If it has paint, it gets polished! by Mike Phillips

[Mike Phillips]

If it has paint, it gets polished! by Mike Phillips

This is me wiping M16 off the lower panels of a 1959 Corvette after doing a multi-step rotary buff-out.

I did all the work in a Glass Shop in Albany, Oregon. After compounding and polishing and wiping the car to a high shine the entire body had a static charge and was attracting glass dust from in the shop.

I used some jumper cables to ground out the body and then blew the dust off and then applied M16 Professional Paste Wax.



Polishing every square inch of an all original numbers matching 1965 Corvette Stingray

Some people skip the hard to reach areas and others don't. I for some reason always feel compelled to get it all.


Mike

 

[Big Dave]

There's a lot less vehicles, and I call them that because there's a lot that aren't really cars anymore, with no paint down low anymore. It's all black plastic trim now, still requires attention, but I don't remember laying down to do it, and the end result isn't as satisfying as perfectly polished paint.

 

[Mike Phillips]

There's a lot less vehicles, and I call them that because there's a lot that aren't really cars anymore, with no paint down low anymore.

It's all black plastic trim now, still requires attention, but I don't remember laying down to do it, and the end result isn't as satisfying as perfectly polished paint.

Totally agree with everything you said. Some people accuse me of only liking to detail classic cars, streetrods, etc. This is true. But there are two reasons.

1: The body styling for any classic Detroit Iron in any version, (restored/hotrodded), looks better to me than any of the modern body

The reason for this article is I wanted to reference it for my Barn Find write up as one of the students, Julia, reminded me of me. BUT - I didn't want to link to it on the AGO forum, so I rewrote and updated it and now I can link to it hear.

Here's the original, you'll see the two pictures that start out the article are now missing. They are still on the AGO gallery somewhere, but after they switched the AGO forum from vBulletin to Xenforo, (like I run here), it's pretty much impossible to not have broken code somewhere, thus a lot of pictures on the AGO forum now do not appear. Luckily, I have a lot of the pictures from my Autogeek days so I can rebuild articles.

If it has paint... it gets polished...



And we're on the new updated version. And here's where I inserted the link to this article. Scroll down until you see this picture and the link to this article is right below it.

Pictures & Videos - February 2026 2-Day Car Detailing Class


Zebra Striping

But yeah, for the most part I can't stand how much plastic is being used for cladding on the sides of new vehicles. It's such a crime. When exposed to the UV rays from the sun, this exterior, pebble textured black plastic trim fades and as it ages, the plastic strains and the weak areas, called the bands, turn white and create the Zebra Stripe Effect

I actually do a deep diver on the problem and the solution in this video/blog article. Lots of pictures.

How to Clean & Restore Black Plastic Trim on Cars

I'll take chrome, aluminum, stainless steel, nickel and even pot metal trim over plastic trim any day of the week

Mike

 

[mc2hill]

Great article (as usual!) Mike. I hate polishing the lower part of the car, so I try to get it out of way first, when I am 'fresh', and save the easy to see parts for later (after doing a test spot first) to get a 'bump' when they are shiny!