More Pictures of the Altima After a Wash/Seal

[The Critic]

Had some extra time this week, so I decided to wash the Altima and strip off the sealant that the dealer applied during PDI.

I washed the car with the two-bucket method using a Chemical Guys sheepskin wash mitt and Chemical Guys Citrus Wash and Gloss solution at the paint preparation ratio.

Sealed the paint by hand with Duragloss #105.

Once I receive my Flex 3401XRG in the mail, I will clay the car and lightly polish it. Surprisingly, there are only one or two swirls on the roof; the rest of the car is swirl-free. Unfortunately, there is some serious orange peel on the finish.

Anyway, here are some pictures of the new car, in case you folks did not see the initial thread:

Full size versions available here

For those of you who are super observant, you will notice that the car is currently wearing license plate frames from a different dealership. The reason for this is because my dad said he wanted the car to "look local," so he went to the local Nissan dealer and asked for a set of their frames. The selling dealer of the car is 120 miles away and if the car wore those frames, we would look like out of town peeps, according to my dad. The logic is quite puzzling to me (why not go no frames?), but since my dad's the boss I did not question his reasoning.

Any questions about the car or chemicals used, feel free to ask!

 

[97tbird]

good job, nice and clean, but i just can't see (not your only, but in general) what a lot of detailing does to a white car...it's just not a color that shows much...
Same with my car - very light blue, i mean you can see that it's clean, but it never looks glossy and shiny like my wife's black Elantra after a detail, wash, wax, etc..

but i am sure you can see a mot more in person - it's hard to catch a white car's finish in pics..

 

[pbm]

Nice car....what oil and filter are you planning to use?

 

[barlowc]

Looks nice, and motivates me to give my Altima Coupe the "spring treatment" and get the Michigan winter off it. A good hand wash (twice) and some Meguiar's Gold Class liquid wax should do the job.

RE: pbm's question about oil and filter, it'll run well on any of the major brand synthetics. My current fill is Castrol Edge 5W-30 and I have another 5-quarts of it on the shelf that I'll use for my next OCI. Instead of using the spec'd "shorty" filter that's the equivalent of a PureOne PL14612, I'd suggest using the slightly longer PL14610. It has the same base size and you'll get some added filtering media because of the slightly-larger size. I'm currently using Denso 150-1010 filters.

RE: the license plate frame, I wouldn't even let the dealer put theirs on when I took delivery. No need to advertise for them. We're fortunate and don't have front plates here in Michigan. On the back, I've got a smoke-colored license plate cover that cleans things up nicely.

 

[GROUCHO MARX]

The chicks will love it.

 

[Nick R]

Originally Posted By: barlowc
Looks nice, and motivates me to give my Altima Coupe the "spring treatment" and get the Michigan winter off it. A good hand wash (twice) and some Meguiar's Gold Class liquid wax should do the job.

RE: pbm's question about oil and filter, it'll run well on any of the major brand synthetics. My current fill is Castrol Edge 5W-30 and I have another 5-quarts of it on the shelf that I'll use for my next OCI. Instead of using the spec'd "shorty" filter that's the equivalent of a PureOne PL14612, I'd suggest using the slightly longer PL14610. It has the same base size and you'll get some added filtering media because of the slightly-larger size. I'm currently using Denso 150-1010 filters.

RE: the license plate frame, I wouldn't even let the dealer put theirs on when I took delivery. No need to advertise for them. We're fortunate and don't have front plates here in Michigan. On the back, I've got a smoke-colored license plate cover that cleans things up nicely.


What is so desirable about your license plate being unreadable? Here in NY if you have one of those on your car its grounds for getting a ticket, for knowingly obscuring a license plate. We also have to have plates on the front.

 

[barlowc]

Originally Posted By: rudolphna
What is so desirable about your license plate being unreadable? Here in NY if you have one of those on your car its grounds for getting a ticket, for knowingly obscuring a license plate. We also have to have plates on the front.


