how to remove scratches?

[texasmolarman]

just recently detailing and some jerk scratched the car. couple of areas appear to go thru the clear coat, and some are fairly minor. any suggestions as to what products might remove these, as i dont have an orbital, so will be doing this by hand.

[BrokenVert]

Use Scratch Doctor. Simply apply and rub into the crack using an MF with a circular motion.

[HPFREAK]

^^^what he said. It should take out a lot of it unless it is really deep.

[shodanusmc]

or, take it to a good detail guy and let him see what he can do. Unless you are in the base coat, they can come out, but you may have to rub forever compared to what a rotary in the right hands can so.

[2AD Tanker]

Meguiar's Scratch-X and Ultimate Compound are two very good products for scratches removal.

[RPM90]

Originally Posted by texasmolarman

just recently detailing and some jerk scratched the car. couple of areas appear to go thru the clear coat, and some are fairly minor. any suggestions as to what products might remove these, as i dont have an orbital, so will be doing this by hand.

Try 3M's "perfect it II" rubbing compound. It's not too abrasive and used as directed it's very safe and very effective on most surface scratches.
I use it first to judge where to go next. If the scratches are deeper and still there after about 2-3 tries, you'll need more pro help.

I've never tried all the new deeper scratch "removers".
My guess is that they fill the scratch somehow, but I'll bet they come back after the product wears off.
But, as I said, I haven't tried them so I could completely wrong on that.

[BlackjackMulligan]

Originally Posted by texasmolarman

just recently detailing and some jerk scratched the car. couple of areas appear to go thru the clear coat, and some are fairly minor. any suggestions as to what products might remove these, as i dont have an orbital, so will be doing this by hand.

You're not going to have any luck doing it by hand. I would either try and see if there are any forum members near you with a buffer, or as recommended above, have a pro help you out. You'd be amazed at what a Flex and some good polish can do.

[JimD]

I used "scratch doctor" for the first time last night on a pretty bad scratch on my SUV. It was about half the length of the door. I think it was all in the clear but it was deep enough it would catch a finger nail in spots.

Scratch doctor changed it from a 25-50 foot scratch to about a 3 to 5 foot scratch. In other words, much less noticable but not hard to find is you look right at it from close up. It does not polish the area like rubbing compound would do. You just wipe it on and off. I did it three times and it might gave done a little more each time but not a lot. For this scratch, it was not really enough but for smaller, less severe, scratches, it would be a very easy way to improve the appearance.

For deep scratches, I think touch up paint and a "blob" reducer would be better. I used a kit from Drcolorship or something like that on other nicks in the paint of my SUV and for deep stuff I think it works well.

I've only had it a couple months and I'm being careful so I have not had to try and hide scratches on my 128i yet.

Jim

[ChrisK]

I need to try the Meguiar's Scratch-X on my mother-in-laws car.

[mrgoochio]

Hand polishing? good luck.. find someone with at least a PC