Put a Puck on it!
Often overlooked, hand polishing is a very useful skill – both for someone just starting out or even for the more experienced detailer. I often turn to hand polishing for those intricate, delicate areas where machine polishing is not always an option. The whole vehicle can be polished using the same technique as shown below.
The beauty of Scholl Concepts fine abrasives is that they lend themselves nicely to hand work as the polishing particles can be easily broken down leaving virtually no haze or rubbing marks. Used with the Scholl Concepts Hand Pucks you will get consistent and even polishing and finishing.
Today I’ve completed a detail on this Porsche 911 Turbo. Its massive spoiler/engine cover makes it very difficult to machine polish the rear wing areas near the lights, as it gets in the way. So by hand it is!
Products used: S3 Gold Edition High Performance Compound and the Black Hand Puck. Please remember, before any polishing it pays dividends to have the area as clean as possible, so the car has been thoroughly washed and decontaminated prior to compounding.
The Black Hand Puck is key here, and makes for light work in this instance. For poorer condition vehicles you can step up to the White Hand Puck – a firmer version foam which increases the cut from your chosen compound.
Before: As you can see it’s not in bad condition, but there are some fine scratches and swirls that are just ruining the finish slightly, so I’m going to remove them.
Under Pressure: I typically put two large drops of compound on the Hand Puck to start with and spread the polish onto the paint. Then, working in straight lines with an overlapping motion, I start working the polish, gradually increasing the pressure until it goes clear and oily.
Wipe off any residue with a clean microfibre and inspect your work. You may need repeat this step a few times until the desired result is achieved.
Finishing Off: Swirls and scratches are removed.
I followed up this stage with a second polishing stage using Scholl Concepts S30+ easy clean finishing compound. It has a very fine cut, so any slight haze or rubbing marks will be effortlessly removed.
With Scholl Concepts S3 Gold followed by Scholl Concepts S30+, maximum gloss and clarity is achieved.
White (SC-22606): a firmer foam for hand compounding.