Rotary vs DA Polishers – Setting the record straight

There has been alot of debate in recent years about Rotary VS DA polishing and which one cuts better as since the late 2000’s, large orbit DA polishers have really become popular. With so many videos from the past five years showing why each machine is the better cutting tool, the debate has raged on for some time. One of the recent videos was from Yvan Lacroix from DIY Detail with his deep dive video on the house of rags you tube channel where he explained why 21 and 25 mm orbit DA polishers cut faster than a rotary but why DA cutting then rotary finishing is the best option for a two stage correction.

That video I am sure created alot more conversation and debate between industry members and detailing enthusiasts and it may have even caused Yvan to upset some people who swear black and blue that rotary is the better tool for cutting with some even saying that you can’t finish with a rotary which is totally untrue but is not easy to do always.

So who is correct about this? Well the short answer is both – there is a time and place where both machines can out correct each other I believe from my vast experience using them. It just depends on the paint your working on, it’s hardness, the defects there are to fix and the paint’s overall condition (level of orange peel texture, dust nibs, a frosted glass look to it or super flat and sharp reflections, dry spray texture, fish eyes, swirl marks, scratches, scuffs etc) plus what the customer’s desired end results are that you as their detailer need to deliver.

There are so many scenarios and situations where different machines, products and pads are needed so let’s settle this argument once and for all and go super deep into this and do my best to explain where each polisher works best and the scenarios you should use them for. Please note that I am not anti rotary or anti DA at all, I’ve used both for decades.

Whilst it certainly isn’t always easy to finish with a rotary like it is with a DA, it definitely can be done but not necessarily on every type of paint in the world. Some paints really test you with how finicky they are to get finished out right. According to the team at Rupes, under a microscope you can see some ultra fine defects left behind by the rotary but my argument to that is that no one is going to go that far and expect a flawless finish under a microscope. We are using various forms of aluminium oxide (alpha and others) plus maybe even silica carbide and ceramic abrasives to correct and polish paint with fiber pads and plastic based pads (foam) so we’re polishing plastic with plastic alot of the time.

It’s never going to be 100% flawless under a microscope at high magnification.

I have used a rotary to finish out hundreds of vehicles out of the thousands of cars that I have detailed in my career and been able to leave hologram free finishes that under natural and artificial lighting looked amazing so yes it can be done

Whilst I do not consider myself the absolute foremost expert on this topic who is above everyone else in terms of knowledge, I do have decades of experience with both machines and forced rotation so I feel that with twenty five years of rotary experience and being somewhat of an early adopter to modern long throw DA polishers in 2008 I think I have some excellent information and experience to share to settle this argument once and for all or at the least add some very insightful and interesting fuel to the fire of this debate.

As many of you would know, I started with the rotary in 2000 and absolutely love the machine but even for me at times it can not be the ideal tool to use on every vehicle and paint type. It will always be my favourite type of polisher due to how versatile it is and the finish that can be achieved with it but I was also a fairly early adopter of large orbit dual action polishers in 2008. I also envisioned variable orbit DA polishers back in 2006

The common argument between people is that the rotary out cuts a DA and vice versa.

Here are the facts about both machines

Rotary

• Does a better job of removing non uniform sanding marks that I find DA machines really struggle with. These marks are caused by sanding discs/ papers with lower quality or inconsistent quality abrasives – one disc or paper works great and the next one is not quite the same. These are getting rarer nowadays but it can still happen.
• Removing oxidation and taking paint finishes with a very poor reflection that looks frosted wiindow glass and making it appear flatter and level but no orange peel has been removed but it appears that it has.
• Polishing exterior trim to a satin or piano black finish with one and two inch pads
• Getting into the tightest grooves and body lines and super close to door handles without hitting them – a rotary can fit into almost any area.
• Gives the richest finish and wet look gloss with an amazing level of clarity The DA and forced rotation machines on rare occasions may eclipse it but 95% of the time I’d say they cannot match it due to pad drag.
• Is not the ideal choice for sticky paints like I encountered with many Subaru Impreza WRX and STI vehicles built between 2000 to 2006. But if the rotary was kept at 800 rpm or even slower and faster arm speed more passes technique was used with smaller sized pads (5 inch or 125-140 mm) and a tiny drop of paraffin oil used to lubricate the pad and paint (applied once every three sections you do), the stickiness would be less of a problem. But it is easier to switch to a DA polisher and do the vehicle.
• Films up all types of abrasive polishes in a way that a DA simply cannot. DA polishers don’t work well with products that are dry and dusty and that don’t give the user a watery and oily film that stays wet and lubricated during the whole polishing cycle. A rotary just like gear driven polishers, has the capability to make almost any polishing product film up and spread well over the surface.
• Breaks down diminishing abrasives fully in a shorter time frame.
• Larger pads are more aggressive on rotary polishers – if you want maximum cut use a seven, eight or nine inch pad with a hard thin plate and a denim, velvet or short nap (10 mm to 25 mm thick) twisted wool pad
• Cutting with a rotary and wool can leave the faintest hologram but lay a seriously great foundation for your follow up steps if you do something simple called “refining as you cut” by slowing your machine speed down, increasing your arm speed and using zero pressure after two cutting passes for one to three more passes. Here is an example of a bad or less than ideal rotary technique then on the right vastly better results with the technique I just mentioned using the same combination of product, pad and machine – performed by yours truly. Though it’s not the fastest polishing cycle, the results are worth it.

