Freshening up side trims, handles, and bumpers

Hello Ian Having spent many a happy hour freshening up the outside trim of my 1985 G... here's what I did. For the 'soft' trim which is the side strips, arches (if you have original PU non colour coded ones - I think yours are colour coded) and bumper end caps, I used the Halford's equivalent of the worth's plastic DYE... not, and its worth repeating not spray paint :-). I am sure this would also work on the side air vent trims as well - but I bought new ones. Thanks to a fairly comprehensive burglary I got new door handles (every cloud and all that) as they took the spare G keys - upto that point I had used AutoGlym plastic/bumper rejuvenator. But that is a 'couple of washes' type remedy. For the plastic dye treatment, I cannot recommend highly enough the need to (with very fine - I use nylon sanding pads) sand the accumulated crud - and of course wax etc off the parts before applying the dye in a number of very fine coats. Done right this gives great results (I can sort some after pics, but do not have before ones - but the parts are original and unloved before I got to them) that lasts for a good few years. To emphasis I say carefully as because its a dye and slight sanding marks can still show, especially on the side trim. As for the steel bits of the bumpers I got them blasted and powered coated. Any questions or queries just give me a shout - I'll nip and and take some pics as well. If you want a chat again just pm me and we can jump on the phone.. The Halford's stuff is great and the black gives a satin finish. I did try the dark grey colour as it looked closer to the original trim colour... but their version of dark grey is a) not the same as mine & b) about 10 shades lighter than they show on the spray can... Ta Simon

Hi Ian Good question/observation. You are right it's an aerosol.. Mine were that 'distressed' that I took them off. Now admittedly that took a bit of work - and resulted in me using N4 rated stainless fixings when I put them back on. The side trims are easier to remove - well on a 460 - and they would be the most fiddly to do in-situ. The arches were some OEM ones I managed to nab when they came onto the forum, so they were already off for the spray work. My old ones were fibre glass and the workshop had to take off and re-fit them when the body work was done so no 30 year old fixings to deal with. If you don't want to go down the aerosol route then you might want to try a very good scrub clean with something to remove all the old tar and wax and then test a 'back to black' type autglym product before looking at the Wurth's stuff. I just found and of the public strength type of plastic recolouring stuff only lasts a few washes (why the good clean is so important as without it the pigmentation can't get into the surface layer of the plastic) - but then again if your cleaning it top to bottom once a month if might be a good start point? to see if its worth investing in either the 'parts off and spray, or Wurth's route? All the best Simon

It may have wurth on its label but its actually made by this firm..... http://www.cleanol.de/ i imported this stuff in years ago after going to automekanika and i still have a few tubes of it, anybody wants some i have it in either grey or black at nearly half of wurth's price

  Ian you had a re spray i thought you G was RED

   or you still got a black & white camera