What's up everybody, welcome back to another episode of Chemical Guys Detail Garage.
I'm Nick, this is Hector, and after that little danger ride, you've seen that Hector has brought
in his new-to-him 2003 Toyota Corolla S. In the case of this vehicle, the S stands for sh...
sport!
It stands for sport.
Sport, I guess.
But you can see that this vehicle was subjected to a lot of harsh elements.
It was left outside and the paint has suffered from it.
The paint on the hood, roof, and also the truck has become beyond repair.
The clear coat has flaked off and now we're left with just bare paint here and eventually
that is going to go straight down to the substrate.
You can see all this kind of cataract looking mess.
That's just the clear coat flaking off.
We wanted to show you guys how well this car can look and also we wanted to show you guys
what can and can't be fixed.
So, Hector already polished the headlights, which look brand new essentially.
Now, this stands out against the rest of the car.
The whole car needs a little bit of love and attention, but that's why we brought it
today into the Detail Garage.
So, Hector, we polished a little section over there, we can talk about that.
We did.
Nick, a lot of the questions we get is: can we polish something that's really really jacked?
Something like this?
And the answer is: You bet you can't.
You can't guys.
You can't polish something like this because it's beyond repair.
As Nick said, it's got a lot of the clear coat coming off.
There's a little bit left just in this little island of clear.
Right in this area, you see that Nick?
It's the island of happiness.
This looks like the map of Alaska and there's a small little...
It's snowing over here.
Anyway, yeah, so you can't.
You're going to be going to the paint and eventually, it's going to come off.
If you go a little too harsh and you're going to get to the metal.
Exactly.
Or in this case, carbon fiber.
It's still metal.
It's metal.
So, on a vehicle like this, you can either sand it down and repaint it, I think you're
going to wrap it...
a little racing stripes.
Something to keep it from getting any worse.
Polishing is going to remove that last remaining bit of clear coat.
It will look shiny for a little while, but eventually, it will just go straight back
to it because the clear coat is that extra layer of protection, but it also enhances
the shine.
So you can see the difference that the clear shines more than just the substrate and metal
by itself being polished.
Having the clear coat on there is what gives it the gloss, but if you want to help prevent
it from getting any worse, you can always add a sealant, you can add a wax, or you can
put a coating on there, but it's not really a feasible or good idea because you're just
wasting that coating because it's still going to come off as well.
What else we got here?
We took a little polisher to the fender.
It looks really, really good.
Come on in.
The clear is still here, you got a really good shine out of it, actually.
It looks like it did back in 2003.
Probably.
Probably not.
It probably looked a little better back then, but anyway... 2010ish.
Oh-10 is that a thing?
I think so, yeah.
Can I say oh-ten?
Eleventy, twelve, sure.
Sure, let's do it.
Yeah, it looks really, really well.
So, again, the hood, the roof, it's kind of a little too far gone, but you can polish
of the stuff on the side here.
It hasn't taken too much of a beating from the sun.
This car was in Mexico, it's not the Mexico you guys think.
I mean, the real Mexico.
Like south of the border.
Not the other Mexico, like Hoonigan Mexico.
It took a harsh beating, it was sitting outside, it was never really washed.
Sandstorms, all that good stuff.
It just sat there for a long time and then I purchased this puppy and now it's here in
its new home.
It's in good hands.
It won't look factory fresh, but it will look a lot better than this.
I only washed it once.
It doesn't even look it.
I wouldn't touch that.
So let's go over the interior.
I sat in there for all of 20 minutes and it was disgusting.
It wasn't the best, Nick, no.
It's pretty jacked.
I haven't touched the interior since I got it.
It came like that.
It was an option, when it squeaks like that, it's a safety thing.
It's got a light to light-heavy coat of dirt.
I wouldn't even call this dust.
It's dirt.
It's like mud.
There's all kinds of stuff, yeah.
What about Chewbacca Jones, right where Chewbacca Jones is sitting is pretty gross.
I don't think anyone has sat back here in 12 - 14 years.
Yeah, poor guy.
Sorry buddy, ok.
Sorry about earlier too.