Dual Action

• Gives professionals the ability to perform one step gloss enhancements and corrections, something very difficult to do with a rotary though it has been done by a select few.
• Enabled me to develop the duo and tri gloss enhancement methods (2 or 3 liquids and pads in the timeframe of using one pad and liquid)
• Can out cut a rotary polisher in some circumstances especially with the 21 mm and 25 mm orbit polishers but can struggle on some things (deeper defects, extremely swirled and scratched paint plus frosted paint finishes that lack clarity, sides of bonnet bulges and stalling on convex and concave areas as well as lacking the ability to get up close on body lines and grooves.
• Smaller pads are more aggressive on these machines so one to three inch pads really do give superb cut and an awesome finish.
• The easiest tool of the three types of polishers to leave a haze, marring and hologram free finish
• Generally the smaller the orbit is, the better the finish though the 25 mm orbit polishers are proving to cut and finish extremely well despite it’s huge orbit size. My recommendation is if you are performing gloss enhancements, use a 12 mm or 15 mm orbit stroke DA – 12 mm from my experience finished better than 15 and 21 mm orbit polishers when doing these services. However, with dual or multiple stage corrections I would recommend the 21 or 25 mm orbit DA machines
• Cleans up rotary holograms fairly easily as long as the user refined the paint when using the rotary so the holograms are not really bad.
• Removes more paint than a rotary does in most cases so not the absolute best option for thin paints
• Less risky to use than a rotary but only because the rotary is always spinning when turned on. You need to be focused when using a rotary – no looking away and talking to someone with the polisher still going. Treat using the rotary like driving a car, keep your eyes on the road or in this case on the panel.
• it’s lowest starting speed in orbits per minute is around 1200-1500 rpm on a rotary so a DA at speed 4-5 is really moving and spins much faster than a rotary even at speed 3-4 would be

So let’s get into the advantages and the disadvantages of each type of polisher and then really dive down deep into these polishers and where they both excel but also fall down and the ideal times and situations to use either one or both in various orders

Rotary Advantages & Disadvantages

1. From 25 mm to 200 mm sized pads can be used making it extremely versatile. You would need three different DA polishers to have the same versatility and even then going beyond 180 mm sized pads with DA polishers is polntless as they won’t be very efficient, effective as their nowhere near as aggressive as smaller pads.
2. You can tilt the pad on angle to get into tight places, reduce the amount of heat you generate when using the polisher, get into areas that a large orbit DA cannot fit into without overhanging onto raised body lines and sharp edges, door handles, under side mirrors.
3. The machine polishes in a straight line and can get into the tightest areas and polishes edges the best
4. Works the best on sanding mark removal especially the marks left by non uniform poor quality sanding media.
5. Rotary extenders increase even further the capabilities of rotaries over DA’s – three quarter inch pads and flexible extension type polishers that screw into the rotary shaft enable the tiniest areas to be polished with precision.
6. Can take frosted looking paints, dry spray and orange peel textured paints and give them a glass like finish much quicker than ever could be done on a DA.
7. Rotaries with their speed range of 200 to 1500, 400 to 2500 and 600 to 3500 rpm with many models gives it a wider scope of corrective capabilities over a DA due to the fact that as long as short polishing cycles of fifteen to thirty seconds are employed before slowing down to finish out, you can use rotaries at 1000 to 2000 rpm and not overheat and swell the paint but achieve tremendous amounts of cut and setup the foundation for amazing high clarity deep reflective rich finishes.
8. Is the best option for show car paint finishes that have been expertly prepared, painted, flow coated and sanded flat.
9. Double sided pads enables you to have twice the working area of a single sided pad – something difficult to do with a DA pad
10. Far smoother operation than any DA – using a rotary is therapy for some people due to how comfortable it is to use and the results achieved can be better than anything else sometimes.

