Polished Bliss®: Ferrari F40
Posted: Thu Jun 23, 2011 10:09 am
I'm conscious of posting too much work in here, but I really couldn't not post this, could I?
It's just such a stunning piece of machinery - yes, the panel gaps are comical and the welding is rather Italian but does it matter? It even smells awesome.
As ever, this is Clark's write-up (he did all the work) so it's his words.
"The car that launched a thousand posters" as they say, and one I was delighted to have sat in our Studio at the start of this week (and what a bad time Alan had chosen to take his Holidays!
)
As you can see this one does get used:
Lots of old product residue and a couple of the wheels look like they hadn't even been buffed off last time they were polished/sealed:
The aim of this detail was to clean and protect all surfaces inside and out whilst giving the paintwork a light machine polish to remove some of the more noticeable scuffs etc.
I had planned on doing a step by step picture guide for the wash stages but as you can see it was raining rather hard and I didn't fancy getting the camera wet...
So instead, this was the process carried out:
- Wheels, tyres and arches pre-rinsed.
- Wolf's Deironizer, EZ & Swissvax brushes for the wheels.
- Meguiars APC (4:1) for the tyres and arches.
- Meguiars APC (10:1) for all exterior trim and badges.
- Foamed with Meguiars Hyperwash & thoroughly rinsed.
- Paintwork washed with 2BM & a new test shampoo.
- Autosmart Tardis on a few small areas of paintwork.
- Clayed with Meguiars Mild Detailing Clay.
- Dried off with PB Lux Drying Towel and the Black Baron.
With the car now clean and dry there were alot of random scratches and almost cat claw type marks visible in the paintwork:
Machine polishing was going to be the only way to remove/improve this but first I had to measure the paint thickness to make sure it was safe to do so.
As there are no metal panels on the F40 a normal paint gauge wouldn't work so the Positector 200 was needed in order to give readings on the composites:
The paintwork was slightly thicker than I was expecting with a few low areas but certainly nothing scary
Menzerna 203S and a Lake Country HT Crimson Spot pad were used with the DAS-6 Pro for the smaller areas:
Whilst correction wasn't really the aim for this detail (just to try and reduce the deeper marks) this achieved a good result with minimal paint removal (approx 2 microns removed).
Before:
After:
Before:
After:
Before:
After:
Before:
After:
Before:
During:
After:
The larger areas were done with a Wolf's finishing pad that Jesse had kindly sent for me to have a play about with:
Scratches removed from front end (you might have to look hard to see them)
Before:
After:
The rotary was used for the rear quarter windows which are made from Lexan. These were badly scratched so Menzerna 3.02 and a LC HT Tan spot pad was used to greatly improve them,
Before:
After:
The scratches left were on the inside which could be removed given more time but I didn't have days to spend on this one unfortunately.
The rear screen which is also made of Lexan was polished with 203S but due to a new backing plate I'm testing there's no pics of that yet
With all that done I dusted the car down with a Lambswool duster and then treated the glass with Nanolex.
First up was the cleaner:
This is applied with a firm foam pad (my own preferred applicator as it ensures you don’t put it on too thick compared to a softer pad):
Then with a spritz of water it's buffed off:
Next up is the application of Nanolex Ultra Glass Sealant:
This was left for a few hours while I attended to the other details.
Swissvax Cleaner Fluid was used to prep the paintwork ready for wax:
Wax of choice was Crystal Rock:
Wheels were protected with Nanolex Ultra Paint and Alloy Sealant:
All 4 dust caps had product residue on them so these were cleaned up:
By the time that had been done the Nanolex on the glass was ready to come off:
Onto the engine bay now, the underside of the rear screen was cleaned with Swissvax Crystal:
The engine bay was largely done by hand with various brushes and microfibers with Meguiars APC (4:1). I found this bit hugely frustrating as I could have spent a whole day on this alone:
Exhausts polished up with Swissvax Metal Polish:
The front end was pretty clean underneath so just a quick hoover and APC wipe down was sufficient:
Interior now and as always, I started with the glass:
Then a good thorough dust out of all the switches etc with a Swissvax Brush:
Followed by a hoover:
The pipe off a spray head makes for a good accessory for getting into the really tight areas:
Don't forget to pull back the seams of the seats when doing interiors:
An APC wipe down followed, including the roof lining which was a bit grubby:
Swissvax Metal Polish was used again for this part:
Another quick hoover followed by a check over and then it was back onto the exterior to finish off a few small bits.
Wolf's Nano Trim Coat was applied to the front lip of the bumper:
Then a few cocktail sticks were used to remove all that old product residue:
It was now nearly 3am Tuesday morning so a final wipe down of the paintwork was all that was left before a bit of time was spent photographing the final result. The pics are in no particular order and you may notice a few look slightly different to the rest as they were taken with my brother's camera
Thanks for looking!
