Redmond detailer heading back to Seattle’s Museum of Flight for fifth year on Air Force One Detailing Team
(Update: Adding video, comments by Mayfield)
REDMOND, Ore. (KTVZ) — Redmond automotive detailer Shane Mayfield of Perfection Plus Auto Salon has been chosen for his fifth year on the 2023 Air Force One Detailing Team at Seattle’s Museum of Flight, July 10-15.
This will be the 20th anniversary of the prestigious project, and it makes Mayfield one of the longest consecutive serving members of the famed team.
Led by the “Detailer of Air Force One,” Renny Doyle, the 2023 team consists of the most experienced and proven members of his elite Detail Mafia who for the past 20 years, have been caretakers of the iconic plane after preserving and protecting its exterior since 2003.
For more than a decade, the first presidential jet lived on the open tarmac at the Museum of Flight, exposed to Seattle’s notorious climate.
Today, the plane is on display inside the open-air Aviation Pavilion, but it is still exposed to moisture and Seattle’s cold winter weather conditions.
Every year when the team comes to work on the plane, the paint has begun to show signs of weathering and the brightwork has begun to dull, even though they use a 1-year protective coating to hold it over until the next year.
The historic presidential plane is a specially built Boeing VC-137B SAM (Special Air Missions) 970, delivered in 1959 as the first presidential jet. It served as a flying Oval Office for Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon, and also entertained many international VIPs such as Nikita Khrushchev and Henry Kissinger.
Also on the agenda, are five additional historic aircraft the team has been restoring over the past two decades including the Boeing B-29 Superfortress “T-Square 54,” the Concorde G-BOAG “Alpha Golf,” the Boeing 727 “Serial No. 001,” and the Lockheed 1049G Super Constellation “Connie.”
Mayfield and other team members are successful detailing business owners, who pay their own way to Seattle and donate their time and skills to the project.
Mayfield’s Perfection Plus was named IDA’s 2018 Detailing Shop of the Year and the Southern Detailer’s Conference named Mayfield himself 2022 Detailer of the Year.
He is dually certified and skills validated by the International Detailing Association and has been a “made” member of the famed Detail Mafia for several years.
The Detail Mafia are the most accomplished and technologically advanced team of automotive detailers in the U.S., and artisans in the care and maintenance of automotive paint and automotive interiors.
This is not Mayfield’s only prestigious detailing project having served a couple of years on the Hagerty Motorlux and The Quail Motorsports Gathering teams at Monterey Car Week.
“It has been quite a ride, or should I say flight, being a part of this team,” Mayfield said. “I’m just a car guy who never dreamed when I got into the business, that these kinds of opportunities existed, much less that I would have the opportunity to be a part of it.
“The technology, the products and the equipment and the team’s dedication have helped us save this deteriorating plane that many people did not believe could be saved, and I am proud to be preserving aviation history.”
Every spring, Doyle chooses his team members carefully from detailers he has trained and certified over the years. Many of them are senior members of the team that go back to the original restoration project in 2003, while he tries to also bring in rookies every year who show promise in the meticulous art of paint correction and polishing one-stage paint and brightwork.
Mayfield has earned his place as a supervisor and leader of the team this year.
