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08-06-2026LAST POST
I think we can all agree this stuff has no place anywhere in a car - especially in high-touch areas. I bought this '24 840 a few weeks ago. The original owner treated it like gold - the screen protectors were still on the two displays, and the doorsills still had the blue film on them. It was/immaculate... except for the cupholder door. I can imagine the guy's horror when he "cleaned" it and left these scratches.

If I had to guess, that large scratch in the middle was first, the hazy scratches came from an attempt to fix the scratch.

I used 1" pads on an SPTA RO micro-polisher. Yep, it's cheap, but I love that thing. My 6" Flex just wasn't gonna fit ;-)

Note: Just like using a 6" machine on exterior paint, I really used only the weight of that tiny polisher. Piano Black is SOFT. Go easy!
  • First pass - 3D Speed on a red (soft finishing) pad, a couple passes, wiped with a mf... no change. None.
  • Next pass - 3D Speed on an orange (light correcting) pad. The lighter scratches were mostly gone. Progress. Sort of. But made that one big scratch kinda pop.
  • Next pass - Griot's Correcting Cream on an orange pad. I took it even easier here - one light pass and a wipe to assess, then did it again.
The three pics don't align with the three bullets. Just before, during (all taped and after one of the passes with the polisher), and after. I really think I spent more time taping than polishing.
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Good job.
good to have a win.
Looks like a quality job. Can this work on the exterior black plastic trim in the center between the drivers and passenger doors (B pillars?) on my G80??
Absolutely. The only thing the previous owner did wrong was (apparently) take his car to the carwash and/or dry it with terrycloth towels. The paint was in really good shape, but had a lot (!) of fine swirls/scratches. The B-pillars showed it too. I don't have any before pics, but took a few during the process.

I taped them just to keep the polish off the rubber. And used the 6" polisher... because I hadn't gotten the small one yet. But it worked great. Same approach - start easy, i.e. not aggressive, and step it up if needed. It didn't take much - again, the orange pad and Griot's Correcting (the mid-tier) Cream did it. Then followed with a black pad and ceramic polish (not ceramic coat).

The before/after pics of the door show the swirls - representative of the whole exterior.
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Looks great. Thanks!