Mobile-Image: C63 bliss...

[Carn]

This past weekend I had the opportunity to spruce up a nearly new C63 AMG

This particular car was almost brand new with only 6000km or so on the clock. The front end had some sandblasting already, no doubt due to it being driven in anger (who could resist with the sound of that engine )

Righty then, onto some pics...

The car on arrival...Aside from some dust from having been parked for a while the car appeared to be relatively clean








Wheels weren't too bad


Pipes needed a clean...



1st up the wheels and this time I decided to put a new product to the test...3M's Wheel and Tire cleaner. This is part of their new retail range so I was keen on seeing how it would fare, albeit on fairly clean wheels!



Product applied


I elected to use the Ez brush to give a truer indication of the cleaning ability without using stiff bristled brushes


And the results after rinsing


As you can see the barrels came up pretty well with only isolated patches of more stubborn dirt. There was also some stains on the calipers that weren't fully removed so it was out with the Raceglaze XL brush for another go...



Much better!



The wheel back brush came in handy when cleaning up the arches...Rear arches with felt lining


And the front's with APC applied and then scrubbed


And rinsed down


The front wheels with the massive brake calipers needed the use of the slender RG XL brush to clean


And all done


Overall I found the 3M Wheel Cleaner worked pretty well. Whether or not it will be able to match the Sonax on more neglected wheels remains to be seen, but from this initial test it appears to be effective!


After the wheels and arches were taken care of it was time for the wash stage. The car was foamed with a new shampoo sample I received and initial results were promising...




After foaming the car was rinsed and I attended to all the small details (cleaning emblems, shuts, etc). After another rinse the car was washed using the 2BM and then clayed and dried (sorry no pics).


With the car still being almost brand new there was very little in the way of swirling and RIDS. I tried to capture a few but being light in colour with gloomy basement lighting I struggled to capture anything worthwhile showing.

Product of choice today was Menzerna's PO85RE5 finishing polish and 3M's blue Ultrafina polishing pad. Some of the areas with isolated RIDS got P203S on the yellow pad, before being jeweled with the 85RE.




After giving the paint a once over it was time for a final wash before attending to the small details. LSP of choice was Werkstat's Acrylic kit (Prime, Jett and Glos) with trim getting Satin Prot, tires getting my new gel sample and glass being cleaned with Sonax Glass cleaner.

The wheels were sealed with Collinite 845 and came up great!


Tailpipes were scrubbed with abrasive pads and then polished with Raceglaze Alutech metal polish



With everything completed I parked the car for the night and elected to return on Sunday morning to get some photo's outside in the natural light...

Some outdoor shots...Well a lot actually



















Some detail shots...














Wheels and tires...



Some more (sorry I couldn't resist!)





















Parting shot



Thanks for looking