DA Advantages & Disadvantages

1. Most paint restorative services can be done with a DA and in just one or two steps
2. Easiest polisher type to finish paint with due to the random orbital pattern and the best option for business profitability due to being able to achieve alot in one or two stages not limited to at least two.
3. Very easy to train staff in your shop and have them proficient at polishing with DA much quicker versus a long learning curve with rotary polishers.
4. More profitable in business to use a DA for the vast majority of your paint care services
5. Can sand and polish with some DA models (Makita BO6050, Rupes Duetto to name two) which means sand and correct-finish with just the one machine. This can never be done on rotary.
6. Dual mode polishers (forced and random orbit) give a few polishers on the market the benefit over just random orbital machines to do near to or the same cutting as rotary and high gloss finishing but without the risk of holograms
7. Puts less heat stress through the pads – it’s usually between the velcro hook and loop material not the surface though microfiber is the one most likely to create the highest heat then foam pads.
8. When your a beginner just starting to learn paint correction the DA is the ideal machine as it gets you up to proficiency quicker.
9. A better choice for applying sealants and waxes and removing polish residue on very soft finicky paints
10. Much lower risk of error – more forgiving than rotary polishers
11. Struggles on certain shapes – stalls and bogs down at times
12. Not all DA machines are created equal – a select few are great some are average and others are terrible.

The scenarios where rotary is the better option

1. Aftermarket show car paint finishes that reward rotary polishing the most due to higher quality paint than OEM paints
2. Edgework to get those small areas spot on – rotary’s targeted control in tight spots make it the perfect tool for precision polishing
3. You want to make the most dramatic transformation to paint – reducing texture, removing that frosted glass look that some paints have, dry spray and enhancing clarity and colour richness to their maximum level
4. Those paints that seem to prefer the action of a rotary where every type of DA leaves micro marring, haze and or pigtails (yes I’ve encountered that a few times in my career)
5. Really hard paints like PPG Ceramiclear scratch resistant clearcoats respond better to the action of the rotary from my experience.
6. Modern thin paints as the rotary used properly will remove less paint – use a single product polishing system not compounds and polishes as the abrasive technology is often more advanced and doesn’t gouge and tear at the paint
7. Polishing the sides of bonnet bulges/scoops where 5 and 6 inch DA polishers struggle to rotate and oscillate on.
8. Severe defect removal during the initial cutting step of a multi stage correction or the last one or two steps of it
9. Marine craft paint correction – Gelcoats and marine paints like AWLGRIP require heat to be able to restore the appearance of the paintwork. A DA cannot generate enough heat in a fast enough time for it to be profitable
10. Headlight restorations – they can fit into the corners of headlights and tail lights much better

The scenarios where DA is the better option

1. Soft and sticky factory paint finishes difficult to get finished out flawlessly
2. Doing gloss enhancements like my Duo Gloss method which are very difficult with a rotary
3. One step paint corrections
4. Applying sealants and waxes and removing them with a bonnet wrapped over a pad
5. Cars with basic body shapes with mostly flat panels and very few concave and convex areas
6. On really hot days in summer where the higher temperatures created by the rotary could very quickly spike panel temperatures too far on vehicle paints to the swelling point which is 60 degrees. Temps of 35-45 it won’t take long.
7. Car Dealership detailers preparing new and used vehicles – eliminates the common issue of cars covered in holograms that people often seen at dealerships.
8. Polishing glass to prepare it for the application of a ceramic coating for windscreens and side glass
9. Correcting painted plastic bumpers where heat can spike even faster than on metal and alloy panels
10. safely polishing piano black pieces on the inside and out of a vehicle to guarantee a flawless finish and less heat

USING THE DA OR THE ROTARY FOR THE FIRST STEP OF CORRECTION – ADVANTAGES & DISADVANTAGES OF BOTH MACHINES

DA Cut – Rotary Finish

The main advantages of using DA polishers for the first stage of paint correction are less mess as it’s more difficult to splatter polish all over the panel and the windows which is very easy with a rotary, you don’t have to worry about putting in holograms or buff marks though micro marring and haze is possible at times, what you see is what you get with a DA as there is no concern of seeing defects after stage two that you didn’t see with stage one which can happen with rotary as well as swelling the paint and seeing the marks come back days or weeks later if you overheat it and cause it to act like botox fillers. You can remove significant defects quicker at times and are not limited to having to do two or three stages of paint correction unlike rotary.

