JLs Detailing: Dually 3500

[JLs Detailing]

(25-11-2008 07:41 AM)springbok Wrote:  Your attention to detail is truly remarkable.

It's a pity that most of the products you use and recommend are not available in this country.

I particularly liked what you did with the wheels.

Talking of the wheels, just an observation. The wheels look too small for the wheel wells. Anybody else here notice that?

Thanks springbok much appreciated! Yes Carn and I have talked about how unfortunate it is that a lot of the products I like you don't have. And not only do you not have it but shipping is a killer to get it there. Oh and I agree with you about the wheels, they are just not big enough to give the right look.

(25-11-2008 08:10 AM)Starvekos Wrote:  Another great read and excellent work JL. This truck is hooog. Also love the results on wheels, did you seal them after cleaning? Why do you lace the tires with Hyper Dressing before applying tire dressing?

Starvekos I didn't seal the wheels as that is an upcharge and he didn't want to pay for it as he is having me clean them every 2 weeks. Since I am maintaining them so regularly there really isn't a need to seal them.

I do the base coat of Megs HD because even though I like the look it gives most of my clients want something a little more shiny. Not greasy super shiny just a little more than matte. Also I refuse to use a solvent based tire dressing as they sling so bad and are generally just not good for the rubber. So since I only use water based dressings I go with a coat of Megs HD @ 3:1 since its cheap and then put a more expensive water based tire dressing like the Optimum on top of it to give it a perfect look and more durability. Lets face it as much as I love Megs HD after a rain its gone so putting something on top gives the look and durability I'm looking for with a water based dressing(s).

(25-11-2008 09:17 AM)freerider Wrote:  Very nice work JL, how long does it take you to complete something this size, from start to finish?

Thanks freerider! I did this truck in about 5 1/2 hours start to finish. Now mind you that is "no" paint correction. I do deep clean the paint with the DG 501 polish but no real correction is done. Since its a work truck and when it comes back every 2 weeks it almost looks like that again there is just no need for him to pay for paint correction as it wouldn't last. Now when I do paint correction it takes much longer. I would say this truck would have taken me at least 15-20 hours with paint correction. Also the interior although dirty was a breeze thanks to the rubber mats and no carpeting, so that cuts down on the time as well.

(25-11-2008 09:55 AM)megesh Wrote:  

(25-11-2008 09:17 AM)freerider Wrote:  Very nice work JL, how long does it take you to complete something this size, from start to finish?

and how many people you have working with you?

megesh its just me working on these details. I don't have any help except the few times my wife's uncle is in town or we go for a visit like the ones I posted earlier. 95% of my details I do alone, but I would kill to have someone to do interior work for me.

(25-11-2008 11:03 AM)Carn Wrote:  Terrific work JL, well done once again

When you have some time I would love to hear more about the CR Spotless System, definately something on my wishlist but at $300 or so it's really pricey

Thanks Carn means a lot from my bud! As far as the CR Spotless goes I would not detail without it. Now how cost effective it is depends on the quality of your water. The water from my municipality is very very good. The Total Dissolved Solids reading (TDS) right out of the tap is about 100. Most municipalities probably run about 300 or more and CR says you should get about 250 gallons of de-ionized water from the CR Spotless before having to change the resins. With my water at 100 I get about 800 gallons of de-ionized water. So I was able to get close to 70 washes done before having to change out the resins. Now when I traveled to my wife's uncles house to do those BMWs I had to use their water and it was from a well. There is no telling what the TDS reading on that water was but it wreaked havoc on my CR.

The CR Spotless has an inline TDS meter that tells you the purity of the water leaving the CR. It starts at 000 and escalates as it pulls impurities out of your water. Once it reaches a reading of 020 CR recommends changing the resins as it can't gaurantee a spotless rinse once it gets above 020. Before going to do those BMWs my TDS meter was reading 000 and after doing those 4 cars down there with water no where near as good as mine it was reading 013. If I lived in that area I don't think the CR would be finacially smart. Now how does it work well:

The CR unit uses a mixed resin bed to take out anions and cations to make the water pure. Deionized water has actually used resin beads to take out cations (magnesium,calcium,iron,etc.) and anions (silica) out of the water and demineralize it. It exchanges these cations and anions for Hydrogen and OH or HOH (can't remember exactly which one) ions. This demineralizes the water and thus gives you "pure water".

Now Reverse Osmosis units do the same thing that the spotless systems do. RO's are ususally used when you have a large volume of water that has to be demineralized. An RO basically "squeezes" the impurities out of the water by sending it through the RO unit at a very high pressure. I don't think you have to be concerned with changing media with an RO unit but the down side is you have a lot of "RO reject" water for every gallon of "Pure water" you recover.

Now if you didn't have a "mixed" resin bed in the CR and the resins were seperated and one canister contained the resins for the anions and the other canister contained the resins for the cations then you could regenerate it yourself when the reading got high. You would simply use acid in one to regenerate it and caustic in the other to regenerate it and once you rinsed them with the chemicals and then rinsed them again with water you would have regenerated resins ready to de-ionize again. Unfortunately since CR uses mixed resins you can't do that and have to buy new resins from them each time your TDS reading gets high.

The system does work though and I can wash a black car in the middle of summer in the middle of the day with the sun directly overhead and leave it to dry. When it is completely dry from sitting in the sun there will not be one single waterspot on the car!