Ceramic Paste Wax Showdown / Test

[acuRAS82]

First off, let me say this: Ceramic Waxes are my favorite type of LSP due to the protection, longevity, number of applications per jar, unique look/gloss, nostalgia of application and ease of removal. Additionally, they don`t expire in a year or two like many coatings and SiO2 sprays.

I decided to use the Acura for a 9-way showdown of ceramic paste waxes. The horizontal panels (hood, roof, trunk lid) were clayed a month ago. On 03/16/2020 they were prep washed, polished with Wolfgang Finishing Polish, then prep sprayed twice with Wolfgang Perfekt Finish Paint Prep Spray. After all this, the surface was squeaky clean to the touch.

The Challengers (applied 03/17/2020):
1) DP “Not Your Father’s” (“NYF”) SiO2 Paste Wax
2) Mckees 37 Krystal Diamond SiO2 Ceramic Wax
3) IGL Ecoshine Wax
4) Dodo Juice Supernatural Hybrid Nano
5) PBL Synergy
6) Angelwax SEMA 2019 (Graphene infused)
7) Angelwax Fifth Element (Titanium infused)
8) Angelwax Enigma
9) Polish Angel High Gloss Paste Wax
10) BONUS WAX (applied 03/19): Wowo’s Contact 21 (Carnuaba, Montan, not-sure-what-else!)


Layout (drivers side to passenger side):

Hood
DP “Not Your Father’s” (“NYF”) SiO2 Paste Wax
Mckees 37 Krystal Diamond SiO2 Ceramic Wax
IGL Ecoshine Wax
Dodo Juice Supernatural Hybrid Nano
PBL Synergy
DP “NYF” SiO2 Paste Wax (2^nd appearance)




Trunk Lid
Angelwax SEMA 2019 (Graphene infused)
Angelwax Fifth Element (Titanium infused)
Angelwax Enigma
DP “NYF” SiO2 Paste Wax (3^rd appearance)
PBL Synergy (2^nd appearance)
Polish Angel High Gloss Paste Wax




Roof
PBL Synergy [drivers side, front to back] (3^rd appearance). Two coats applied.
BONUS: Wowo’s Contact 21 [middle, front].
DP “NYF” SiO2 Paste Wax [drivers side, front to back] (4^th appearance). Two coats applied.





Notes:
- DP “NYF” shows up 4 times because it’s new and I was comparing it to others. I particularly wanted to see it up against Synergy (the gold standard in my opinon) and against Mckees (it’s rival cousin).
- Synergy shows up 3 times because I just love it and I think it’s the measuring stick in many ways.
- Wowo’s Contact 21, while I’m not positive it’s ceramic from reading it’s description, I’m guessing it is coating-ish in some way due to the supposed 121 contact angle. I received it 3/19 and applied at 6pm. It will not have the 48+ hours cure time that the other 9 waxes have. But I’ll monitor and add a second coat later as needed… it’s a bonus anyways.
- Wipe off and cure times were followed per directions.

Interesting Info:
- All of the waxes used in this test include carnauba in their formula except: The 3 Angelwaxes, DP “NYF”, and PA High Gloss Paste. These 4 are purely polymers and silica or titanium or graphene or combo.
- They are all finishing LSPs except IGL Ecoshine Wax which has cleaning properties.
- Only Fifth Element and Synergy recommend application of 2 coats (but neither require it). The only instances that I used two coats in this test was on the roof. Everything else is one coat.
- The longest recommended cure time identified (prior to moisture) was Dodo Juice Nano. It requests only 1-24 hours prior to being topped, but 48 hours dry time. This is unfortunate because I missed some good T-storms after the 24 hour mark. Instead, my car will have remained in the garage for around 54 hours before going into rain (48 hours for Nano plus 6 extra for Wowo`s.

Application Thoughts:
All applied very easily. Ceramic waxes wipe off so easily and cleanly compared to most SiO2 sprays. I consider this a great benefit of ceramic paste waxes.
The best application and removal goes to High Gloss Paste. It melts on and whisks away when buffed. It does request 30 minutes prior to removal though. The next tier of easiness IMO is Synergy and IGL Ecoshine Wax. I’ll put the remainders in the last tier… but this whole application discussion is nitpicking. None of them are difficult.

