thats the best statement i have read on here in a long time (i have not begun to wonder, i have known it for quite some time)....but i was to say it i would be the a$$hole....too true. anyone can buy a brand new car and take pics in the shade thump from 20 feet away and say it looks good.

it was about a year ago he was asking about wax....now he it the say all end all....there are guys like myself that have been doing this for 20 years with "hands on" experience. not reading what others wrote and retyping becasue they think it sounds good.

there are many professional products that i have suggested that i know work, but guys like thump that have never used it will talk others into being scared about it. like the guy with the audi and needs help cleaning the rims....i would use professional acid diluted 50/50 clean each wheel in under 1.5 mins....he has never used it, but he would scare the crap out of the guy to even try it....i personally have used it on hundreds if not thousands of wheels with never, NEVER! any problem....he has never even seen it in person in a bottle...but he just knows it will not work without ruining a set of wheels....the guy talks out of his **** and does not even have a truck....once your truck is gone, so should you thump share your "knowledge" with the other mustang talkers over there

 

back to the rotary....get a couple of test pannels....after playing around a bit on a test/scrape pannel...using a foam cutting pad and most aggresive compound you have, keep the pad flat, crank up the speed see how hard it is to burn the paint...its harder than you think it is...today foam pads do not hold heat like wool pads do...a wool pad will burn the paint quick, but with foam (unless you kick it up in an angle) it is hard to burn the paint....


stepping compounds and glazes i go 1500-2500 rpms 7 inch pads.
my final step of 3m ultrafina spins at 2000 rpms on 7 inch finishing pad.


alot of people that have used a da for a few years and now are getting and falling in love with the flex just one step closer to a real paint finsihing machine....if they ever used a rotary for one month exclusively they would never use a da again....

 

I really don't even have any detailing supplies. I search google and steal pictures.

 

1. Why use acid when p21s wheel gel works perfectly fine? no risk involved. safe on all types of rims.

2. there are quite a few members on here that dont have any f150 whom I gladly take advice from. There isnt a person on here who wouldnt listen to Boss about detailing.

 

I use the DA frequently. If i have a tight spot, simply put the 4inch pad on and bingo. that small pad doesnt need the kind of rpm that a rotary puts out.

 

Why don't you guys lay off of thump. :e never said anything offensive to you. He has a rotary and a text panel so he isn't regurgitating what others say. I wouldn't feel comfortable either using it on my mustang (if i had one)

It just seems like a lot of really unnecessary hatred from you guys.

As for that guys rims I know i don't have you 20 years experience but a rule of thumb I have heard around here is to use the least aggressive method first. I think it would be better to use that brush and soap and water or the other tire gel/cleaner before jumping straight to a 50 50 acid solution.

Just my 2 cents

 

shows your level of not having knowledge either....you write it off too because you are scared of it...you hear acid and think it will cut into metal in a few seconds....on ph scale water is 7 any thing above that or below is an acid or base...i would bet the water that you wash your car with is not dead on 7 so that would make it an acid or base....but the acid i speak of in your closed mind must be 14....its not hcl....what makes it unsafe, because you have not used it and dont think that it is....another just talking out of his a$$ with no knowledge of the product that i speak of

i did not post the suggestion over there, because too many guys that have never a professional acid based wash will yell no dont use it...so i quit suggesting it...it something that works, follow the other sheep or keep your head in the sand and buy all your stuff over the counter at auto zone and walmart

 

Don't worry Andrew. I can take the bashing, it doesn't hurt my feelings.

It just shows their true characters. I find it pretty amusing, it's giving me something to laugh about today.

 

I have a question. You have the DA and then you can step up to the Flex and then I guess a full blown rotary like the Makita right? Now in the right hands the Makita would be the best machine for a full corrective process on a cars paint right? Here's my question though. Now say you own all three machines and you've done corrective work with the Makita and now the time has come to do another detail but your paint isn't in bad shape... do you step back down to the Flex or DA seeing as they're less aggressive or do you still use the Makita? Is it the same idea as using the least aggressive polish/compound first before going to something more aggressive?

 

My level of knowledge? you do your acid 50/50 wash on some ferrari or lambo chrome rims, wait 6 months and see what happens. but wait, you've been doing this for 20 years so you've already done this kind of rims. right? how am i talking out of my butt? i use a product that works great and causes no problems. if it works so well how come no one else has agreed with you on this? such inflamatory comments from someone who knows nothing about my detailing. whats the name of your company? wheres your website? whats the nicest car you've done? whats the longest you've spent on a car? how many cars have won best in show that you've detailed?

 

Where did you get your 20 years of experience?

 

That is a good question. In the right hands, in my opinion, the rotary is almost always going to produce and equal or better result than a DA. That doesn't mean it is always the best solution, as there are times when the DA will get the paint far enough that the majority of people will not see the difference, with the trade off being DA is almost always the least agressive of the two, which follows the "always use the least agressive method possible" mantra.

The majority of the time I use either my DA or my Dewalt. Usually when I have my flex in my hand, I usually end up wondering to myself "why did I pick this thing up". LOL .. My opinion on the flex is differnet than a lot of peoples.

If I am in my own garage working on someone's car, it almost never gets used. I will use the DA, or step straight to the Dewalt. Where I end up using the flex a lot is if I am working at someone else's location, and I don't want to drag two machines with me.

I think the flex is a more versitile tool than a a DA or a rotary, but it is not a replacement for either, in my opinion. It is not as easy to use as a DA, and by that I mean physically. You have to hold the trigger down, and it does not lend itself to one handed operation for LSP application like a DA does, and it is heavier than a DA.

in a nutshell, I would compare them with this starement. When I am trying to decide on what machine to grab there are times when I grab my FLEX instead of my DA, but there has very seldom been a time when I grabbed by Flex instead of my Dewalt.


troberts6874 made a good point earlier about learing how to use a rotary. Avoid edges and angles, and as long as you are using a foam pad, you are lowering the chances that you will damage something.

Get a practice panel and go to town.



sorry for the long winded post.

 

Dan get on AIM.

 

For what it's worth, I worked at a professional full service car wash for a couple of years, and we used dilluted acid to clean ALL the rims that came through the place (except aluminum ones). We had some stuff called F350 (i think) that cut through all kinds of grime, and something else called All-Sol (or something like that) that cut through tar, sticker residue, etc. All those products worked GREAT, but I never hear anyone talk about them here.
I forget the supplier we used there, but it was osme good stuff.

 

No offense, but its not worth much.