The disadvantages are the inability to level orange peel as much and as quickly as a rotary, can sometimes leave micro marring and DA haze which a rotary will never leave, inability to get some of the deeper defects out as quickly. It ultimately cannot do what a rotary does best

To get the most correction out of the DA as the first step, use a 21 mm or 25 mm orbit polisher with a five-inch diameter backing plate. This combination can deliver the most aggressive cutting power.

WHEN TO USE DA TO CUT: Use the DA to do the cutting stage if the paint has light, moderate to heavy swirl marks on soft paints, sticky paints and the occasional scuff mark or light scratch removable by DA with the 5-5-5 technique

WHEN TO USE THE ROTARY: When paintwork has extreme levels of damage such as more than light to moderate levels of oxidation and orange peel that you wish to reduce down, semi deep scratches that don’t require sanding and if the paint has an appearance that lacks clarity like frosted window glass – that requires a rotary for the quickest and best results.

WHEN TO SAND THEN DA CUT: Heavy oxidation where sanding is much faster and more likely to permanently fix it, orange peel reduction (OEM) or removal (show car finishes) and a need to remove the heaviest defects and the customer wants a show car level paint finish once they are removed. When you sand up to 5000-8000 grit so the sanding marks are much easier to remove with just a DA polisher

WHEN TO SAND THEN ROTARY CUT: You’re sanding up to 2000-3000 grit only or even 5000 and prefer the faster and more consistent sanding mark removal of the rotary and achieving a crisp rich wet reflection to the paint which only the rotary can deliver. It’s the best foundation in achieving a brilliant and even flawless finish

Finishing with the rotary after a DA cutting stage will give the paint an excellent clarity, depth of reflection and a rich wet gloss. However, I would only recommend doing rotary finishing on paints which are in between soft and medium hardness and closer to medium than soft plus any paints harder than that. Medium to hard paints would be the best types to finish with a rotary due to them being easier to finish down without any imperfections from the polishing process.

Finishes from DA cutting then rotary finishing

Rotary Cut – DA Finish

Using the rotary for the cutting stage then following with a DA would be ideal for paints in very bad condition to average condition that are suffering from some of the issues mentioned above such as the heaviest concentration of swirl marks plus lots of light scratches that the rotary can remove as well as doing darker colours to set up a high gloss reflective foundation from a wool pad especially if you use the foamed wool pads available on the market. What you will get with using the rotary first is potentially the highest cut, the ability to correct paintwork on car panel shapes which a free spinning DA polisher would struggle to retain its rotation and oscillation on due to convex and concave shapes especially the sides of bonnet bulges on large sedans and being able to correct in the tightest areas in the most precise manner for safer and better correction work around door handles, side mirrors including the underside, side indicators and right up to edges and sharp body lines without worrying about pad overhang on lines and edges which can lead to clear coat burn through with a long stroke DA if the pad is too big and is constantly touching them. Front bumper small area polishing is also done best with a rotary due to the superior accuracy of a perfectly circular spinning pad with no offset. Remember that with a DA with any orbit from 12 mm upwards, if your 12-25 mm away from a door handle, indicator, side mirror or anything else, your actually hitting it with the pad or lightly brushing it whereas with rotary from 1 mm away you’re not touching it at all hence why it’s the more precise tool.

Following this with a DA polishing stage – my recommendation is to use an eight, nine or twelve millimetre orbit DA polisher for the best possible finish. The shorter the orbit the better your finish will be in almost all cases. Between 2006 and 2016 I was using a dual orbit DA sander with a washer mod done to make it more free spinning and set at the six-millimetre orbit mode to finish out hologram free after rotary.

I did notice at times however that it would reduce the colour richness and the wet look gloss finish that the rotary had created by just a small amount no matter what type of DA polisher and pad that I used. Whilst this doesn’t always happen it can occur due to pad drag – the inertia of a DA as it’s moving one direction then changing direction and the pad’s still moving the other direction for a moment before changing. Something the rotary never does so a rotary cut, DA finish combination would be best for lighter and brighter colours but of course still try it at times for darker colours and see how you go.

