Product Review: Pinnacle Black Label Waterless Wash & Protect

While talking to the folks here at Autogeek about products to review, they mentioned Pinnacle Black Label Waterless Wash and Protect as one I just had to try. In fact, they raved for quite a while about this product and how much they liked it. Based on their enthusiasm, I decided to try it out and see if I`d like it as well.

What is it?


Pinnacle Black Label Waterless Wash and Protect is a new waterless wash product in the long line of Pinnacle Black Label Products. You can read the full product copy provided by the good folks at Autopia here. Unlike some waterless washes sold here, this one is NOT a concentrate and comes ready to use in a spray bottle.


The great lubrication and the hydrophobic properties of this product are two of the big selling points in the product description and points I heard in conversation with the staff.


Testing/Review Approach


I tested this product two ways.


1. As a waterless wash. Since the product description specifically calls out scenarios where people live in areas with water restrictions or in apartment/condo complexes where a traditional wash is not possible, this is exactly how I tried it out. It was used on my personal car while sitting in my driveway late in the evening to keep surface temperatures down.


2. As a QD spray and drying aid. This is how I use other waterless wash products as do many others. These days, there is very little difference between waterless washes and QD sprays and many waterless wash products serve QD and drying aid duty easily and with great results.


OK. Now that we`ve got that behind us, on with the review.


Use as a Waterless Wash


With all the current pandemic restrictions, I`ve been teleworking for months and my daily driver has become a garage queen. However, I still get out for few errands and a recent trip to a state park for some hiking. This gave the car plenty of opportunity to get a little dusting of pollen, dust and bugs.


Here is how the car looked before washing.


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As the owner of a black car I`ll freely admit the act of performing waterless washes scares me a bit. I`ve been disappointed by waterless wash products in the past which didn`t work as well as I hoped and created more work for me the next time I corrected the vehicle. Most of the time, I won`t even try it unless I have a high level of confidence in the product and there are only minimal amounts of dust and pollen on the surface. In this case I took a deep breath and hoped for the best. On this evening the temperature was in the low 70`s and the sun was setting. The surface of the car was cool to the touch, making it the perfect time to try out.


I started out using a similar amount of product as you see Mike Phillips using in the demo on the AG product page.


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Right away I noticed the lubrication was really good which made me much more confident I`d be able to safely clean my black car without inducing any marring. This was even more surprising to me because the product is so thin. Lately, I`ve been using CarPro`s Ech2O which is pretty thick even in WW or QD dilutions. I also noticed it has a pleasant, mild, fruity-like smell. Nothing overbearing and not an industrial solvent smell that might bother some people if used in close quarters.


One down side I did notice to using the amount of product shown in the picture above was I would occasionally get a little streaking. A light mist of product would remove the streaks and backing off a little bit on the amount of product applied seemed to eliminate the streaking problem.


The cleaning ability is really good as well.


Here is a before/after of a sticky sweat/sunscreen/bug repellent hand print left by a passenger after our hike. I wiped away with ease.




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It also did a good job with removing fresh bug splatters.


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Once done, I was left with a car that was clean, glossy, totally marr free and a surprisingly slick surface.


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So I guess everyone is wondering about the hydrophobic properties mentioned earlier? I`ll get to that next...


Use as a Quick Detailer/Drying Aid


A couple of weeks after the waterless wash, my car faced a couple days of sitting outside, an autocross event, and a 500 mile road trip. It was far too dirty for me to be comfortable with a waterless wash, so this provided a great opportunity to try out this PBL Waterless Wash as a QD and drying aid.


Right way when I sprayed my car with the hose I noticed the water was sheeting far better than the last time I performed a bucket wash. The car currently is coated with CanCoat and was treated about six weeks ago with a 50/50 diluted Cure. However, what I witnessed was sheeting far better than anything I managed from Cure. I was really surprised. The gallery is still randomly rotating some of my photos, but hopefully you all can still get a sense of what was going on.


