Coatings and Holding up in the real world

[TTQ B4U]

Prompted by Clays point in my most recent detail from CR, I'll put out the following thoughts and points of feedback from the detailing world as it's a great topic for discussion and learning.

 

In a nutshell, if your car is a daily driver then there's no escaping that the finish will develop a build-up or a layer road grime that physically and mechanically will bond to and eventually stain the finish thus reducing the hydrophobic property of the coating and the level of gloss. The impact isn't just on the paint/clear coat either. It will impact the windows, plastic trim, metal trim work and even fabric tops. It's one of the main reasons why I don't push the super expensive 3-5 or 7-10 year type coatings that are marketed today. They are fine for a garage queen but daily drivers and weekend toys are more of what I see.

 

In the case of a ceramic paint coatings, if the owner maintains a clean car and does so carefully as to not scour the actual coating, a coated vehicle will stay cleaner longer and resist the build-up of a film of road grime, far better than any sealant or wax on the same surface. The reason for this is coatings are usually applied to a fully corrected and polished vehicle. That polish or leveling aka smoothness of the finish is what provides a vehicle it's gloss level. It also removes any voids, pits, pores or interstices that road grim/oil film will tend to migrate into thus causing the build up I've mentioned. Once embedded into imperfections it's typically beyond the point that normal car washing will remove it. Just the same however, all finishes will, with enough time, see a build up of dirt and film.

 

 

The good news is, the newer coatings I'm using and that are readily available on the market are very good, very durable and resist the bonding of contaminants extremely well. Thus here in Ohio you will easily get 2 winters worth of stellar appearance so long as you don't leave the December through February salt-laden gunk on the surfaces.

 

So at that point what do you do? Well, at some point you will need to deep cleaning of the finish with some type of paint polishing process. My first recommendation is to look at products like CarPro Cquartz, they do offer a non-destructive product in Essence Plus that when combined with their Gloss Pad and a polisher will help not only restore the properties of the coating but it helps hide light swirls and overall combined with the mechanical action of the polisher and pad system will help clean the paint.

From there, if the finish is really bad and the above is not able to work, a full decontamination, polish and a re-application of the coating will likely be necessary. The great news is that with proper care from day-one, this re-polish will likely be nothing more than a strong cleaning vs a full correction thus keeping time and costs down significantly.

 

Polishing the paint will restore clarity and depth to the finish/clear coat and it will restore the full richness of color to a single stage paint non clear coated paint. It's also the base for your choice of wax or sealant. If you choose to use a paint coating, there are typically additional steps necessary to prepare the paint for the coating as per the specific manufacturer's instructions/process.

 

I hope the above helps provide some insight as to my take on the longevity of coatings. It's high-level and perhaps not an all inclusive reply but should fit-the-bill for initial conversation.

[SpaceGhost]

I washed the car with Wolfgang’s the other day with the 2 bucket method, man with the coating it is so easy, washed it with the top down, and used a leaf blower to dry each panel working my way top to bottom with doing the sides last and the lower half sides the last two parts washed. Car comes out perfect and it’s awesome to wash the car in the garage out of the sun. The coating lets the leaf blower blow all water off the paint and don’t have to dry with a towel. Only thing I am gonna order now from Autogeek is the wheel trollies for the buckets. Here is the car and it poured on this car yesterday before I drove home from work from downtown to Westerville. Here at Masheter getting an oil change since it’s cheap because I bought the car here. It’s still almost spotless. Oh and we drove to Heath and back last night to see the fireworks.

 

Edited July 3, 2018 by Benjamin