TIP: if on dark colours any DA does not deliver the darkest, wettest and richest finish and the customer is paying enough for the best possible finish then switch to forced rotation DA or a rotary to finish out.

Rotary Cut and Finish

Things a rotary can achieve that a dual action polisher cannot do or at least not in an efficient enough time frame

Here is a prime example of what a rotary at high speed for a short thirty to fourty second cycle can do with the most aggressive fiber pads followed by a foam pad or two of them. This Pajero’s factory paint with excessive orange peel was significantly levelled and a richer clearer high gloss finish was achieved in a time frame that no DA polisher could achieve in the same time frame unless using denim or velvet pads which are much stronger than the wool pad which achieved this.

The rotary is capable of achieving this from its direct drive gear driven circular motion which generates more friction – the downside of this is it can create more heat than a dual action machine although a microfiber pad and a DA used aggressively can still create alot of heat but usually rotary and foam cutting pads cause the highest heat spikes but if it’s managed so it stays in the 35-45 degrees celcius range, then there will be no paint swelling issues

My Recommendations for Rotary only paint correction and finishing

THE BEST WOOL PADS FOR MAXIMUM CUTTING

• 4 ply twisted wool (either steamed or unsteamed)
• Oberk Thundercut pad – silk and natural wool
• 1 inch and 1.25-inch nap twisted wool pads (shorter fibers don’t bend over as much and stay upright for better cut)

LESS CUT – BETTER FINISHING WOOL PADS

• 1 ply untwisted wool
• LC purple foamed wool
• Rupes Cut & Finish
• Natural and synthetic wool blend pads – higher heat generation due to the polyester or acrylic is a downside

BEST FINISHING WOOL PADS

• Synthetic Wool – Acrylic
• Synthetic Wool – Polyester
• 50/50 Natural Wool & Acrylic
• Untwisted wool/silk blend

GREAT FOAMS FOR STEP 2

• The Pad King Frostbite white cutting pad
• The Pad King Green All Rounder
• The Pad King Lone Star Red
• Buff and Shine Edgeguard maroon
• Buff and Shine Edgeguard blueberry
• Lake Country HDO blue
• ZviZZer Thermo All Rounder Red

EXAMPLES OF ROTARY ONLY PAINT CORRECTION RESULTS

What causes the scour marks and bad holograms that you sometimes see with wool pads on a rotary

If you’ve detailed cars for long enough, you probably remember the kind of swirled up hologram ridden mess that using a twisted wool pad on a rotary could cause, especially in untrained hands or even experienced ones. Well before the introduction and evolution of large orbit DA polishers that make it much easier to finish out car paint, buff marks aka holograms were a bug bear of many pro detailers who had to remove those marks with a second and even third step of polishing to get that flawless finish and there was no guarantee of a hologram free finish until weeks after the job was done in some cases as if they created too much heat, the paint would swell and effectively once everything outgassed from the paint the holograms appeared.

The cause of these holograms wasn’t the rotary polisher on it’s own. In actual fact the causes of them is not one thing but multiple things including to a lesser degree, the user. The causes are as follows.

The compounds that were available in the past two to four decades were a major cause, but other causes include the barbs or burrs as their also known that are within certain wool pads as the wool has not undergone the super washing process which removes them. contained within certain wool pads on the market because they are not super washed wool – a process where those barbs are removed. Other causes are bad technique such as not finishing with the pad flat, finishing the polishing cycle at a speed too high to be able to refine the paint and leave a better finish with really shallow super fine wool pad marks. Another one is not keeping the pads clean enough. The typical machine speed people would use back a few decades was 1500 to 2000 rpm and if you do that then stop you are being very aggressive and not leaving the paint with a finish that has very little defects from the polisher, pad and product.

Compounds for decades contained crystalline silica abrasives which were able to remove serious paint defects and more of them quicker than the early aluminium oxide abrasives which replaced them later on as the silica was carcinogenic so it was replaced out of health and safety reasons. The trouble with silica abrasives is that they were powdery or dusty most often due to not the best formulations ever made and lousy at finishing out to a really high gloss. Most of them would gouge and tear at the paint to correct it but were unable to be refined down enough to improve the finish. The vast majority of them left the paint looking no better or actually worse after step one than it was before as there was just as much damage on the paint after removing the swirl marks and scratches that it looked just as bad. those marks were replaced with shallower holograms, scour marks and haze.

