[GoudyL]

From what I've learned so far, (and some of what I knew previously), carnauba is extremely hard, is NOT readily soluble, has an extremely high melting point, and can not be broken down by water.

That sounds like something I want on my car paint, doesn't it??

Not really, there are many other aspects a substance needs to have in order to be a good ingredient in a car wax.

The fatty alcohols in Carnauba wax, cause it to be slightly hydroscopic, and the linear structure of its molecules means it doesn't form stabilising entanglements within itself. It's not detergent resistent either.

A reactive aminosilicone that bonds to the paint and to other components in the formulation is going to be much more durable.

However, those properties make it nearly impossible to get pure carnauba from the Brazillian Carnauba Palm Tree, onto your car. Oils and solvents, and mixing carnauba with other, more forgiving waxes makes it easier.

Not exactly, disolving carnauba in solvents would require strong solvents, and leave behind a wax film that would be streaky and too hard to buff.

So what you do, is you soften the carnauba by combining it with oily substances, and further combine the carnauba with emulsifiers/emulsifying waxes, thus forming a colloidal dispersion of softened wax microparticles, in a continious phase.

The emulsifying waxes are critical, which is why you see oxidised waxes used. These waxes have acid groups (acid value) which make them polar, and easily emulsifable. Classically people use montan wax's (Luwax or Licowax) or various oxidised polyethylene/PAO waxes.

Further a good formulation will contain silicone oils which lubricate the movement of the wax microparticles in the emulsion and film. This helps form a level film of wax on the surface. Of course the silicone oils contribute additional functionality because they are very glossy, hydrophobic, and slick/non-tacky.

When you spread the wax on the surface of the car, the emulsion breaks (due to the shearing and evaporation of solvents), the wax microparticles form a thin film layer, and are further "smooshed" together when you buff the wax.

Therefore, as the content of pure carnauba goes up, the oils, solvents, and other waxes need to work harder in order to make the product more spreadable. Or, they need to be higher quality oils, solvents, and waxes.

Not exactly, welcome to the world of emulsions and colloids.

However, when these products evaporate from the surface of the car all that's left is carnauba.

Along with emulsifiers and lubricants and all other non-volatile solid ingredients in the wax.

In the case of emulsifers, you don't want things in the film that make it more soluble. Thus car wax formulators would prefer not to use ingredients that require emulsifers or retain their emulsification abilities in the final film.

This is one of the reasons that the actual amounts of wax in a formulation tend to be quite low.

This also explains the "hand" application of ZV. Heat is known to aid in the breakdown of carnauba wax. Therefore, since ZV contains such a high volume of such a resilient product, the introduction of heat aids in the application process.

Not at all, the carnauba wax is happily inert at body temperatures. All that's happening is that the solid emulsion has a softening point around body temperature. Heat makes both the microparticles and the continious phase more energetic, Same idea as butter softening at room temperature.

How is this accomplished? From what I've read, ZV contains certain enzymes that interact with your own body head and act as a catalyst to aid in the application of the wax.

How? By what mechanism?

Furthermore, the 61% by volume shouldn't be so difficult to understand.

Maybe it's much more complex than you are aware of? Remember that the wax film is 100% solids. So 61% by solids means the wax film will be 61% carnauba wax. 61% by volume means the wax film will be more more than 61% carnauba by volume.

Since carnauba is what's left behind after the evaporation of the solvents, it stands to reason that a higher carnauba content would leave a thicker, more durable protective coat.

Absolutely not. What matters is how well that coat bonds to the paint, and how well it bonds to itself; how thick it is a secondary consideration.

Only the first layer of molecules in the wax film can bond/interact with the paint surface. The next and subsequent layers can only interact with the layer of molecules that are interacting with the paint.

This is why straight mineral oil would be a poor wax, the first layer binds nicely to the paint, but the later layers have so much less interaction with each other that they come right off.

Now when we have a wax that contains reactive aminosilicones, these will bond to the paint, and to other reactive ingredients in the wax, thus forming a cross linked network throughout the film. Even better if that film contains things like highly branched compounds and hard particles that form stabilising entanglements or stiffen the film by restricting movement within the film.

In contrast, the molecules of carnauba wax, are mostly linear, with only perhaps slight bending due to ester linkages etc.

Where thickness is a consideration, is in the optical distiortion that the wax film creates. The thicker/less uniform carnauba film, creates a "wet look" because of this. But you can get the same or better effect by using bulky polymers to create a thick synthetic film. This is also why sealants look better on metalic cars, less distoration allows the metalic flake to shine better.

For example: if Brand X contains 5% carnauba and ZV contains 61%. Then it stands to reason that applying 1oz of Brand X will leave your car with .05 oz of carnauba protection. Whereas 1oz of ZV will leave .61oz of carnauba protection. Since your car is a finite size, that means that the protective coating must be thicker and harder when using ZV.

No. The thickness of the film is limited by the waxes ability to bind with itself. The waxes will form films of roughly equal thickness, and durability of the film is much more influenced by the other ingredients.

Again, in a product that is a mixture, what is important is the relative proportions of the ingredients, not the absolute amounts.

And, since the ZV coating is thicker, it stands to reason that it is more durable. Just like a large chunk of ice takes longer to melt than a small chunk, .61oz of carnauba will take longer to break down than .05oz given the same driving conditions.

No because again you are making the faulty assumption that thickness = durability which is not the case. And further you are assuming that the wax coat is abraded off, or degrades due to scission rather than being washed off or falling off in microscopic flakes.

This is all basic info I know. I got it from wikipediaand wisegeek.com.

Here's a wikipedia article for you.

Dunning-Kruger effect - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I'm still learning, but it seems that this information supports the idea that a 61% carnauba formula should cost more. 1) It takes higher quality, more specialized ingredients to make it work. And 2) It seems logical that it would perform better than Brand X because it leaves behind MORE protective wax.

Seriously, the expensive ingredients are things like functional silicones/polymers, not waxes or emulsifiers. Basic waxes and emulsifiers (aka soap) are bulk chemicals. Carnauba wax costs less than $10/lb.

Again, for someone not in the chemicals industry, you have no idea how silly the idea of a car wax that costs $2100 for 22oz is. I doubt the total cost of ingredients is more than $25 per tub.

Please don't come back at me with "Why does more = better" I just attempted to explain it, and I think I did a pretty good job.

Your explanation was naive (Evian?).

You can claim 'projective identification' all you want. But I don't see PhD after your name. But the woman sitting next to me has one, and she says you're wrong.

She's married to you, and I hope you aren't expecting an honest response to a question that is the male equivalent of

"Honey, does this dress make me look fat"

"No of course not."

"Sugerplum, do I project my male insecurities onto other people"

"No, Tiger, of course not"

Surely you know that Bernie Madoff does not represent the entire wealthy population.

How about his clients?

He built $65 Billion dollar business built entirely on rich people too stupid to understand why what he claimed to be doing was impossible.