All depends on budget & attitude to risk of damage to the car.
Machine : I use a Meguiars G220 random orbital polisher.
Pads : Megs 7" foam cutting pad, (Megs used to discourage use of same with G220 saying it could cause damage), 2 x 7" Megs polishing pads, 2 x (donated to me & seldom used) Megs finish pads.
Polishes : Megs 83 & 80 & more recently Megs 105 :
To be honest the 83 & 80 hardly touch BMW clearcoat with a polish pad via the G220. I initially corrected my whole car with 83 & polish pad but it took me several days & was very hard work. I since accquired Megs 105 which I am testing at the moment.This has more of a compound quality and make work easier but even using this and the more aggressive Megs foam cutting pad I found it hard going to remove swirls & RDS the other day after 2/3 sets with slow passes, power setting 5 from Max 6 & applying max pressure that still allows the backing plate & pad to spin.
If I wanted to go more aggressive I would need to go to a wool cut pad but these are really not a good idea for those unfamiliar & not really designed for random orbitals like the G220, (which are aimed at those wanting a safe solution to home detailing). The other issue is that my G220 might struggle to correct & finish with polish pad after that aggressive wool pad stage.
Menzerna make decent polishes & power gloss should be up to ther task on firt or 2nd set Menz polishes & compounds were designed with Merc clearcoat.
You should bear in mind that most bodyshops use faster & more capable of heat generation rotaries - not random orbitals like my G220. That said I have seen an Aston Martin badly corrected by a main dealer using a rotary & there were trail and buffer marks all over it. I have no idea what pad/polish/compound/speed combo was used but this shows that in the wrong hands it is easy to use a rotray & make a hash of correction, (let alone risk of taking off too much clearcoat on certain cars). I am confident I could have easily corrected the rotary defects left on that A.M. with my G220, but I don't have rotary skills as I have yet to use one. I may get a rotary in future & if I do I will get a couple of scrap panels to experiment with first.
Many may shudder at my talk of aggressive machine polishing. When reading posts of serious enthusiasts & even pro detailers they have indicated that a softer approach is virtually a waste of time on BMW clearoat as on our cars. I must emphasise I wouldn't dream of being anywhere near so aggressive on say Mazda clearcoat. My advice to anyone starting on an unknown clearcoat is to go in gently & work upwards.
If looking to buy a 1st random orbital machine I would try a
DAS-6 PRO which is being marketed as the most powerful dedicated random orbital machine out there at moment. I would
NOT buy another G220 - I am on my second unit, (1st sorted under warranty via, Alex at
Serious Performancewho is a top bloke and very helpful). Supposedly it was only 1tst batch machines that had problems with bushes & the later machines are more allegedly more durable- a fair few had G220s fail. I still use it, but I seldom if ever set it to max for fear of burning out the motor brushes- even if mine has revised items,(assumption is that it does as unit replaced when these had been on sale nearly a year). The DAS-6 PRO also comes with 2 different backing plates, potentially more flexibility for smaller pads which, incidentally, can generate a little more cut as well as being easier to manouvere.
With harder BMW paint there is logic to the sensible & potentially competent going straight to rotary. This
Silverline seems cracking value & I would buy one if looking for my 1st rotary. Once again, if buying a rotary then I would practice on scrap BMW panels 1st & move onto my car later. If you have significant rotary doubts then go for the DAS-6 PRO & suitable products with enough cut - just don't expect it to get speedy results on hard bmw clearcoat.
Re dark colours.........Darker colours are less forgiving & further correction time often required as same on a silver car would be barely if at all noticeable unless strricly scrutinised. With any colour the detailer may often have to make a decision whether to remove lots of clearcoat to deal with a random deep scratch, (RDS), or whether to just perform sufficent correction to reduce visibility of same whilst having wider consideration for long term integrity of the surrounding & worked on area. There are methods to keep correction working areas specific to RDS such as using masking tape &/or maybe using a little G3 compound along the length of RDS before correcting the RDS & surrounding area with the machine & less aggressive product. Difficult to explain here & concerned not to cause undue confusion albeit I feel I may have already given you too much to digest in one sitting.
Finally I can assure you that it is not a requirement to spend masses of hard earned to get a reasonable kit though you can spend far more if so inclined.
