Stuart had called in the week and opted for a Gold Waxxx Detail to sort out his Vauxhall VX220 Turbo which was suffering from severe swirl marks and light surface scratches all over. With the forthcoming weekend being a free one, the VX220 Turbo was booked in for a one day detail.

Stuart arrived on Saturday morning at around 9.15am and we went around the VX220 Turbo with Stuart pointing out the defects. As the weather was very dull and with the car being extremely filthy, it was quite difficult to see any defects although Stuart confirmed they were present and showed up under street lighting like a sore thumb. Stuart wanted as good a correction as possible and would await my call when the detail was complete and headed off.

After finally figuring how to get the VX220 started and into motion with the big silver starter button on the dash (a quick call to Stuart sorted this problem out), I drove the car up the driveway to begin the detail. I decided the best course of action would be to thoroughly wash and clay the car before putting it under the halogens to see what horrors lay in wait.

I began the detail by rinsing the wheels and applied Meguiars All Purpose Cleaner diluted 4:1 and watched as the APC worked its magic breaking down the brakedust in just under 5 minutes. Although the APC has many uses, I had tried it out on the wheels of a very dirty Ford Puma and have not looked back since. I then worked the alloys with a range of wheelbrushes and another dose of APC until they were spotless. APC was then applied to the wheel arches and scrubbed clean with an abrasive long-handled brush. I then proceeded to wash the car with Meguiars Shampoo Plus and rinsed clean. Using a new block of Fine Poly Clay with Meguiars Last Touch diluted 1:1 acting as lube, I clayed the car over. Surprisingly, considering how dirty the car was to begin with, the clay removed very little and I washed the car again with Meguiars Gold Class Shampoo & Conditioner, rinsed clean and dried with a Sonus Der Wunder Drying Towel ready to see what lay in wait under the halogens.

By this stage it began to rain so into the garage the VX220 went. Well, as Stuart had explained, the car was suffering from severe swirl marks, light surface scratches together with holograms which showed up under the lights.

Onto polishing then and I taped up a test area on the bonnet and gave it a hit with Menzerna Intensive Polish PO85RD 3.02 on a brand new Sonus SFX-2 Polishing Pad with the Porter Cable 7424 on speed setting 5. Only achieving around 60% correction, I gave it a further hit with Meguiars #83 Cleaner/Polish and there was little marked improvement. I therefore tried another hit with Intensive Polish PO85RD 3.02 and achieved around 90% correction which I was pleased with considering it took three hits. I proceeded to use the same pad and polish combination having to hit certain areas twice to achieve a good correction. Marring and holograms were removed with Menzerna Final Finish PO85RD on a Sonus SFX-3 Finishing Pad which also refined the finished.

Although the VX220 is a small car, it does have a large area of bodypanels and a number of tight spots and the polishing stage of the detail was more time consuming than I had first envisaged having to swap between 4” and 6” pads a number of times.

Onto LSP and I decided to use my new purchase; Chemical Guys JetSeal109. Allowing 20 minutes between each application I applied two coats and also worked the same into the alloys to act as a wheel guard and I was extremely happy with the finish all round. The JetSeal109 worked wonderfully well and brought out a tremendous flake from the black paintwork. However, being a wax enthusiast, I could not resist applying a layer of wax and reached for Swissvax Best of Show. As per usual, Best of Show added a fantastic wetness and rich depth to the paintwork and worked extremely well in tandem with the JetSeal109.

Onto the wheels and arches and I dressed the tyrewalls with Chemical Guys New Look Trim Gel and the wheel arches with Meguiars All Season Dressing. The windows were polished with Meguiars Glass Cleaner Concentrate and the grills were lightly dressed with New Look Trim Gel.

Stuart arrived on cue and was delighted with the finish and commented on how well the car looked after a good clean. I explained that I had achieved 90% correction although it was a right old slog with the tight spots, curves and proportions and had applied two coats of JetSeal109 followed by a coat of Swissvax Best of Show which would act as excellent protection over the coming winter months. Stuart was clearly happy and said he would recommend his friends to Hotwaxxx which was warmly appreciated.



The photos - click thumbnails to enlarge