2017 Mustang GT Grabber blue

AustinSN

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Sorry this will be kind of long.

I took the week off between Christmas and New Years so I had some time to get some stuff done I had been putting off. One of them was correcting and coating the Mustang, so that's what this thread is for.

I did the work at my mom's place, mine isn't really setup to do much and with one huge box that holds the majority of my stuff it was easy to throw it in my truck and drive over there.

3 days worth of cleaning, I easily could have done this faster but I've learned my back only likes little bites of it. So I mostly worked from 10am to 2-3pm and moved at my own pace.

The car was pretty dirty to start and because it was 15 degrees outside, I elected not to hook up a hose and risk a potential loss on a very expensive house that's on the market. I gave the car a thorough rinseless wash with Ultima Waterless Wash concentrate.

Half my pics were on my big camera, on one memory card and I never moved them over from the other memory card so I'm just positing the ones I have.

Before pics that I have.
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After the wipe down
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This car had rubber all over it from various track days and from the start I told myself I wasn't going to be paint crazy about this car so I ignored it. I wish I would have just taken care of it from the get go. The product I used to remove 90% of the rubber is mother R3 (race rubber remover), and while it does work, a speedy prep mitt does the work about 100X faster with less effort.

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There were other shots of the rubber but no afters so I'll omit them.

I moved onto the wheels after this and used C.A.R bullet proof wheel cleaner and wheel woolies. Admittedly, I would never have bought wheel cleaner as I normally use Zep 505 that's been diluted and I've never had a problem with it. I meant to purchase the C.A.R. iron remover and somehow messed up my order. I figured I might as well use it and I was genuinely impressed with the cleaning abilities. It smells like hell and gave me a terrible head ache (enough to call it a day after I finished claying the car) but it did work.

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To the keen eyed guys, I didn't clean the tires. They are getting near the end of their life and I'll be replacing them so I didn't worry about it.

After the wheels I moved onto clay, I'm not a fan of traditional clay so I go the synthetic route. I know clay can get into tighter places but this worked incredibly well.
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After being blown away at how fast and well this worked (it took maybe 5 minutes to do the whole car). I gave it another quick wipe down with Optimum paint prep to get an idea of what I was working with.

The black on the car was pretty bad.
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Grabber blue really is a nice color, it's actually really difficult to see defects in the paint. I got lucky with this shot, even with a flashlight the swirls were very minor but I have to assume the entire car looked like this. For anyone wondering why I polished the car if I couldn't see the scratches 99% of the time, that 1% you will ruin your day if you get it in the right light, and polishing the paint brings a new level of shine to an already shiny car.
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Day two started out with a little bit of testing on a few different pads. I did most of the car with a white heavy polish pad and a cyan light cutting pad, teamed up with HD adapt which took out most of the larger swirls and scratches and finished down to a very appropriate shine. I use a HF DA, the big guys would probably cringe if they ever had to use a $50 dual action but it does work. It's just incredibly loud and you need to pay attention to your pad speeds as it's easy to slow down the machine with too much pressure and basically get no where.
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I way over loaded this pad initially. I haven't done this in a while but no harm done.

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The roof cleaned up decent as well.

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Turns out there is some flake in the black.

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One thing I really wish I could get on camera was the difference in paint color after polishing. I brought my fiancee over to verify and it's very noticeable in person, the black on the roof was significantly more "black" where it had been cleaned.

I also used whatever beer I could find in the house as mom doesn't drink beer. I actually really like this stuff. It's too easy to down 6 of them though.
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After polishing the car got 3 separate wipe downs from an IPA mixture and Optimum Paint prep. When I did this to my RS I felt like I didn't get the paint clean enough in certain areas and it failed after 6 months in some areas and others it was going strong till the day I sold it. I coated the car with Optimum gloss-coat. It is so incredibly easy to use. It's way easier to apply than a wax.

Put 6 drops on the foam applicator or so and working in small circles for even coverage you get about a panel out of it before you need to add more product. After that, get a good look at it in the light and a minute later, if you have any high spots, hit it with a soft microfiber to knock them down.
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^ I only used a little over half of that 10cc plunger as well, that includes a nasty mishap where the plunger stuck and sprayed probably 1/2 car worth of product. A little goes a very long way.

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I didn't bother with the interior at all, I'll do that another time.

After the car was safely coated and had been curing in a few areas for about an hour I let my fiancee touch the paint with her fingers. She didn't know a paint could be so soft and smooth. Felt good to me too.

I took the car out for a spin and got a surprising amount of thumbs ups and even a guy in a ZL1 gave me a wave.
 

galaxy

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Great color and great job on the polishing. NOTHING...and I mean nothing...beats perfect paint regardless of color. What did you use for polish? I've about 100% converted to Adam's stuff, including polishes and pads.
 

AustinSN

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Great color and great job on the polishing. NOTHING...and I mean nothing...beats perfect paint regardless of color. What did you use for polish? I've about 100% converted to Adam's stuff, including polishes and pads.
HD adapt.

They don't make it anymore but I liked it enough on my last few cars I've polished I bought a big bottle. At this rate it should last me the rest of my life.
 

oneof185

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I've been thinking of doing both my mustangs too but it's too damn cold, even in the garage. Since it's cold there too, what was the temp in your garage would you say? Just curious about cure time etc.
 

galaxy

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Polishing is fine this time of year, but it’s too cold to wax, seal, or coat with anything. It just won’t adhere or cure like it should, and thus won’t last. Even if indoors, it needs to be warm, and the paint/metal needs to be warm completely through. Then kept that way for sometime followings. I don’t do any LSP once it drops into the 50’s, but that’s just me.
 

gimmie11s

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Wow that looks fantastic.

One of these days i need to spend a few days correcting my Shelby.

Black... ugh!
 

AustinSN

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I've been thinking of doing both my mustangs too but it's too damn cold, even in the garage. Since it's cold there too, what was the temp in your garage would you say? Just curious about cure time etc.

It was probably around 60-65. The garage is well insulated.

Polishing is fine this time of year, but it’s too cold to wax, seal, or coat with anything. It just won’t adhere or cure like it should, and thus won’t last. Even if indoors, it needs to be warm, and the paint/metal needs to be warm completely through. Then kept that way for sometime followings. I don’t do any LSP once it drops into the 50’s, but that’s just me.

I was concerned about that initially. I even brought a space heater over to help heat it up, but the sun did that quite a bit better. By the time I did the coating it was probably low 50s outside and in the 60s in the garage.

The flash time on the coating was pretty quick unless it was a high spot. Optimum says 40-80 degrees is the workable range for gloss coat.

I'm confident the paint was warm enough.
 

tones_RS3

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Great color and great job cleaning her up!
 

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