SuperBee364
06-12-2007, 04:09 PM
It`s been an ongoing thing, trying to determine whether or not the Vintage was worth the huge hole it shot in my wallet. Today, the verdict was finally turned in: The stuff really is worth every penny.
As I`ve said before, Zaino was my primary LSP prior to the Vintage. I loved the look and the durability, but I hated Zaino when it came time to wash the car. The stuff holds on to dirt, water spots, and surface contaminants like craaaazy. The bond between Zaino and dirt often seemed as hard as the bond between the Zaino and the paint. It was always necessary to wash a Zaino finish with an MF mitt to get the car completely clean. So one of the primary determinants for Vintage`s worth was seeing how well it releases dirt, etc from the paint during a car wash. So I used my Wife`s Sequoia as a guinea pig for this experiment. I didn`t wash it for two weeks. During that time, it saw 800 miles in travel (we took a road trip down to southern Utah and back) and numerous driving rain storms, and one of the worst wind storms (with the accompanying dust/dirt) I`ve ever driven through.
The car was an absolute mess. It had water spots, dirt, dust, bugs, road grime, fresh road oil on it... just about every type of contaminant save maybe tree sap. I have never let this vehicle get this dirty in the two years we`ve owned it. I could hardly bear to look at it.
Today I ran it through a touchless car wash. Afterward, it looked like I had just finished wiping off a fresh layer of Vintage; it was completely clean and unbelievabley shiny. I was shocked beyond words. I spent a good ten minutes going over the paint from every angle in bright sunlight trying to find something left on the paint. Nada. Zip. Zilch. The car was clean! The thing that was so shocking to me was that every water spot was gone. I have never seen water spots come completely off a car from just a touchless wash. I was truly floored.
These results pretty much follow the results I had been seeing with my Charger, but I hadn`t let my Charger go more than two or three days between washings, so I really didn`t know how well the Vintage would let go of the tough stuff.
Today was also the first time I tried using Zymol`s Field Glaze on my Charger. I`ve always been kinda leery of Zymol`s stuff, inluding the Vintage. I really wanted it to live up to the hype, but I was very skeptical that any product could live up to the price tags associated with Zymol. Also, I have grown to truly hate the HD-Cleanse. So out of two Zymol products used, I had hated one, and still hadn`t decided on the other. I was truly impressed with the Field Glaze. It made the car look even better than it had after it`s last coat of Vintage. It adds a Zaino kind of gloss, which, over the top of the Vintage, just really adds to the depth and overall quality of the look. Imagine carnauba depth with Zaino shine. I just stood there and stared at my car for ten minutes. The Field Glaze has better than Z8 gloss to it.
Then all of my new found joy was completely shattered. I had taken my car to the dealership for some work last week. Being the knucklehead I am, I forgot to tell them to not wash it. So of course they did wash it. Today was the first chance I got between work and last week`s road trip to really look at the damage. After I had applied the Field Glaze, I got out the Brinkmann and the halogens. It`s unbelievable to me how this car can have such an unbelievably hard clear coat and get so freaking swirled up from one dealer car wash. Not just swirls, but RIDS, too. Some of them deep enough that I don`t dare try and remove them.
So today I`m gonna break out the SIP 3.02, 106ff and the edge line of wool. I`m planning on one pass of 3.02 with Edge green wool, one pass of 106ff with Edge blue wool, then one (possibly two) passes of 106ff with Edge white wool. Going to follow that with an IPA wipedown, then I`m going to try a new experiment. Did I mention how freaking bad I hate HD-Cleanse? I`m going to go over the car with Menzerna Final Touch Glaze instead of the Zymol recommended HD-Cleanse, then a hand applied layer of Vintage.
It`ll be interesting to see if the MFTG affects the durability of the Vintage. Which, by the way, has been extremely good so far. The Sequoia only has one layer of Vintage on it which is almost 30 days old. No noticeable decrease in beading. It also survived several 100 degree days in the southern Utah desert. Between the heat, then the driving rain, I was expecting all of the Vintage to be gone before we even got home.