As you can see here, holograms can leave a paint finish looking awful. So how do you ensure you leave the faintest holograms with the rotary and wool pads or none at all as well as finishing with a rotary using foam hologram free.

The answer is to follow these guidelines

• Ensure your wool pads are clean and kept clean during use – compressed air or a pad washer is a great option
• For maximum cut use a 4 ply natural twisted wool pad or a thundercut pad from Oberk
• Use the latest abrasive paint correction creams and liquids – CSI Ceram X or XX, Dr Beasleys, Oberk, 3D Products and a few other brands are the better options due to superior abrasive technology
• Finish your last two passes at 800 rpm and then 600 rpm or even 350-500 if your rotary has that feature
• The higher rpm speed you use spend less and less time working at that speed the higher you go. So 1200-1500 keep it to 30 to 40 second cycle time then lower your machine speed down by 200-300 rpm per pass.
• Do your first pass or two of cutting with the pad tilted on a slight angle which will keep the paint temperature at a safe level of 25-35 degrees celcius.
• If you need to start with some pressure, do this for two passes then put the pad flat on the surface and reduce the machines rpm speed down to 800 or 900 rpm and do a pass from top to bottom or left to right with slightly faster arm speed and less pressure. Then do another pass but this time at 600 rpm and with even faster arm speed with no pressure at all. These passes will refine the paint down and reduce the holograms down to either very light or super shallow and in some rare cases leave just the faintest white hazy line as seen in the second photo in this blog post.
• When polishing with wool on rotary, always increase your arm speed, reduce machine speed and your pressure on the machine, pad and paint. This will help you leave a better finish with far less refining to do with stage two and a great foundation to build on with a second and even third stage

THE 100% GUARANTEED HOLOGRAM FREE ROTARY AND WHY IT WILL NEVER EXIST

I believe it could be possible to produce a constantly hologram free rotary all the time if there was such a rotary created where the centre part of the pad was driven by one motor on the polisher and the outside two or three inches of the pad was driven by a second motor and both operated at different speeds so both the centre and the outside sections completed a rotation in the exact same timeframe rather than the centre doing it quicker with conventional rotaries due to having less distance to travel than the larger outside diameter, the centre rotated at a slower speed to match the time it takes for the outside section to complete the rotation. The other option would be some way for the motor and the electronics to drive the two sections of the pad independantly with different speeds so the centre isn’t rotating quicker than the outside. I believe that the single circular motion plus the fact that the centre spins faster than the outside is why we sometimes do get holograms

The reason that a true constantly hologram free rotary polisher will never exist is that the complexity in designing it would make it not financially viable to mass produce and also since we have a myriad of dual action polishers on the market that do not suffer this problem, why would anyone bother to design and make them – as much as they would be good

DO ROTARIES ALWAYS LEAVE A HOLOGRAM

No – my former mentor who spent decades on rotary polishers knew how to never leave a hologram ever when he polished cars and he has won pebble beach concourse before with a car he painted and polished, so he knew how to do it extremely well and taught me some of the best knowledge I’ve ever gained.

WHAT ABOUT PEOPLE LIKE TODD COOPERIDER OF ESOTERIC DETAIL WHO SAY ROTARY IS NO LONGER NEEDED

Todd is someone I know and really like. I actually sent him a denim and a velvet pad I believe back in 2011 when I first encountered them before most in the industry knew what they were. I respect him for his skills, knowledge and what he has done to build up Esoteric to what it is today which is seriously impressive. Though his video where he states that rotary is no longer needed for anything other than perhaps spinning pads dry whilst understandable as DA polishers can do so much for us, limiting yourself as a professional detailer to just random orbital polishers or that plus forced rotation and not having the most versatile type of polisher in existance in your arsenal that can get into areas so close and tight that a DA with anything more than 3-6 mm orbit simply struggles to get into properly is a major mistake IMHO

Yes, we can detail cars most of the time without a rotary but what happens when you have cars with many convex and concave shapes, motorbikes with lots of small areas, boats with AWLGRIP and Gel coat paints that require significant heat to be able to remove the oxidised paint and actually give it a high gloss finish – a DA would take you way too long.