It's just such a stunning piece of machinery - yes, the panel gaps are comical and the welding is rather Italian but does it matter? It even smells awesome.
As ever, this is Clark's write-up (he did all the work) so it's his words.
"The car that launched a thousand posters" as they say, and one I was delighted to have sat in our Studio at the start of this week (and what a bad time Alan had chosen to take his Holidays!
)As you can see this one does get used:
Lots of old product residue and a couple of the wheels look like they hadn't even been buffed off last time they were polished/sealed:
The aim of this detail was to clean and protect all surfaces inside and out whilst giving the paintwork a light machine polish to remove some of the more noticeable scuffs etc.
I had planned on doing a step by step picture guide for the wash stages but as you can see it was raining rather hard and I didn't fancy getting the camera wet...
So instead, this was the process carried out:
- Wheels, tyres and arches pre-rinsed.
- Wolf's Deironizer, EZ & Swissvax brushes for the wheels.
- Meguiars APC (4:1) for the tyres and arches.
- Meguiars APC (10:1) for all exterior trim and badges.
- Foamed with Meguiars Hyperwash & thoroughly rinsed.
- Paintwork washed with 2BM & a new test shampoo.
- Autosmart Tardis on a few small areas of paintwork.
- Clayed with Meguiars Mild Detailing Clay.
- Dried off with PB Lux Drying Towel and the Black Baron.
With the car now clean and dry there were alot of random scratches and almost cat claw type marks visible in the paintwork:
Machine polishing was going to be the only way to remove/improve this but first I had to measure the paint thickness to make sure it was safe to do so.
As there are no metal panels on the F40 a normal paint gauge wouldn't work so the Positector 200 was needed in order to give readings on the composites:
The paintwork was slightly thicker than I was expecting with a few low areas but certainly nothing scary
Menzerna 203S and a Lake Country HT Crimson Spot pad were used with the DAS-6 Pro for the smaller areas:
Whilst correction wasn't really the aim for this detail (just to try and reduce the deeper marks) this achieved a good result with minimal paint removal (approx 2 microns removed).
Before:
After:
Before:
After:
Before:
After:
Before:
After:
Before:
During:
After:
The larger areas were done with a Wolf's finishing pad that Jesse had kindly sent for me to have a play about with:
Scratches removed from front end (you might have to look hard to see them)
Before:
After:
The rotary was used for the rear quarter windows which are made from Lexan. These were badly scratched so Menzerna 3.02 and a LC HT Tan spot pad was used to greatly improve them,
Before:
After:
The scratches left were on the inside which could be removed given more time but I didn't have days to spend on this one unfortunately.
The rear screen which is also made of Lexan was polished with 203S but due to a new backing plate I'm testing there's no pics of that yet
With all that done I dusted the car down with a Lambswool duster and then treated the glass with Nanolex.
First up was the cleaner:
This is applied with a firm foam pad (my own preferred applicator as it ensures you don’t put it on too thick compared to a softer pad):
Then with a spritz of water it's buffed off:
Next up is the application of Nanolex Ultra Glass Sealant:
This was left for a few hours while I attended to the other details.
Swissvax Cleaner Fluid was used to prep the paintwork ready for wax:
Wax of choice was Crystal Rock:
Wheels were protected with Nanolex Ultra Paint and Alloy Sealant:
All 4 dust caps had product residue on them so these were cleaned up:
By the time that had been done the Nanolex on the glass was ready to come off:
Onto the engine bay now, the underside of the rear screen was cleaned with Swissvax Crystal:
The engine bay was largely done by hand with various brushes and microfibers with Meguiars APC (4:1). I found this bit hugely frustrating as I could have spent a whole day on this alone:
Exhausts polished up with Swissvax Metal Polish:
The front end was pretty clean underneath so just a quick hoover and APC wipe down was sufficient:
Interior now and as always, I started with the glass:
Then a good thorough dust out of all the switches etc with a Swissvax Brush:
Followed by a hoover:
The pipe off a spray head makes for a good accessory for getting into the really tight areas:
Don't forget to pull back the seams of the seats when doing interiors:
An APC wipe down followed, including the roof lining which was a bit grubby:
Swissvax Metal Polish was used again for this part:
Another quick hoover followed by a check over and then it was back onto the exterior to finish off a few small bits.
Wolf's Nano Trim Coat was applied to the front lip of the bumper:
Then a few cocktail sticks were used to remove all that old product residue:
It was now nearly 3am Tuesday morning so a final wipe down of the paintwork was all that was left before a bit of time was spent photographing the final result. The pics are in no particular order and you may notice a few look slightly different to the rest as they were taken with my brother's camera
Thanks for looking!
Keep 'em coming! I love these threads. 