I`ll quit rambling now and get to buffin`. Did you really read all the way to this point??? :)
As I`ve said before, Zaino was my primary LSP prior to the Vintage. I loved the look and the durability, but I hated Zaino when it came time to wash the car. The stuff holds on to dirt, water spots, and surface contaminants like craaaazy. The bond between Zaino and dirt often seemed as hard as the bond between the Zaino and the paint. It was always necessary to wash a Zaino finish with an MF mitt to get the car completely clean. So one of the primary determinants for Vintage`s worth was seeing how well it releases dirt, etc from the paint during a car wash. So I used my Wife`s Sequoia as a guinea pig for this experiment. I didn`t wash it for two weeks. During that time, it saw 800 miles in travel (we took a road trip down to southern Utah and back) and numerous driving rain storms, and one of the worst wind storms (with the accompanying dust/dirt) I`ve ever driven through.
The car was an absolute mess. It had water spots, dirt, dust, bugs, road grime, fresh road oil on it... just about every type of contaminant save maybe tree sap. I have never let this vehicle get this dirty in the two years we`ve owned it. I could hardly bear to look at it.
Today I ran it through a touchless car wash. Afterward, it looked like I had just finished wiping off a fresh layer of Vintage; it was completely clean and unbelievabley shiny. I was shocked beyond words. I spent a good ten minutes going over the paint from every angle in bright sunlight trying to find something left on the paint. Nada. Zip. Zilch. The car was clean! The thing that was so shocking to me was that every water spot was gone. I have never seen water spots come completely off a car from just a touchless wash. I was truly floored.
These results pretty much follow the results I had been seeing with my Charger, but I hadn`t let my Charger go more than two or three days between washings, so I really didn`t know how well the Vintage would let go of the tough stuff.
Today was also the first time I tried using Zymol`s Field Glaze on my Charger. I`ve always been kinda leery of Zymol`s stuff, inluding the Vintage. I really wanted it to live up to the hype, but I was very skeptical that any product could live up to the price tags associated with Zymol. Also, I have grown to truly hate the HD-Cleanse. So out of two Zymol products used, I had hated one, and still hadn`t decided on the other. I was truly impressed with the Field Glaze. It made the car look even better than it had after it`s last coat of Vintage. It adds a Zaino kind of gloss, which, over the top of the Vintage, just really adds to the depth and overall quality of the look. Imagine carnauba depth with Zaino shine. I just stood there and stared at my car for ten minutes. The Field Glaze has better than Z8 gloss to it.
Then all of my new found joy was completely shattered. I had taken my car to the dealership for some work last week. Being the knucklehead I am, I forgot to tell them to not wash it. So of course they did wash it. Today was the first chance I got between work and last week`s road trip to really look at the damage. After I had applied the Field Glaze, I got out the Brinkmann and the halogens. It`s unbelievable to me how this car can have such an unbelievably hard clear coat and get so freaking swirled up from one dealer car wash. Not just swirls, but RIDS, too. Some of them deep enough that I don`t dare try and remove them.
So today I`m gonna break out the SIP 3.02, 106ff and the edge line of wool. I`m planning on one pass of 3.02 with Edge green wool, one pass of 106ff with Edge blue wool, then one (possibly two) passes of 106ff with Edge white wool. Going to follow that with an IPA wipedown, then I`m going to try a new experiment. Did I mention how freaking bad I hate HD-Cleanse? I`m going to go over the car with Menzerna Final Touch Glaze instead of the Zymol recommended HD-Cleanse, then a hand applied layer of Vintage.
It`ll be interesting to see if the MFTG affects the durability of the Vintage. Which, by the way, has been extremely good so far. The Sequoia only has one layer of Vintage on it which is almost 30 days old. No noticeable decrease in beading. It also survived several 100 degree days in the southern Utah desert. Between the heat, then the driving rain, I was expecting all of the Vintage to be gone before we even got home.
I`ll quit rambling now and get to buffin`. Did you really read all the way to this point??? :)