Having a rotary in your tool kit gives you so much more versatility to be able to use 1-inch up to nine-inch pads, backing plates with different thickness and hardness to change your level of aggression and contouring ability for the pad, heat generation and more. Most of all, on that one rare day when you go to paint correct a vehicle and every single random orbital polisher on the market regardless of orbit size leaves pigtails, micro marring or haze and refuses to finish out without a polisher induced imperfection because the paint is crap quality or there is something strange about it and it actually prefers the rotary action, that is when you will be grateful for having a rotary.

Whilst the difference in gloss levels between a rotary and all other polisher types is not that big, what a rotary can do on those paints with nasty water spot etching, non-uniform sanding marks and the frosted glass appearance to it is phenomenal. Transforming paint from dull as to a diamond. It can reduce orange peel faster than a DA and create finishes a DA with any two or three pad combination simply never can match. That is why you should have one.

There is still evolution that can occur with rotary polishers, it’s just that no one is doing much besides Mirka who are making new ones which are so much quieter and smoother to operate. Look for the new Mirka rotary in September which is based on their new rotary sander that I tested for them some months ago.

THE FINAL SAY ON ROTARY VS DA

It is my firm belief that rotary polishers will always have a place when it comes to aftermarket show car paint finish polishing as well as deep cleaning classic cars with vintage paints, safely polishing some modern thin paints as rotary removes less paint most often and for sanding mark removal unless everyone starts using 5000 to 12,000 grit sanding discs. It is just so much more versatile and actually more therapeutic with less strain on the human body

The rotary at speed 3-4 (1between 900 and 1500-2000 rpm between all models) is not even the speed that a dual action polisher starts at. Their typical usage speed of 3-5 is way faster than the typical speeds we use a rotary at so they can be deadly in the wrong hands and are not some ultra safe machine that will never damage anything.

HERE IS AN EXAMPLE OF PAINT DEEP CLEANING VIA ROTARY

TOOL USAGE BASED ON VERSATILITY-CUTTING PERFORMANCE-FINISHING ABILITY ETC

This is a pie chart representing how much I would use each type of polisher on the market.

Gloss enhancements are the realm of forced rotation and 12-15 mm orbit DA machines though some may use 8-9 mm orbit machines at times as well. For one step corrections 15 mm orbit polishers would be the best option though forced rotation can also be used to great effect on many paint types. Getting more intense from there is where the largest orbit polishers or a rotary are really the most efficient, highly effective tool options. What you choose to do the remaining one or two stages after that with could be any number of combinations of tools.

As you can see here, the rotary has the highest cutting power despite how some say DA cuts more – yes at times it can but with some things it really does lack the ability to match the rotary when massive paint transformations are required. Heat is needed on marine paints. I do love my dual orbit Metabo DA sander with 6.25 mm orbit – it has served me well as a final step polisher after rotary with the least amount of drop off of colour richness and gloss though the next best are the medium orbit polishers from eight to twelve millimetre

To sum it all up, the rotary is the king of edgework, severe defect removal and at times the best finisher (paint type dependant) but 25 mm orbit DA is a monster at defect removal as well but can finish out great too. I just have not used a 25 mm orbit polisher yet but was going to do so but could not find a quality version at the time. Short and medium sized orbit polishers are

My service-based polisher recommendations

Gloss Enhancements (single or duo gloss process)

1. Forced Rotation
2. 15 mm orbit DA
3. 12 mm orbit DA
4. 8/9 mm orbit DA

One Stage Corrections

1. 21-25 mm orbit DA
2. Forced Rotation
3. 15 mm orbit DA
4. 12 mm orbit DA

Two Stage corrections

1. Rotary & DA for messed up paint
2. 21-25 mm orbit DA for medium to heavy damaged paint
3. 15 mm orbit DA – lighter level damage
4. 12 mm orbit DA – paint in excellent condition
5. DA & Rotary (tricky to finish out flawless so not the best option every time)

Three Stage corrections

1. Rotary-Rotary-DA
2. 25 mm DA-Rotary-Rotary
3. Rotary-DA-DA

Thank you for taking the time to read this longer than normal blog post and I am sure that there is even more that I could add to this topic. I welcome your opinions and feedback on this such as what you feel should be added to this that may be missing. There is absolutely no point trying to choose either the rotary or a DA, have both of them and even forced rotation too so you have all the great tools and the most capabilities possible with your businesses paint correction services which will allow you to achieve whatever it is that you want to.

Happy Detailing everyone

Matthew Gibb

Founder – Matt’s Magic Detail Tech