Looks:
My garage lighting sucks, but initial assessment includes:
I can tell the candy coated look of DP vs the carnauba ones. The carnaubas have some warmth. DP looks like a sealant / SiO2 hybrid. Most the waxes that have carnauba do also have some glassy SiO2 look mixed with the familiar carnauba glow. The Angelwax products all look fairly unique and have a colder, sharper look. More coating look than sealant look, but still a mix of both in my eyes.

Overall they all look awesome. They are high end waxes. They all have the coating-ish glassy look to some degree. Some have the warmth, some have the candy coat / colder look. I can’t say that any of them look completely like a traditional sealant or a traditional carnauba wax.

I’m not going to attempt subjective appearance rankings until I get the car outside and see the paint under different conditions.

Slickness:
Most the waxes are pretty slick, but have a smoothness and softness to them. None of them are as ‘slide-off’ slick as a traditional sealant slickster (i.e. DGPS, UPP, Powerlock, Blackfire, BM). High Gloss Paste may be closest. IGL also seems to be slightly slicker than the rest. They all feel nice to the touch, one way or another.


…For everything else such as water behavior, self-cleaning, dust attraction, etc., I hope to add observations when conditions allow. I’ll see how long I can leave these before I need to touch, top or ceramic wash them. Stay tuned if you`re interested. Thanks for reading.

[glfnaz]

Very interested in self cleaning properties and longevity.
I would never have considered these products until you did this test.
Thank you!

[Coatings=crack]

Subscribed. I’m really hoping HGPW doesn’t win i’m gonna have to wait till this Corona BS is done.


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[lloydrm]

I was expecting PA to be a stand out. Look fwd to your updates.

[acuRAS82]

Update @ 3 days 03/20/20

Some beading shots from 03/20/20, the day the car came outside.

NOTE1: I used a sealant to cover the tape lines so I wouldn’t have unprotected lines. The tape lines now are causing larger beads which may roll onto the ceramic wax areas. Probably would have been best for me to leave paint lines unprotected but I’m an Autopia and didn’t want months without “no protection lines”.

NOTE2: The beading wasn’t very pretty this day on any of my cars, I’m guessing due to lots of dust/pollen or acid rain (my X5 LSP went from still semi-ok to 90% dead during the rain storm. The Q5 with CanCoat had terrible beading until I washed it.






Since beads on silver are tough to see, here’s my short summary of this day:

They all had similar , nice bead quality, but Mckees Krystal and DP “NYF” were a little behind. These are two of the more affordable-per-ounce options. But then I must give credit to IGL Wax for not being behind the pack with a cost tied for the lowest per ounce.

Another observation is that PA HG Paste was not miles ahead/better at beading. It’s spray version isn’t a great beader on its own but I’ve seen it bead amazing as a topper on Cosmic (noticeably better than Cosmic alone which is saying a lot). Perhaps the paste is similar in that it has best behavior as a topper. I’ll find out soon as I have it on my wife’s car as a topper.

[acuRAS82]

Update @ Day 4, 03/21/20

I didn’t clean the horizontal surfaces but gave them a spray down and did a few sheeting checks. Note that the variable nozzle on my hose broke and it’s rusted on... so I only have one spray mode. I call it “sloppy water splatter”. Whatever, below are brief videos of that water test:

Hood
https://youtu.be/hQXt09GWiTk

Front Roof
https://youtu.be/Z4g0JP0-hFA

Trunk
https://youtu.be/qbBwVMUfQcs


Since readers may want to go back and check lines to see what’s happening, I’ll try to summarize my observations, particularly for areas next to each other where it’s noticeable to make a statement:

Hood:
- Mckees and DP are sheeting noticeably slower than others. Mckees is a bit better off.
- Synergy, Dodo and IGL sheet very well (left side of Synergy seems slightly compromised though but maybe it’s just water hanging around from the DP area).

Front Roof:
- Synergy beads better on the front roof than DP by far and a bit better than Contact 121.

Trunk:
NOTE: I need to pick a higher/better angle to shoot down on the trunk lid so the water spray doesn’t get hung up on the glass before sliding back down and off the back of the car.

- DP is next to non-Mckees waxes, and it stands more so out as the slow sheeter, big beader.
- HG Paste is the second slowest sheeter. I feel this is meant more as a topper to get the top water behavior.
- Of the Angelwax trio, 5th Element looks like it sheets a teeny-tiny bit slower than SEMA and Enigma. It’s also the only one of the trio that recommends two coats, which it did not receive.

