A beater truck that cleaned up pretty good

[Jean-Claude]

Hello everyone! My first post here at tn.com. I thought some of you might be inspired to clean your beater up if you saw the type of result that were possible with effort and a bit of know-how. If you have any questions feel free to ask me!

This Toyota is owned by the father of one of my maintenance clients. He just moved from California to Georgia and wanted his truck cleaned up. He didn't want to pony up for a two step polish but I told him he'd be very happy with a one step. He also wanted his wheels polished.

I started the job at 9am. It was so cold out that water was freezing until about 11am. So I just washed and polished the wheels first.

2-bucket wash with I love my car shampoo
Pinnacle claybar
dry with mf towel
aluminum wheels polished with Mother's alum. polish and powerball.
tires and wheel wells dressed with Meguiar's product.
flex DA
orange or gray pads w/ SIP or 3m Finesse-it 2.(hood got orange pad and SIP -I wanted to take extra time on the hood for obvious reasons)
seal with Collinite 845

Before


After


Before


The hood only partially done to show how well the 1 step works.(Only the middle area is polished)


Before


After


Before


After

[TrailDust]

Nice to see the fruits of your labor, isn't it? Just pray that a flock of birds don't pass by overhead! Seriously, nice write-up, and welcome to TN.

[TTercel]

Damn good work and that's a nice beater truck. Makes my beater, well look like a worse beater

[PolishAndWax]

Nice job. The wheels look like new!

I can't tell from the pictures, but if your headlight lens are hazed up, try polishing those as well.

The front bumper plastic looks faded pretty badly (so is the plastic on my 2000). Unfortunately, there's no permanent fix for this, but I find tire dressing works decent as a temporary cover-up.

[dktaco]

Originally Posted by PolishAndWax.com

Nice job. The wheels look like new!

I can't tell from the pictures, but if your headlight lens are hazed up, try polishing those as well.

The front bumper plastic looks faded pretty badly (so is the plastic on my 2000). Unfortunately, there's no permanent fix for this, but I find tire dressing works decent as a temporary cover-up.

+1 on everything mentioned.