General > Detailing
Newbie detail-help/guideline
Leebo310:
Yeah I've noticed a few people like that on there already too....
Shame really as there's also a lot of really helpful people on there.
Ha, good work on the guide, looking forwarf to reading the epic masterpiece! :smiley:
Are you a detailer or is it just a hobby? Your knowledge is incredibly good whatever!
xjay1337:
Yeah I mean, if you are knowledgable about something it is hard to appear "non arrogant" without using loads of smileys (then you can appear a bit special) :jumping: :jumping:
I am like that sometimes I will come across as a bit up myself even when I'm not really and whatever I wrote is not meant to offend. So you have to be careful HOW you says rather than what you actually say, which makes no sense to me but hey :stupid: :stupid:
I do it as a hobby. I'm not a professional detailer haha. I feel, given a unit, I could be pretty comfortable doing it professionally or working alongside someone who does it already. Problem is working outside there is only so much you can do. I feel definitely limited by my environment.
Problem is on my current salary working in IT, it is next to impossible unless you're VERY highly regarded (eg Kelly at KDS level or Polished Bliss) to earn enough to do it as a living. - Basically you have either got a HUGE presence within the detailing community and a good customer base, or you are the only guy (or group of guys) in the middle of an area where there is a high demand for detailing but few people who actually do it.
I mean let's say you charge someone £300 to do their car for a 2 stage correction (so we're talking about 80-85% correction) along with a ceramic/si02 sealant such as Cquartz.
I did a 90% correction on my friends Audi S3 to return a favour (so didn't charge him anything!) and with him helping me do things like tape up the car and apply the wax I spent over 18 hours on correction alone. I spent probably 23-24 hours on it in total.
So let's round it down and say you save time by doing things differently and you get a 80-90% correction down to 25 hours (and trust me you can spend 45+ hours chasing perfection).
In a normal working week there are let's say 40 hours - So by the time you've paid your unit's rent, insurance and products out of that £300 you probably TAKE HOME about £100. (that's just a rough calculation).
So on the basis you work 8.30-5 Monday - Friday and a couple of extra hours in the evening a few days a week, you manage to do 2 cars and after your expenses, your actual take home is around £200. Which to me is not enough to live on.
Thing is doing something for fun and doing something for a living are VERY different. And I wouldn't want to get sick of doing detailing.
Detailing is hard work it is a lot of effort and you need to concentrate on what it is you're doing.
The best money is in Enhancement details where you do a single stage machine polish to get about 60-70% of the swirls out and top with a decent carnuba wax or sealant. These can be done in 6-8 hours (normal day basically) and you can pay up to £150 to have this done at a "professional".
Many decent detailers also offer a simple wash & dry! (with other things like a decent wheel clean and trim dressings and what not) but still charge £50 for a couple of hours work..
Local to me a friend of mine does do it professionally. His quality of work is amazing and he has built up (with hard work and nothing but word of mouth reputation) a very large and loyal customer base doing Ferraris, M5s, Aventadors, anything... But even so I'm not sure if it'd be enough for him to work it full time. I believe he still works in his day job and does this on the side.
I don't step on his customers or business as I support what he does - I only do friends and family, people who wouldn't pay his (very very reasonable) prices so I do it for them for £50-100. People who I do wouldn't ever pay someone else that amount if it makes sense? If a friend comes to me saying they've already gotten a price from this guy and if I would dp it for less, I'd say no and tell them to use him.
It's not really a masterpiece haha it's actually pretty poor I think but hey :scared:
Edit: well that turned out to be longer than I thought LOL :drinking:
Leebo310:
Yeah definitely agree with that, it's hard to get a point across in just text as people read it however they want. What some read as tongue in cheek others read as "being a d1ck"! You can't win sometimes when you're only trying to offer advice! :signLOL:
Yep, when you break it down like that it makes you realise it must be really hard to turn over a decent amount, and actually how much consistant effort is involved. Plus there's no real room for error or complacency that you could have on your own car for example.
I love doing my own cars and therefore don't mind spending x amount of hours but I'm not sure I would love doing other peoples so much day in, day out! Yep you'd get to work on some amazing cars but then that brings a whole heap of added pressure knowing you're working on something worth 100k plus, and the fact it isn't even yours! :surprised:
Chris92:
I have one or two more silly questions then I'm all good to go at it this weekend should of had it done by now.
When applying polish and wax (by hand) do I need to tape my car up with that blue tape?
Is tape needed when using a clay bar on the car?
Can I clay bar plastic such as wing mirror, front bumper etc?
I take it its ok to apply wax without polish so after every wash will I need to top up on the wax on the car? I'm going to be using collinite 476s as my winter wax I hear it durable but was wondering if it requires a top up any thing?
That's all I need to know even if they are daft things to ask just want to get it right :happy2:
Oh LEEBO310 I just read what you wrote early on in this thread and what did you mean by using a snow foam first then as a 'main' snow you used....... I Throught you just snowed the car with the same stuff in one detail session? Or do you mean you use a different snow when your doing the whole thing again and just use another snow foam that won't strip wax every time your washing it?
Cheers :happy2:
xjay1337:
No you don't need to tape up the car to clay or hand polish.
And clay bar is fine to use on plastic.
After waxing any polish you apply will remove any wax. If you want to top up the Collinite which you shouldnt need to, but a carnuba spray wax would be fine or carpro reload.
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