrote this before i do sand fully to the edge on some jobs and on other keep away from edge with first grades 1500 then slightly closer to edge 2000 and so on , that why you have a blend from fully flat finish to slight orange peel on very edges .

Here is a car , and my first fully wet sand to the edges 16 years ago :thumb:

http://www.detailingworld.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=141379&page=6

it all comes down to cost/daily driver / show car / enough paint for full wet sand / what the owner wants / how well is the owner going to look after it and so on with such extreme processes as wet sanding .

Kelly
 
#79 ·
Hi everyone ,

I have been taken back by the amount of views and replies already :doublesho

I will promise to answer most if not all questions when i get time to do so , i am not the quickest on a keyboard and my english grammer sucks too .

It looks like i may have a slightly quietier workload in a few weeks time , there will be alot more threads from me soon all along the same lines with some being larger and more in depth description .

Black FORD GT 450 pictures 2 weeks solid work , Rolls Royce Phantom 200 pics 1.5 weeks work . my own car 2000 pictures (E46 LSB M3) spent 20k on parts over last 4 years and now about to fit 580 bhp supercharger Kit from the states :argie:


Kelly
 
#86 ·
Hi everyone ,

I have been taken back by the amount of views and replies already :doublesho

I will promise to answer most if not all questions when i get time to do so , i am not the quickest on a keyboard and my english grammer sucks too .

It looks like i may have a slightly quietier workload in a few weeks time , there will be alot more threads from me soon all along the same lines with some being larger and more in depth description .

Black FORD GT 450 pictures 2 weeks solid work , Rolls Royce Phantom 200 pics 1.5 weeks work . my own car 2000 pictures (E46 LSB M3) spent 20k on parts over last 4 years and now about to fit 580 bhp supercharger Kit from the states :argie:

Kelly
I dont give a monkeys about your English grammar, and I bet nobody else does (and they shouldn't, its a discussion forum not an English exam :)). This thread was a pleasure to see, and I look forward to hearing your thoughts and discussing some detailing with you around DW...
 
#81 ·
Along with a lot of the peeps, I remember seeing this on Pistonheads and I'm as blown away now as I was then (you need to get the black Navaro up mate, that'll impress a few of the peeps on here:thumb:).

Don't even think of putting your prices up until you've sorted my car:D

Aren't you just round the corner from Lepsons as well? (Knackered alloys:()
 
#82 ·
Welcome.


Have to say left truly blown away with the level of the detail and really does set the Bench Mark for standard.

Reading this was truly great and a real pleasure to read further in to what detailing is about. The fact you know Matt and Clark says to me your up amongst the best with what you do.

Look forward to reading more posts and learning from another great.

Kind Regards

Gareth
 
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