OK so my truck has some bad scratches around the bed/tailgate/rear door area, seeing as how I bought it used I don't know how it was treated before I bought it.... However I am curious as to how to attack these scratches. I guess I want to try to buff them out, but some are pretty deep, through the clear and the paint, is there anything that can be done for these short of repainting the area? I also want to claybar and wax my truck as it needs it badly. I live in a pretty harsh desert climate (El Paso) and want as much protection for my paint as possible. I currently have The wax shop products, and have only used their car wash, but I am very unhappy with it.... any opinions on the mr clean auto dry? the water here is very hard and spots easily and the spots are damn near impossible to remove.... any input would be appreciated.....

 

Hard call being that it's sight unseen.

Are the scratches 'through' the color coat? In short, can you see grey through the scratches? Are they very fine? Almost not-noticable unless you look at them in the right light? Let us know on that... we can probably help a bit more if we have more description since scratches come in several different flavors -- as do their remedies.

I'd definitely go with a synthetic product for your protection. Mothers SynWax, Meguiar's NXT, or the Zaino system would all be good choices for last step products -- last step because there sounds like there may be many steps that you should go through before applying it to do it 'right'.

Car Wash Shampoos -- again, there are lots of great ones out there. I've never used the 'Wax Shop' product but, I'm not sure I've heard much about it either. I have, however, tried a plethora of shampoos out there and, for my money, I still prefer Meguiar's Gold Class shampoo. You can buy it by the gallon at Target for $10 and it's WELL worth it. Sonus and a few others make my list too but are much more expensive and I just don't feel much difference between them -- Gold Class is a great buy in my opinion.

Mr. Clean -- Some love it, some hate it. Some think it's a great idea but fell short because they tried to make it a mega-consumer product and thus, those that are true enthusiasts didn't buy in... I'm in the last category. The water filter thing is a GrEaT idea for those of us who have horrible water quality at the tap (me) but, it just doesn't give the pressure that I want and the replacement cartridges get spent QUICK with my water quality (did I mention that my water sucks?).

Either way, I don't think you're going to be able to use it like a 'touch-free' system as they promote it. I still feel that you'll have to have a nice mitt or sponge to get the 'film' off of the vehicle but, again, for that last rinse, it may benefit you from a spot-free standpoint. I still found, though, that I needed to blot dry several areas because it simply wasn't totally spot-free... you can obtain spotfree but, the systems are pretty expensive and replacement cartridges for a DI system aren't cheap (hence, I still use a true in-line softener that can be recharged).

I hope that helps a little... let us know on the scratches.

RP

 

My idea of the damage comes around to this remedy:
Claybar
Meg.'s step 1
Meg.'s Scratch-x
Step 2
NXT(let dry 12 hours)
Step 3 (2 coats)

If your scratches are shallow enough, this should do the trick.

 

some of them are through the color coat and pretty nasty, up near the bed rail (probably someone throwing something over the side of the bed carelessly) and on the tail gate; I would go as far as calling them gougues in the paint I am pretty convinced that those color fill products are garbage even without ever having used them.... so I am kind of stuck on what to do on this one. I do feel you on the water, as el paso water is the worst stuff I have ever seen so that's why I was wondering about the mr clean system, is for the rinse filter. Any input on these bad scratches is a help!

 

If they want sand out with 2000 grit, they might be to deep to buff out, you might have to buy some paint (get color code of the door jam) and get a fine hair brush and touch them up, i did that on my truck and cant even hardly tell, hopes this help

 

My tailgate got keyed badly so I thought that it would be cheaper to buy a tailgate off of ebay. So I got a new tailgate off of ebay (same color) but while I was waiting for that to arrive I found a great bodyshop to repaint my tailgate and paint my LT handle that I had for $250. Same price that I paid for the now extra tailgate that I now have laying around. I did have to strip all the hardware, badges and the rail protector off of the tailgate for that price but since I had custom badges ordered it was no biggy. I also installed an electric tailgate lock while I was at it.

 

If they're through the color coat the only way to remedy something like this is to replace color coat. Two ways to do this -- touch up paint (be it in a tube or professionally air brushed on) or respray (be it a rattle can (which I don't recommend) or a body shop). Sorry, there's no easy fix here....

I'm @ work at the moment and don't have all of my links on my laptop but, if you do a little searching here on 'rock chip' repair, you'll find some links that can direct you towards doing some of your own touch up, sanding, and polishing to get it back to par. Sanding alone will not help your situation -- you need to replace that color coat.

RP

 

thats what i was afraid of.... my skills as a body man or a paint man are very limited, the only thing I have ever painted was the racecars and they only have to look good from the grandstands! so I guess it's time to start doing my homework on prep/paint for touch up....