Recommended products for a paintwork make-over

[stuart27]

Hi folks

My XJS is currently having some fairly major mechanical renovation done. I was thinking about having her re-sprayed next year sometime. However, I was looking at the bodywork today and it's really pretty good. I have a few minor dents to sort out, and there are a few scratches here and there, but nothing too serious. I'm starting to wonder if a re-spray is really necessary.

Are there any products out there that anyone can recommend, which will help to sort out minor scratches and give a more uniform look to the paint work? The car was re-sprayed at sometime...when I waxed the paint work, the paint colour came off on the cloth, so I suspect the re-spray was done without a correct clear coat on top?

I'm happy to spend a lot of effort to do the work myself, but am not really sure what products are available these days. I've done web searches, but it's all very confusing...clay sticks, paint restorers, waxes, sealers...where to start!

Any recommendations would be much appreciated.

Best Regards


Stuart

[Mr.Ian]

I've tried the wax sticks and special polish and to me it doesn't appear to work too well, it masks the scratch colour wise but it's still there.
After having all this work done on the underside why not get a few quotes from mobile dent and scratch specialists ? as long as you can see previous work they've done beforehand. From what i've seen in the past they can get very good results.

[PaulE]

That's good advice re consulting a local scratch and dent man as the best seem to make a large part of their living on new cars and motorbikes removing delivery defects from them so their work has to be able to stand close inspection. Think I would clean and polish the body with one of the systems such as McGuires or Autoglym then see to the defects, then polish. Both these firms have very good and helpful advice teams on the phone and also visit local regional centres to give talks and demos. We had Autoglym last winter at Lincs North and it was a very good evening run by their local dealer, and I have spoken to McGuires who do the same. Special offers on the night too. Paul.

[steveww]

One of the local dent specialist should be able to sort out any little dings depending on where they are, how deep etc.

The paint work can be revived with a good cut and polish. I used good old T-Cut to clean the paint work and remove swirl marks. I followed this up with Zymol 2 stage system, see http://www.steveww.org/blog/?p=46

I did some by hand and some with a polishing machine. If using a machine be very careful around any creases/edges on the body work, it is very easy to burn through to the undercoat or metal.