Zaino Question

[davesbedroom]

I have seen so many cars on here look great with zaino on them so I am giving it a try. I currently have 6 coats of Z5 and 3 coats of Z2 on my 97 black cobra. The swirl marks do look less and the finish looks very wet, but there are still visable swirl marks. I dawned the car and claybared per zaino's instructions, and I have been useing 100% cotton towels from Lazaino and I have been only doing 3 coats in 24 hours with ZFX.

My question is, should I keep putting on more coats? Will I ever reach a point where all the swirls are gone? Or am I just wasting time and product? Should I have done prepwork?

 

[VettTheRipper]

Swirl marks are actually super fine scratches in either the wax coat or the paint. They're caused from applying or removing a product in a circular motion when there is some sort of fine dust present or even certain synthetic fibers in the rags. With the wax completely removed (since you clay'd it I'd assume it was) if there were swirl marks in the bare paint...Zaino cannot always hide them since they may be deep. If swirl marks were gone after the prep and appeared after your Zaino application, it's your appication is at fault. There could be dust in the air that you cannot see getting on the car. In the end...Black sux for swirl marks. I was lucky and started using Zaino when the car was new and even still, it's impossible for me to completely eliminate the dust in the air from landing on my car while waxing so I do have a few swirl marks...you just have to look very close to see them and only in certain lighting conditions. Since you started using it AFTER the car had a couple of years on it, yyou will have a difficult time getting rid of them. It can be done...it's just gonna take extra work on an older car.:beer:

 

[davesbedroom]

If even dust causes swirl marks then I'm giving up. I'm just going to drive it.

 

[VettTheRipper]

Originally posted by davesbedroom
If even dust causes swirl marks then I'm giving up. I'm just going to drive it.

I hear ya. I've gotten to the same point. To keep that show look you can't really enjoy the car. I'd rather be driving and live with a few swirl marks.:beer:

 

[tommyhil4_6]

I was suprised out how well 3m's products worked. My car had MAD swirl marks, I mean terrible ones, and I clay'd it, rubbing compound, swirl remover and now i'm on polish. Not 1 swirl mark to be scene in all lights and only 1 coat of polish. I use a foam applicator and then for removal I use micor-fiber towels (costco had 12 for like 10 bucks) and then any left over bits that are hard to remove use a baby diaper. Cleans it up perfect, water beads off and it looks shiny as hell... Hope this helps, BTW my car is DARK AMAZON GREEN - almost black.

 

[davesbedroom]

what 3m product did you use? By the way those microfiber towels from costco are from china and are not 100% cotton!!!!!

 

[RedFireGT]

First post. Anyways, Zaino will only hide imperfections in the paint. Same thing for wax. The only true way to remove a scratch is to level the clearcoat to an acceptable level so that the scratch surface is leveled. If you really want them out, get 3m scratch remover, its a consumer product so its easy to use. Then zaino it.

 

[SVTINBLAK]

You might want to try the Meguiars NXT Generation.....I just tried it myself and it seemed to take out some swirl marks (blackstang).
Redfire suggested the 3m scratch remover and YES I will be trying that as well.
Very good point on JUST drive it...I said that to myself a long time ago! You can drive yourself CRAZY trying to get it it PERFECT!

 

[RedFireGT]

Pretty much all waxes and synthetic polishes will never take out the scratch. Just cover it. That's good enough for most micromarring. For the slightly deeper clearcoat scratches, I used the 3M Scratch Remover. It was the only consumer product I have used that removed the scratches.

 

[davesbedroom]

can you use the 3m scratch remover by hand? I don't have an orbital thing??

I couldn't find 3m scratch remover by name in google.

Is this what you guys are talking about? here