after washing then putting on a coat of wax on my 01 it looked great ... I just washed it this weekend and put it away and i noticed some light scratchs in the paint all over ... it looks like from using the towel to remove the wax ... I mean it isnt something you can see just by looking at it you really have to get up on it and look at a angle . Is this normal or am i doing something wrong ? I used a clean bath towel to remove the wax

thanks

 

check out the cleaning & detailing forum. There are a couple of gurus over there that can set you straight.

 

Get yourself some nice microfiber towels with no polyester or nylon thread. Not cheap but no spiderweb scratches.

lots of good tips at autopia.org.

 

Excellent advice, I don’t use anything other then Microfiber material on my Lightning. I would also add that Zaino gives an absolutely amazing shine…

 

Use micro fiber towels that are 100% cotton. Also recomend using Meguirs NTX wax and detail spray. They work well together. Plus using this wax it takes about 2hrs total to do the whole truck (3 if you do all the jams too). Its very easy to apply and remove. The more coats you put on, the deeper the paint will look. Plus it will get rid of this tiny swirl marks and scratches. They the detail spray is very nice for touch up. About 20 minutes to go over the whole truck. Only use 100% cotton micro fiber towels for the whole process. I got about 8 towels to do the whole truck with in one shot.

 

Thanks guys ... glad to know i can always come here to get the answer to anything to do with my truck ... Where can i get these towels ? And does it matter what i use to apply the wax ?

 

http://store.premiumautocare.net/mictow.html

 

http://www.superiorcarcare.net/micprod.html

If you want you can use this coupon code and save yourself 15%

SU205

Expires 02/18

 

Yes!!!

Use a 100% clean cotton applicator. It is very important that the applicator is clean. You will get scratches in a few ways:

Wash mitt
Material used to dry the vehicle
Material used to put wax/polish on
Material used to take wax/polish off
Material used to dust off light dust on the paint surface


If you want to get real **** about preventing scratches, especially micro scratches here are a few recommendations. First and most important is to know you will never completely prevent micro scratches but the objective is to keep them at a bare minimum and those that do get introduced to the paint keep them as invisible as possible.

First, use a clean wash mitt, preferable like a sheep skin. Use 2 buckets, one with the soap and one with clean water. Rinse your vehicle and get as much dirt off as possible. Next dip your clean wash mitt into the soap and wash a section of the truck.

IMPORTANT, to reduce micro scratches wash in an up & down direction, never in a circular motion. When you have circular scratches they are very noticeable and easy to see. If you have micro scratches in an up & down orientation they are a lot harder to see and notice.

After you wash a section do NOT put it back into the soap bucket until you rinse you wash mitt in the bucket of clean water. Continue to do that until complete. The clean bucket of water will help to insure if you pick up any grit when washing the paint you will rinse it off into the clean water instead of in the soap.

When you dry you vehicle do it in the same fashion, up & down NOT circular, same holds true for putting wax/polish on and taking it off. If you’re using a buffer and are careful you will probably do ok. If you don’t have much experience with a buffer know it is usually the most common cause of putting micro scratches in the paint and since they are in a circular motion they are usually the most visible.

Yes, the above is **** but I have a 2003 sonic blue lightning with very little to no traces of any micro scratches from practicing the above…

 

thanks for the info