The old girl - my boat - was looking decidedly shabby after a winter of storms, bird attacks, fall-out from fuel-reducing bush burns and general lack of attention.

Can't be too hard to clean her up, I thought: a bit of a scrub, some teak treatment, a smear of metal polish on the rails and rigging, a couple of hours with the buffing pad on the end of the drill... and she'd be as good as new. Not quite, as it turned out.

I don't know if you've ever tried to spring clean and polish your boat in one afternoon, but trust me, it doesn't work.

Scrubbing isn't as easy as it used to be, in the days before water restrictions. After umpteen bucket loads of water and an hour or so of scrubbing, the deck looked a bit cleaner, but there was still ingrained dirt in the anti-skid panels and along the edges of the deck fittings and the toerails.

The teak cockpit slats kept shedding grey bits, no matter how many times I scrubbed them, so I called a halt before the timber vanished altogether.

The metal polish got rid of stains on the flat metal fittings and the stanchions, but the rigging screws still looked pretty ordinary. I tried the buffing pad on the end of the drill in an attempt to polish up the dull, porous, chalky, fibreglass gel coat. The cutting compound went on all right, but the fast-spinning pad soon flung it off, onto surfaces I'd just spent hours cleaning, and onto next door's boat. The pad speed caused heat that made the drill body uncomfortable to hold and dried the polish into an immovable crust.

I switched to rags and elbow grease, poured on the compound, and rubbed and rubbed... for about an hour. The effect on the boat was minimal, but the hard work wasn't a complete waste of time: the cutting compound had neatly removed my fingerprints and a successful safe-cracking career beckoned. With the proceeds of my felony, I could hire a team of professionals to clean up the boat, I theorised.

And so it turned out - the hiring of the professionals, not the criminal career.

My cleaning and polishing efforts were completely overlooked by Reflections Boat Detailing's professionals, Andrew, Lee and Ryan, when they turned up to do the job properly.

"It looks pretty crappy," they agreed among themselves, quietly, so as not to offend. "But," they assured me, cheerily, "It'll look like brand new by this afternoon."

DOING IT RIGHT
The boys kicked off by covering the available dock area with gear: two trolleys full of mysterious, unbranded spray bottles; well-used, lidded tins; piles of polishing cloths; a stack of fat buffing pads; two monstrous, electric polishing machines; a five-horsepower jet blaster; a hose reel; and a couple of heavy-duty power leads.

Step one was a power wash with the jet blaster and while it did its thing Andrew Tuckey explained the process: "It doesn't matter how much you scrub with bucket and broom; you just can't get ingrained dirt out of nooks and crannies and anti-skid surfaces without a high pressure jet of water.

"However, you can't just blast away with any old pressure or you run the risk of damaging soft covers, clears, the gel coat or the timber."

Lee varied the pressure on the blaster, depending on what he was cleaning, while Ryan ran around ahead of him spraying different surfaces and the soft covers with various cleaning agents.

The rigging screws copped an acid spray, and suddenly were as shiny as new, rivalled only by the just-milled look of the troublesome teak. Next came a soapy hand wash of the whole area, followed by a hose rinse, to get rid of the blaster's handiwork. Then the boys hand dried the boat with chamois, examining every surface as they went about the job.

Now two hours into the operation and I was getting twitchy for the sight of a buffing machine. I needn't have worried.

With the boat now thoroughly clean and dry, the big polishers came out of the closet. The boys coated small areas of the tragic gel coat with cutting compound and systematically coaxed patches of shine out of the aged surface. The buffing job involved much slower pad speed than my little drill.

Three hours later, they downed machines and surveyed their achievement. Grins indicated they could see a revitalised boat under the patchwork quilt of flung compound and discarded matted wool fibres.

Then, you guessed it: it was time for another full, soapy hand wash of the whole boat and a hose rinse, followed by the chamois procedure once more.

Elbow grease was now the order of the day: marine wax was worked into the shiny gel coat and hand rubbed to an even more lustrous shine. I became slightly exhausted, just from looking on.

The finishing touch was a metal polish for all the stainless steel.

KEEPING IT THAT WAY
I couldn't bear the thought of the old girl losing this renewed glamour, so I plagued Andrew for some maintenance pointers. "Cleanliness is the primary issue, so it's important to give the boat a wash and rinse after every sail, or at least once a month if you're not using it," he said.

"A wash after every use gets rid of spilt food and drink that cause stains if left unattended, and also is an opportunity to check the boat for any damage or loose fittings.

"The best stuff to use is a wash and wax cleaner, because it won't strip the wax off like truck wash does, and will actually leave a wax film behind.

"Every month, you should finish the rinse with a dry off, followed by a wax job - not with hard-to-apply wax, but with an easy-coat type that doesn't make the job too arduous."

Andrew caught my fixed stare at the glowing teak slats in the cockpit and answered my unasked question: "Teak won't stay like that for long, because it develops a protective, grey barrier that limits weathering.

"However, without protection from a teak preservative, the surface will gradually erode as the grey surface barrier sloughs off.

"It'll need recoating every couple of months, but it's a simple enough job."

Stainless steel develops characteristic, brown 'tea' stains that are easily removed with regular use of a quality metal polish, Andrew told me, but intricate shapes like rigging screws are difficult to polish. An acid cleaner is the most effective way of keeping them bright.

"Clears are expensive and are easily damaged - even just by rolling them up," he said.

"There are several different compounds you can use to keep them truly clear, but polishing clears can be hard work.

"Another option is spray-on clear panel polish that fills scratches with wax, making them look unmarked."

The Reflections blokes were quick to admit that they'd learnt the best way to do the job by experience, built up over many years' hard work detailing boats, cars and trucks. They do all three, so they're up to date with the latest products and have found that products and techniques developed for automotive, for example, can have boating applications.

"Regular cleaning and waxing are the secrets to keeping your boat looking like new," said Andrew Tuckey.

"Apart from having much better appearance, this process keeps the gel coat in good condition and helps it resist oxidation and patchy fading that's such a nuisance when any gel coat repair work needs to be done.

"You may still need professional detailing at some stage, but regular care prolongs the effect."

Now I can't wait to show off the boat, use Andrew Tuckey's cleaning and waxing recommendations, and see how the old girl stands up to a summer of knocking about Pittwater, doing social sailing and some (very) casual racing.

If you're in the Sydney region and your boat needs professional care, you might give Andrew Tuckey of Reflections a call on 0411 701 570.