A friend and Farm Shop customer, ( not yet club member ) Rab bought herself a lovely "red" Imola edition 323F a few years ago,
and we have always been trying to arrange some time when we can work together to bring the colour back.

In the end Rab decided to leave the F with me for a weekend, last weekend to be exact

I think that this has been my biggest challenge to date, the bodywork was in fairly good condition,
with a few dings and small rust patch on one of the front arches.
The paintwork was very flat and chalky to the touch, here are a few before pics when I moved the F into the garage on Friday evening:

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R1.jpg[/img]

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R2.jpg[/img]

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R3.jpg[/img]

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R7.jpg[/img]

My first job was to hoover the pine spikes, leaves and detritus that had collected behind the bonnet and rear hatch :

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R4.jpg[/img]

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R5.jpg[/img]

The window seals and shuts had built up layers of algae and lichen:

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R6.jpg[/img]

And a couple more before shots on Sat morning before washing:

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R7B.jpg[/img]

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R7C.jpg[/img]

I gave the car a very careful wash with NXT wash, using a soft brush to loosen the lichen etc. Then dried with a water magnet.

Gave the alloys a good clean up with wheel cleaner, dried and applied NXT liquid wax, dressed the tyres.

Working on the bonnet first to determine the products and order.
I started by claying, which removed a great deal of road tar and grime.

Then moved onto the paint cleaner, this had the desired results of removing the oxidised layer and began to reveal the lovely deep red below.

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R8.jpg[/img]

this did confirm that the paint seemed to have no lacquer layer:

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R11.jpg[/img]

The next stage was to use my DA with some ultimate compound to bring up the finish, then applied ultimate polish and wax by hand.

This gave the bonnet a much improved depth:

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R9.jpg[/img]

and quite different to the untreated front bumper:

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R10.jpg[/img]

I worked round the front of the F with the same products, and again improved the wings and bumper colour and finish.

Managed to get both sets of doors and rear wings finished by Sat evening, leaving the rear bumper and spoiler to do:

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R12.jpg[/img]

On Sunday morning I finished the rear of the car:

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R13.jpg[/img]

and started to clean up the exhaust pipe:

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R14.jpg[/img]

I then went round with window clean, and plastrx on the rear panel, numberplates and light lenses.

I was very pleased with the results, not perfect on the plastic bodywork areas but a great improvement.
Rab and her partner Rich were both impressed with the outcome, it "looks so much better than when Rab originally bought it".

some of the "used pads"


[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R19.jpg[/img]
Here are some finished pics:

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R20.jpg[/img]

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R18.jpg[/img]

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R17.jpg[/img]

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R15.jpg[/img]

[img]http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj25/Howiezxi/Rab%20Red%20323F/R16.jpg[/img]

Thanks for wading through

Howie

That is such an improvement. Are you sure its the same car?

mate, that's FDUKin brilliant!

Do you fancy having a go with/on my 'once was nice and red' ba ? :P

Absolutely stunning work Howie, great job!
especially love the pic with the treated bonnet - what a difference

Nice one Howie. I saw it on Saturday and it looked a bit of a sorry state. Much better now!


Mark

Beautiful! absolutly amazing! Polishing is always recommended Results like this are always better when you've put hard work into it! Nice stuff!

I love these paint transformation threads. Would love you to do mine. How much would you charge out of interest?

Nice work

I love working on faded red...big results with relatively little effort on the paint really

this, for example, really didn't take long...and it's by far the worst I have ever seen

[img]http://i168.photobucket.com/albums/u177/marcrs323/Paragon%20Auto%20Finishing/Restoration%20Red%20MX5/050620112653.jpg[/img]

The plastic parts never come up quite as well as the metal bits Howie, I think it's the way the paint reacts with the different substrate - quite often the finish is slightly different from new, let alone after a few years of neglect

Cheers for the comments

I meant to add that it took me about 10 hours in all, including all the preparation etc.

I'm always happy to help fellow 323F members with the cleaning and detailing of their cars,
if anyone would like to make the trip down to our farm to try out some Meguiar's, then send me a pm and I will try to arrange a time.

When I started the job I did think of the work you did on that MX5 Marc

Do agree with you about the plastic areas, the paint on the rear spoiler was really flat, marked and worn right through at the edges too

Was very pleased with the overall improvement, as was the owner.

WOW, looks like a very similar project to ours when we first bought it

Stu

Thats awesome chap, wish I could get that kind of finish on my bonnet and front bumper, no matter how hard I try, I still can't get rid of the water stains on the bonnet or get the bumper to shine And I AM using megs too

I do like the Imola wheels as well

That "Rab" is a really lucky person--must be my twin rebel! Never noticed this before so thanks for adding the link on your other post. I remember when you did this and made the car look brand spankin new! Amazing talent came out of your man cave that weekend!!!