Picking up new Roadster Sat

kenchan

first thing i did was removed all contaminants with clay and the proceeded to remove swirls from the dealer-installed "washing" and put some wax on it.

since my Z is a hobby car i use wax (Griot's), but if yours is a dd i recommend you use polymer sealants as they last longer in the baking sun and weather. for off the shelf stuff, NXT TechWax works very well for beginners.

RomRox

Did you find claying your car actually put in some swirls in itself? I clayed my car after I got it from the dealer.... I saw that the paint was perfect in terms of swirls .... still had SOME contaminants on the paint, but it was swirl free. After I clayed, i found a ton of swirls on it. Luckily Adam's swirl remover took most of my clay-swirls out, but still have some deeper lines in the clearcoat that just dont seem to want to come out with the orange pad (2nd strongest cutting pad).

It's a black car so you see EVERYTHING on it when its out in direct sunlight.

kenchan

which clay did you use? the meguiar's blue (soft) was too coarse for my Z's paint so used Griot's yellow clay (super soft) and no issue.

also the towels you use can incluce swirls if you're not careful.

RomRox

I used Mothers yellow clay. It was super soft... easy to stretch etc etc.

I used a foam gun using DP super foaming formula as lubricant. Also to dry, used Adam's microfiber towels to dry. But, looking at how the swirls/scratches appeared, i think it came from my claying because i went up and down, not side to side and thats how the scratches were.

I obviously did something wrong to get the swirls. Maybe i'll use the detail spray next time that came with the claying kit. I just know that someone else on here (a professional detailer) said that the detail spray is fairly expensive to use just for claying and that using car wash shampoo and water would do just fine.

Anyhow, alittle more work to get those swirls out, just not happy that i had to go through that extra proccess and not be able to remove 100% of the swirls at that.