Hey Guys,

I'm after some advice on restoring the tired white paintwork on my White '95 850 Wagon.

The paintwork is in pretty good condition, it's just looking faded.

I went into AutoPro the other day to see what they had in terms of waxes and polishes; and left empty handed, with the exception of a rather large headache. I just don't know where to start or what to use.

What should I do first? And what should I use?

I'm a big fan of a bit of elbow grease, and I don't own any electric polishing equipment.

I'd be forever grateful if someone could give me some step-by-step instructions... "You should start by doing xxx, and then xxx" etc.

The last thing I want to do is destroy my lovely new car!

 

What I did on both of my cars was this.
We went to Walmart and got polishing compound. You put it on like wax and wipe it off using some good elbow grease. You should notice a difference right away. Then after doing the entire car we went over it with the Mothers cleaner wax liquid and it brought it back to looking like new.
Here is a post with pics of the wifes car from when I got it to after it was done. The entire steps are not in the post just pics of the overall progress.
https://volvoforums.com/forum/volvo-850-16/wifes-car-progression-upgrades-23504/
And some pics of mine.
https://volvoforums.com/forum/volvo-850-16/my-progression-upgrades-22381/

 

Wow! I can't believe how well the yellow came up! Nice work!

Pardon my ignorance, but is polishing compound like clay? Can you recommend a brand, or are they pretty much all the same?

 

Polishing compound is actually a very fine abrasive. It is actually removing the oxidized portion of the finish. Clay is not and is only designed to remove grit and grime that is setting on top of the finish. If your finish is gritty then you could clay first, followed by the compound . . . etc.

 

Yes the compound is an abrasive. It comes in like a wax container.

 

I bought a cheapo Black and Decker random orbital buffer from Target ($30) and used the foam pad with ScratchX all over the entire car to remove oxidation, etc.

Here you can clearly see the 50/50 where I have buffed using the ScratchX and have not:


And the result:



Elbow grease can only get you so far. With my buffer I can wax the car in around an hour. After the ScratchX treatment I put Klasse All-in-One on, buffed it off, waited 24 hours, and applied 4 coats of Klasse Synthetic Sealant Glaze over 3 days. Expensive stuff, but the result is totally worth it.

 

Im a fan of using this stuff first to polish the paint with a buffer

the I use this stuff to seal the paint with a buffer.... You will think your paint is Glass!

 

I ended up buying this

And it came up really nice - so now I need some kind of sealer to finish it properly?

 

This will seal that finish!

 

This is what many professionals use



It comes in smaller bottles, just google. It's amazing stuff. You can use it with a buffer and don't have to worry about buffing through the paint..It's not a sealer. To wax/seal I'd recommend Eagle One Nano wax more amazing stuff.

 

If you are still looking for step by step instructions I can write some up for you if you need them. I can also give you a list of product that can actually repair the paint and not just cover up the problem, so when you're done the paint will be both repaired and polished.
Its not that hard to do. I will cost a few hundred dollars to get the right items to properly complete the paint restoration though.
Just PM me if you're stilll looking for help.