Look at him, scared stiff.
I know...
I'm sorry.
He didn't use his turn signal, Nick.
You saw that.
I did.
I was riding shotgun.
Everybody else saw that.
Yeah, so we're going to give a nice deep clean and it makes ok for my kids to sit back here,
finally, because they're scared when they sit back here.
They don't want to sit back here.
At least it smells nice.
It does smell delicious.
It's got a cross between overbearing perfume and maybe something that's rotting?
So, yeah Nick, if someone were to come to you and be like: Hey, can you please polish
this?
What would you tell them?
You're wasting your time, essentially, polishing this.
Why?
Because you can get a little bit of shine out of this, but you're just pulling off whatever's
remaining on the surface.
Whatever paint's left, whatever protective coating, you're pulling all that off.
I've seen people kind of cheat it where they're spray a clear coat over this.
You can rattle can it, or just fresh clear, and then cut and buff that, but essentially,
this is exposed paint now.
Oh, a little rust right here.
See, exactly.
You've already got the problems coming out.
There's no fixing that without actually sanding it, priming it.
Cool, man.
Hey, $800, it's a diamond in the rough.
Old Betsy here just needs to get me to work and back.
Let's hope so.
You've got quite a commute.
Speaking of commute, your car has some interesting noises and what not.
Yeah, it came from the factory like that.
It was an option with the Sport.
It's like an anti theft device.
People hear your car driving by and they go: I don't think I want to mess with that one.
Yeah, so... oh geez.
That brings up another point.
That's just a rubber coating over the trim pieces on the side there, right?
That's exposed to harsh elements as well, so it starts to flake and peel off.
For some reason, though, this side is in tact still and that side's not.
Yeah, I think it's just the way it sat in Mexico.
The sun only shines on the west side.
So, we can't polish this and bring it back.
We can, but we're just wasting time.
At this point, you would recommend just shooting some clear on it, repainting it , or wrapping
it.
You can do whatever you want essentially.
There are a lot of guys out there with cars similar to this.
Maybe you just got a car that wasn't routinely detailed or taken care of but you wanted a
beater.Something so you could have your racecar in the garage and take your commuter during
the week and this is exactly what it looks like.
But being a car enthusiast and detailer, you want your car look its best.
So, you can clean this up but adding a polish to it, you can wax it, but essentially, you're
going to need to repaint this, wrap it, but this is about as good as it's going to get.
That small section there makes a huge difference, but it's still not worth it because we took
more of that paint off, so it's less paint here now.
How does this compare to your Charger, though.
Oh, this beast right here whewww.
All that power, it's like 16 and a quarter horse, I think, right to the wheels.
It's got 200,000 miles on it probably had 120 horsepower brand new, who knows how many
have escaped now.
Somebody left the stable door open, those horses are gone.
Alright, so let's get to it, Nick.
We need to definitely clean it because the more I touch it, the more anxiety I'm getting.
Yeah, so we'll do a basic wash, maybe.
Would you clay this?
It sounds terrible.
Even the painted side sounded pretty bad.
It's got a lot of contamination because like Hector was saying the original owner probably
didn't clay this car.
They probably didn't wash it.
Yeah, you're right.
It was an older lady and she did not really wash it.
Every once it a while when it rained it would get a wash by Mother nature.
But it was never really washed.
It just kind of sat there.
So, yeah, it's never really seen a lot of love and that's why I took her in.
It's time to show here some love, Nick.
That's ok.
Not a lot of people have the ability to wash their car or the desire to.
Not everybody's a car enthusiast or detailer because that takes a different kind of mindset
to want to put the effort into your vehicle.
So we'll give it the love, the appreciation, I guess.
this is your car, so we'll definitely do our best.
In the meantime, you guys can head over to our website, ChemicalGuys.com, to get all
the products you need for your vehicle.
Also, if you like this car or like this video, be sure to give it a thumbs up.
Don't forget to drop a comment down below on things you want to see.
If you want to talk to Hector, come down to Detail Garage Los Angeles, he'll help you
out.
Give you some trips and tricks and as always, we'll see you guys next time right here in the Detail Garage.