Halfords Cutting Compound - good stuff! (General Car Care & Repair)

Member Name: r_welfare

Product:	General Car Care & Repair
Date:	30/06/02 (4600 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Really works well, easy to use, cheap

Disadvantages: can't use too often, don't expect miracles

Ever got fed up with the paintwork of your car? I'm not talking about the colour, but what happens to older cars, especially in dark colours, or bright red - oxidising.

Oxidising makes the paint lighten in shade. Unfortunately it does not do this uniformly, but is more likely to show itself as light-coloured streaks.

Sometimes T-Cut, Mer, or a whole host of expensive, "colour" polishes that are sold on the fact that they will restore colour, won't work. When this happens, you've got to play with the big boys.

This is when I happened upon Halfords Cutting Compound.

It comes in a yellow tube, not unlike a handcream tube in design, and can be found along with the fillers, sandpaper and tack cloths, not among the polishes.

It's best used in a "Ronseal" way - i.e., do exactly what it says on the tin. Take a damp cloth, apply some of the paste, rub into the affected area, then rub off with a dry cloth.

I first used this on my white 1985 BMW 528i. At some point the leading edge of the bootlid had been resprayed, in a slightly different shade of white (white is so difficult to match!). I applied some cutting compound, and rubbed hard.

The results were quite remarkable. The new paint began to come off, so that spots of the old, correct shade, showed through. Some hard graft saw the original colour restored.

Next subject was my recently-acquired 1978 Ford Fiesta in that delightful shade of Midnight Blue. This is a very dark blue, like squid ink, and is notable only because the paint used to go milky almost as soon as the cars left the factory.

Again, the stuff was rubbed on, and rubbed off. This time the results weren't quite as good, as some oxidation remained, but it was far more presentable than before. No doubt another go may bring even better results. Not bad for a 24-year old car which doesn't appear to have been polished for a good few years.
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The major caveat with this stuff is, like T-Cut, it works by stripping layers of old paint. There is only a finite level of topcoats you can strip back before you reach primer, so it's basically a one-shot deal.

Also, it's imperative to apply a coat of polish afterwards, to protect the "new" paint.

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