Hi, any detailers here recommend a good flashlight. AA would be best but don’t mind 18650. I’m just wondering best tint to show up swirls/defects, I’m guessing a warm tint would be best.
something like a convoy S2 comes to mind?
I can’t really contribute any relevant information to what you’re asking, but I will mention that like many others have said, convoy lights are top notch. I have an s8 that I absolutely love.
Aren’t swirls very slight differences in thickness though? would a fairly-fast-strobe light be able to make the shadows easier to spot? I know with plastering pools, swirls can be found by holding a flashlight at a very steep angle (measured off of the wall) so the spill from the light makes the “peaks” in the swirls cast shadows. Hard to spot, takes a really sharp eye to find.
Thanks and helpful. The trade use a 3m Sungun but prohibitively expensive. people have made diy ones using a halogen spot which does show defects rather well. I’m hoping to find the best tint that’ll work, being fairly new to detailing I don’t know exactly what I want in colour temp.
I should know the exact requirements of what I’m looking for, but hoping someone’s second job/hobby on here is paint correction.
Well, the Sungun appears to just mimic the spectrum of natural sun light….I don’t know if narrow-banded LED’s would do well, unless you had a light with 3 different LED’s or so to come to gether to mimic the sunlight…
You might be better off getting a 4’ flourescent light with a bulb made for either growing plants in doors, or for people with S.A.D. (Seasonal somethingorother disorder), who need to mimic sunlight in doors to control depression and mood swings. I do know they make flourescent tube bulbs to mimic sunlight, as I used to use them in my terrarium for my lizards.
Any easy way to implement this in a small form factor such as convoy s2 size?
The sungun can be easily built diy using a 14.4v cordless drill and spot halogen. It’s rather bulky and not portable for times when it’s not always convenient.
I’m thinking a very warm tint may be suitable
I’d get with ric at cnquality goods…he can probably make you an s2 or similar light in the 500k range of color…that’s pretty dern close to sunlight.
I worked a little in a body shop years and years ago. My brother is a magician when it comes to repairing paint jobs.
As far as finding swirl marks I’m not sure. I’d say do the whole vehicle with. farecla and you wouldn’t have to worry about them.
A very warm tint that may work would be xml2 t4 7a. It may depend on the color of the car too.
You’re looking for a 3000- 3500k color temp I would say.
Thank you.
I have a few paint systems, megs and farcela are both in my tool kit. It would be nice as I now seem to be buying a light every week to have one suitable for this.
Alot of the time I use a da polisher over a rotary and this requires multiple passes so the flashlight would help here to assess correction between stages.
I tried it, wasn’t very good, always used too much or not enough water. I noticed my brother always put his eyes low to the paint and held his halogen cage light away and moved it a bit. If that makes sense.
It’s alot of work chasing perfection on say old paintwork but is very rewarding. I’m invested now so can’t quit 
and lots to learn.
plus I work in this field, well not so hands on but it’s work related.
You might also try one of the Nichia LEDs that render color well … that might show tint variances in swirls well if the light is also bright enough.
Tint is unimportant when looking for swirls. It’s funny that people seem to automatically default to warm when no legitimate reason really exists to do so. In this case cool white is a better advantage just because you get more light output total and it’s easier to determine the paint condition of metallic paints with a light that more resembles sunlight than a candle.
What matters more is the amount of light. You want it bright but not so bright that it blinds you while you’re looking for swirls. This can vary depending on how much ambient light there is. So a 3 mode hi-mid-low is probably best.
A decent floody design like an XM-L P60 will offer plenty of swirl spotting power. The best way to spot swirls is in a garage with a flashlight being the only source of light. Getting rid of all the extraneous light will really let you see every swirl and imperfection.
I’m not speaking casually either. I used to detail professionally to help put myself through college for engineering. And unlike many of the detailing snobs I’ve actually experimented with different low budget techniques and even formulated an easy to make rinseless wash that you can make for a a lot cheaper than the off the shelf stuff like ONR in order to help people who want shiny cars but don’t want to spend the obligatory $200-300 on a DA and polishing kit.
You practically get banned from the autopia forums or at least shunned for daring to propose new techniques not approved by the pros. Like when I try to convince people that with newer SMAT polishes it is entirely possible to do swirl correction with a cheap 6” “wax spreader” type polisher. Led to quite an uproar and people swearing up and down you might as well just give up and do it all by hand. Even though I’ve proven before that you can correct swirls with such a kit. But even after seeing they refuse to believe and think I’m damaging paint with a less powerful polisher. Weird how people can get so ingrained on an idea that they refuse to believe anything different even with proof staring at them in the face.
http://www.bobistheoilguy.com/forums/ubbthreads.php/topics/3377125/Re:\_Rinseless_wash_redux.
And if you’re wondering yes those are my posts.
And if you’re wondering why I don’t polish to absolute perfection there’s been a recent trend with paints getting thinner and thinner from the factory. Though they are harder constant compounding to correct every little swirl and rid does more harm than good. Better to just avoid polishing as much as possible. I only tend to do a finishing polish once or twice a year tops and maybe a compounding every 4-5 years if that.
http://www.bobistheoilguy.com/forums/ubbthreads.php/topics/3326840/The_big_deal_about_thin_paint.
The 3M Sunguns as far as I know are more developed for colour matching when re-spraying cars as colours will appear differently under natural sunlight. So if it is an overcast day the Sungun allows you to colour match inside with the hope that the paint will look the same when put under natural sunlight. As said previously swirls will show up without needing to replicate natural sunlight, it is more important to hold the light source at the correct angle.
In saying that, does anyone know if you could do a triple Noctigon with 3 different tint LEDs which would closely represent sunlight?
Krabs, those detailer forums sound a LOT like people on the “other” flashlight forum!