![](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/60d396044467b671339185bd/ca8c033c-dc63-4274-a86c-8d78d34c3bb5/polish-11.jpg)
Paint Correction Specialist in Houston Breakdown The Process
Want to know our paint correction process? This gives you deeper look into how we go about getting the proper results. Although this is meant to go more in detail, it’s far from describing every single last step that we do to achieve your desired results.
We’ve gone through many trial and errors with technique, tool selection, and product selection to find what works best. This process is also applicable to our paint polishing services, however, the paint part that’s going to be missing is step 8, the correction phase.
Initial step) We will first discuss what you’d like to achieve with your vehicle and how much work you’d like to get done on it. Ideally, we’d like you to bring in the vehicle for a Test Spot Assessment so we can see what type of results we can produce for you, how much it will cost, and how long it will take.
1) Inspect the vehicle: We’ll take paint measurements around the vehicle to see how much clear coat we have to work with. We inspect the wheels, tires, and paint to see if there’s any special areas we should note for taping or to be more careful while polishing.
2) Clean the wheels, tires, and wheel-wells: We’ll rinse down the wheels/tires/wells, spray our wheel cleaner, agitate with various brushing (ensuring we get into all the tight areas), and thoroughly rinse once done.
3) Wash the vehicle: We rinse the vehicle down to remove any loose debris. Next we’ll foam it down with our pressure washer and begin our towel-wash method using proper wash techniques (light pressure, moving side-to-side, and regularly flipping sides). We then rinse the vehicle.
4) Decontaminate the paint: It’s now time to use the iron remover and the clay bar treatment to remove any stuck on above surface contaminants that didn’t come off with the wash. This is where the paint feels super smooth. This is imperative to do as this can interfere with the paint correction results.
5) Dry and blow the vehicle: To move on to the next phase, we need to make sure the vehicle is completely dry. In combination with a drying towel and a blower, we’ll get the paint, wheels, and trim completely dry.
6) Panel prep the vehicle: To ensure the paint is ready for correction, we’ll wipe down all the panels with a wax/grease remover to make sure there’s nothing on the surface. We want to make sure it’s a completely “naked” surface while we’re polishing. Things like leftover polish/wax residue can get in the way of the correction.
7) Tape the sensitive areas: Going back to step 1, we’ll tape off the areas that need it like trim, chrome, glass, or anything else that we want to protect. This will differ car-to-car but the point here is to avoid getting compound/polish on the any surfaces that’s it not supposed to be on.
8) Correction phase: Now it gets down to the main part of the job and that’s to remove the majority of the imperfections in the paint with the correct process. This is the first of two steps to bring out maximum gloss and clarity. This part of the job, although seems rather short and simple in this small description, can take 8 to 12 hours to complete.
9) Polishing phase: After the correction phase, the paint is now level and looking much better. But to get the most gloss, we have to follow it up with a polishing step to refine the results from the correction step. It sounds a bit counterintuitive, but the correction steps removes 90% of the imperfections, but also leaves behind very micro-hazing (intentionally). It’s the polishing phase that cleans up that to reveal an amazing shine.
10) Remove tape and prep paint: Once the paint correction is complete and we’re happy with the results, we’ll take off the tape and prep the paint once again to remove any polish residue left from the correction steps.
11) Apply protection to the paint: 90% of the work is complete. Now it’s time to apply your choice of protection. Whether that’s a ceramic coating or traditional wax or sealant, the paint will be shinning and protected. A ceramic coating will give you years of protection while the wax/sealant can give you up to 6 months (in ideal conditions).
12) Touch up everything else: It’s time to dress the tires, wheel-wells, wheels, wipe down the door jambs, clean the exterior glass, and any other minor details that’ll complete the look of the vehicle.
And that’s a wrap! Of course, once we actually work on your vehicle, depending on the size and condition, can take 12+ hours to complete. This is why we require you to drop off the vehicle at our shop location.
There’s a lot of steps, both small and large, that will contribute the to overall process and results. When we have it in our shop, we can much better control the factors.