It's not unreadable. It's a very light smoke tint and just cleans things up a little bit. By the "letter of the law", it's probably not legal here in Michigan either. But neither is having the front-side windows of my coupe tinted. They too are light, 50%, cleans up the look of the car and cuts down on the sun. So far I haven't had any problems with the police.

 

[asiancivicmaniac]

Looks good. Now go convince your parents to put some fogs in. Those two white covers seem to look out of place.

 

[macdole99]

you right about that i got nailed with 140 dollar ticket for having that cover on my car. cop said it can distort the redlight camera pictures.

 

[huffmuds9320]

Looks great. It must have taken a large part of the day to clean up the car. Looking at the pictures, it looks like the sun is setting. By the way, nice front lawn.

I removed the license plate frames on my cars for weight reduction so I can get better gas mileage. Just kidding, I just don't find them necessary. Plus it covers part of the car paint so when you wash and wax you will not be able clean that area.

 

[The Critic]

Originally Posted By: pbm
Nice car....what oil and filter are you planning to use?

Nissan recommends the Genuine Nissan Ester Oil 5w-30, but it is not required. At $12/qt, I doubt I'll be using it. Plus, they only started the recommendation for the 2010 model year-- the 07-09 models used the same engine and did not recommend anything other than latest API oil. So, I will probably end up using an oil whose manufacturer claims will meet/exceed the requirements of the Genuine Nissan Ester Oil-- which at this point will either be any Pennzoil product or Valvoline SynPower.

Originally Posted By: 97tbird
good job, nice and clean, but i just can't see (not your only, but in general) what a lot of detailing does to a white car...it's just not a color that shows much...

A well-detailed pearl white will look like this:

http://www.autopia.org/forum/pro-details...hite-pearl.html

It is my goal to reach that kind of finish after I have some practice with the Flex.

Originally Posted By: barlowc
Instead of using the spec'd "shorty" filter that's the equivalent of a PureOne PL14612, I'd suggest using the slightly longer PL14610. It has the same base size and you'll get some added filtering media because of the slightly-larger size. I'm currently using Denso 150-1010 filters.

I already have four PL14612 filters from Amazon. I am afraid to use a non-recommended filter since in the event of a filter failure, the filter manufacturer will not warranty the product.

Originally Posted By: GROUCHO MARX
The chicks will love it.

Yup, which is why I don't want the drive it-- I hate driving "chick cars."

 

[daves87rs]

Originally Posted By: rudolphna
Originally Posted By: barlowc
Looks nice, and motivates me to give my Altima Coupe the "spring treatment" and get the Michigan winter off it. A good hand wash (twice) and some Meguiar's Gold Class liquid wax should do the job.

RE: pbm's question about oil and filter, it'll run well on any of the major brand synthetics. My current fill is Castrol Edge 5W-30 and I have another 5-quarts of it on the shelf that I'll use for my next OCI. Instead of using the spec'd "shorty" filter that's the equivalent of a PureOne PL14612, I'd suggest using the slightly longer PL14610. It has the same base size and you'll get some added filtering media because of the slightly-larger size. I'm currently using Denso 150-1010 filters.

RE: the license plate frame, I wouldn't even let the dealer put theirs on when I took delivery. No need to advertise for them. We're fortunate and don't have front plates here in Michigan. On the back, I've got a smoke-colored license plate cover that cleans things up nicely.


What is so desirable about your license plate being unreadable? Here in NY if you have one of those on your car its grounds for getting a ticket, for knowingly obscuring a license plate. We also have to have plates on the front.



GUess you haven't been to MI then..

I used to have a gray tinted plate cover on my S 10...

 

[Brons2]

ugh get the fog lights!!

nice polish job on the paint.

 

[L_Sludger]

Seems like every car in California has dealership plate frames or just some kind of plate frame period. I think it's absurd. Free advertising? Not on my car.

 

[Lurch]

Nice car!