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Once the wash was complete I set out to use this PBL Waterless Wash I use other similar products to reduce water spotting while drying and remove any spots I might have missed. In this application the product really excelled. The lubrication made drying a breeze and a light mist of product made short work of any spots I missed. I was really impressed again by how well it worked.


This also showed me the product is coating friendly. Granted, CanCoat is "lite" coating, but it still did not have any adverse effect on the properties of the coating and actually give them a bit of a boost!


Final Thoughts


As both a waterless wash and a quick detailer the PBL Waterless wash excelled. I really liked using it, and it performed really well. The waterless wash process took a little experimenting to get the right amount which wouldn`t streak, but that`s not a big deal at all to me considering the great results.


As far as the "protection" in the name goes, I have no idea. Frankly, when using a product like this or any other like it I wouldn`t count on any protection lasting more than a week or so in normal daily driver conditions. I`m certain the results I saw when washing my car after using it the first time was partially due to the car spending most of it`s time parked in the garage.


There is one, "However" to this glowing review I can`t overlook and it is price. Right now this 16oz bottle is listed at $24.99. When using this product for waterless washes at the volumes shown in my photo, I used half a bottle o a 4-series BMW which is essentially a coupe version of a mid-sized sedan. That means would cost you $12.40 per wash, if not more if you had a larger vehicle!


PBL Waterless Wash and Protect a great product that lives up to the reputation of the brand and the product copy. It would be a good waterless wash if you have a smaller garage queen or needed something special for a car show and you`re willing to pay the price. As a quick detailer where you`ll use FAR less product at any one time it becomes far more economical and a more realistic option. It performs really well in the role and is exactly how I would use it going forward.


Would I buy it myself and use it again? To answer that I`ll leave you all with this last reflection shot of the car after the drying aid/quick detailer test.


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Nice review! After purchasing a few bottles, I got frustrated thinking it was SiO2 based since it’s PBL (and that’s what I expect from them)... but found out it may not be ceramic based from a thread on AGO. It is ultimately my fault for assuming and not closely reading the description. But my main reason for the disappointment was due to concern this could interfere with good water behavior LSPs. So I’m glad to hear it had no adverse effects on your Cancoat. I hope the same is true for most other ceramic sprays.

Anyways, I did take it out recently and apply to one panel as a drying aid. I was very impressed how the water droplets instantly dropped away and a swipe with my drying towel left zero wetness behind. So all I can confirm to this point is that it’s a top notch drying aid.

I doubt I’ll ever use it as a WW due to the price, but it’s use as a gloss enhancing drying aid/QD is the reason I purchased to begin with. Your review gives me hope that it may excel at those purposes and not be a detriment to self-cleaning properties. I appreciate your fine write-up!

If I ever get through my backlog of soaps, blackfire, optimum, WG, and the CarPro sio2 stuff, I’ll give this stuff a shot. PBL stuff has generally treated me very well.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by acuRAS82

But my main reason for the disappointment was due to concern this could interfere with good water behavior LSPs. So I’m glad to hear it had no adverse effects on your Cancoat. I hope the same is true for most other ceramic sprays.

Anyways, I did take it out recently and apply to one panel as a drying aid. I was very impressed how the water droplets instantly dropped away and a swipe with my drying towel left zero wetness behind. So all I can confirm to this point is that it’s a top notch drying aid.

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Something I didn`t put in my review, but probably should have was for those folks who like the surface to be slick after a wipedown, This BPL Waterless Wash is the slickest stuff I can remember using. It`s slicker than Ech2O or Cure and much slicker than the Pinnacle Waterless Wash with Carnauba.

I found the gloss to be interesting as well. It doesn`t offer the glassy look of Cure or other SIO2 products, but does give a more carnauba-esq appearance. It looks good on my black metallic car, but would be spectacular on a solid black or a solid red.