What do you pay for a full detail?

Anywhere from 100 to a couple thousand. For a wash, clay, and wax with light interior cleaning, vacuuming, spot treatment, dressing/conditioning the interior usually goes for 125-150. Add polishing the paint to remove swirls 300+, adding suspension, wheel off cleaning, engine, and exotic products..............

What kind of car are you looking to get detailed and what are you looking to get done?

 

+1

Usually about $150-$200 for wash, clay, a couple applications of Zaino and full interior.

Show car detailing can be upwards of $800-$1500++ considering every nut and bolt (literally), nook and cranny get thoroughly polished to perfection inside and out, and I don't mean inside as in the cockpit, I'm talking inside the lug nuts on the rims, inbetween the panels and the weather stripping, inside the headlight bezels, all aspects of the car fully restored, reconditioned and polished to perfection. Upwards of 3-5 days worth of work and between 20-35 hours.......don't ask me how I know.

Is it worth it? Depends if your detailer is a perfectionist and has plenty of experience with paint correction.

Josh

 

Absolutely. Luv2Detail on here does very good work. Depending on where you are located and what you are looking to accomplish, I can most likely recommend some people in your area.

 

It's worth it....if the detailer is passionate about their work. Not all detailers deserve the title.

THIS IS NOT DETAILING if the car comes out with buffer swirls in it. Many of us have seen cars sitting in the dealer lot with this kind of damage:
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The picture in the above post shows what a black car looks like with swirl marks in the finish.
Notice that the sun's reflection in the hood gets strange halogram effects in places.
The picture below was from a prior fchat thread about getting a 1968 365 ready for a show.
When black paint is fully polished and carefully detailed, it looks like this:
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That's a beautiful pic, but to be fair there's really no direct sunlight hitting it so you wouldn't be able to tell in that lighting if there were any holograms or not.

I'm not saying your car has any swirls or holograms in it, I'm just saying you really need direct light to know.

Do you have any pics of that car in direct sun light or at least with some bright 500W hallogens?

Here's a couple for example.

Notice the swirls in direct sunlight in this pic.
http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y148/Joshvette/Detailing/Robs%2086%20Ferrari%20328GTS/DSC01775.jpg

Notice the same angle, but different lighting and you can't see the swirls at all.....NOTE I did not polish this car at all, the swirls are still there, just can't see them.
http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y148/Joshvette/Detailing/Robs%2086%20Ferrari%20328GTS/DSC01905.jpg

Now, here is a car that I did fully polish the swirls out of in direct light to show you before and afters. Notice the lighting is exactly the same along with with the camera angle and shot.
http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y148/Joshvette/Detailing/Bordens%2002%20Lexus%20GS430/DSC00113.jpg
after
http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y148/Joshvette/Detailing/Bordens%2002%20Lexus%20GS430/DSC00114.jpg

You really need light to show you what's there or what's not there to know the truth about your car's paint.

 

RacerX, you are absolutely right. That is what we call a hack job.....someone who claims to be a pro detailer then hacks your car all up and you don't know it till a few weeks later when you see it in the sun. That car can still be corrected btw.

BMW has medium/softer clearcoat so if the detailer goes over it once with the rotary and a cutting pad and polish and does not finish it down, then it will look like that pic you posted with holograms and buffer trails everywhere. However as you mentioned, one who is passionate about perfecting the car would finish it down with a finer pad and polish on the rotary to fine tune the first correction, then even go over it again with a porter cable (ROB, random orbital buffer) and finish it off perfect. Then followed would be another wash to remove any oils and lubes from the polishing so the sealant would have a good foundation to properly bond with the clear coat.

With that type of process it may take 10-12 hours from start to finish and you will pay what it's worth as well $500-$600, but your finish will be flawless and there's not many with the patience to do such maticulous work.

Josh