ok, so i got her all cleaned up. used some scratchx 2.0 and followed it with meguiars nxt 2.0 and it looks great.

my question is how much of a difference will i see buying porter cable buffer and and doing a proper polish? i cant imagine it looking much better.

 

General wisdom says a good hand polish vs. machine is the same, only slower. And there is a very real chance of damage using the buffer, so learn from a pro before using.

 

If you have swirls or light scratches you will do a better job using a Porter Cable orbital buffer you will not damage your paint using an orbital buffer because of the way it moves.

 

Hand waxing and polishing builds a bond between man and machine. The car appreciates it more. Would you use a machine on your wife or GF? And, it builds muscle, unless you hang out in the garage drinking beer and smoking cigars while detailing, like I do!

 

I can wash, claybar, polish, glaze, 2 coats of paint sealant and hand wax in about 3.5 hours. Hand prep will give you bonding time with your car — a Porter Cable will give you more driving time with your car. I'd rather be driving.

 

you are comparing apples to oranges. the p/c is used to generate heat which in turn cuts the clearcoat allowing it to blend the micro abrasives and form the shine in the clearcoat. this cant be done by hand.
so if you have swirls and haze use the p/c if your paint is perfect use the hand rub and apply poorboys black hole for dark cars and the million different waxes and glazes

here a perfect example of what the proper tool in the hands of a pro can do. this guys work is beyond genius!!
http://www.benzworld.org/forums/deta...eg-almost.html

 

The p/c doesn't generate much heat at all, at least directed to the paint, which is why it's so safe. With the p/c (Porter Cable 7424, Meguiar's G110 for those who aren't clear) accomplishes leveling of paint through the abrasive action of both the liquid and pad used. It can do remarkable things if you know what you're doing, but virtually no damage if you don't know.

This guy, Presidential Detail, is also a member of meguiarsonline.com and on this project he made use of a Makita 9227 rotary buffer - a completely different tool - along with a Meguiar's Solo wool cutting pad and M105 Ultra Cut Compound. Honestly, about the only way to get more aggressive than that combination of machine/pad/liquid is to wet sand. This is the same approach I had to take on my Crossfire when I picked it up. It had lived on dealer lots for 2 years and was a mess, and this combination was the only way to remove all the defects in the paint. As for heat, this combination will generate a lot and can actually generate too much if you don't know what you're doing. Where the p/c can be learned in literally a matter of minutes, the rotary takes time - often a lot of time. Even so, on a modern clear coat it still isn't the heat so much as the cutting ability of the liquid and the pad that gets the work done. But this combination can offer a lot more cut.

Now if you're working on an old single stage paint, the heat can actually cause the paint to flow again, which helps to level out any defects. While there may still be a tiny little bit of this going on with a modern clear coat, it's a very small percentage of the correction process. After an aggressive rotary polishing session like the one shown in the MB forum thread you can measure how much paint was removed via use of a paint thickness gauge. With a normal p/c buffing session, the vast majority of paint thickness gauges will show no difference in film build.