[acuRAS82]

Update @ day 6. 03/23/20

Beading pics after some torrential rain today that ended in a gentle, soft sprinkle:

[Sizzle Chest]

Thanks for taking the time to do this informative test/experiment! I`m sub`d to see continuing results!

Again, thank you!

[SNP209]

Thank you for doing the testing and tracking the data! I`m surprised the graphene one isn`t noticeably better since that is allegedly the "latest and greatest" technology offered at the moment. Perhaps the consumer graphene stuff is still in it`s infancy and could use some more refining? I`m in for results, nonetheless.

[acuRAS82]

Thank you for doing the testing and tracking the data! I`m surprised the graphene one isn`t noticeably better since that is allegedly the "latest and greatest" technology offered at the moment. Perhaps the consumer graphene stuff is still in it`s infancy and could use some more refining? I`m in for results, nonetheless.

Yeah, it’s hard to know how “infused” the SEMA 2019 is. It was a small batch, possibly a test sample. It’s very possible that it’s beta version of something more they have planned.

But it’s also possible that the paste waxes need a bit of time to level out. I haven’t washed the car yet besides a very light N-914 Rinseless and the behavior seemed to get better after that. Whether the behavior wasn’t as good prior due to curing/leveling/wax oils, or because of wind/dust/pollen, or due to cold rain on a cold car making water bond slightly (think how ice bonds very hard to surfaces, maybe rain/surface in low 40’s is “stuck” to the paint a little bit)... I’m not sure.

Anyways, I’ve been waiting to do a real wash for the 1 week mark. For this case it will be Wednesday (8 days) due to rain schedule. Maybe we’ll start to see some further distancing between product performances.

[acuRAS82]

Update @ Day 7 03/24/20

I was able to water the HG Paste on the trunk Acura today...
https://youtu.be/qq_9KZk4Am4

...And then on the hood and back of the Q5 that has HG Paste on top of CanCoat.
https://youtu.be/5ttS0XZVfaE

https://youtu.be/37JsMjn87ak

HG Paste on CanCoat beads:





Pretty drastic difference. The Q5 has a bulletproof vest on. Probably helps that CanCoat of all things is underneath... but now I wonder if either:
1) The Acura horizontal panels weren’t prep wipes good enough, or
2) The Acura’s soft paint combined with no base coat just doesn’t get the most out of HG Paste.

[William_Wallace]

Nice test and variety

[acuRAS82]

Update @ Day 9 03/26/20:

Interesting observation while driving in the morning while the car was wet with morning dew. The entire hood sheeted it off like normal except Mckees Krystal barely sheeted any dew off.



Not sure why, just something to share.

[Coatings=crack]

Update @ Day 7 03/24/20

I was able to water the HG Paste on the trunk Acura today...
https://youtu.be/qq_9KZk4Am4

...And then on the hood and back of the Q5 that has HG Paste on top of CanCoat.
https://youtu.be/5ttS0XZVfaE

https://youtu.be/37JsMjn87ak

HG Paste on CanCoat beads:





Pretty drastic difference. The Q5 has a bulletproof vest on. Probably helps that CanCoat of all things is underneath... but now I wonder if either:
1) The Acura horizontal panels weren’t prep wipes good enough, or
2) The Acura’s soft paint combined with no base coat just doesn’t get the most out of HG Paste.

It’s definitely looks like the Q5 Cancoat is showing. That is definitely coating quality. My thinking is on a coating, when you use a sio2 wax, the sio2 adheres to the coating but the rest is shed off?


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[acuRAS82]

It’s definitely looks like the Q5 Cancoat is showing. That is definitely coating quality. My thinking is on a coating, when you use a sio2 wax, the sio2 adheres to the coating but the rest is shed off?


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Well the paint certainly doesn’t look the same as CanCoat alone. The 10 Minute Paint Sealant would also have to have shed for this to be CanCoat. High Gloss Paste and Spray are (in some measurement) 80% TiO2 and 10% SiO2. So if we’re talking about other ingredients shedding, there’s not much else there to account for.

There’s no doubt using these toppers on coatings or coating lites allows them to benefit from being bonded to an already smooth, nano-surface, but I dont think things just shed off. If I put Megs Gold Class Carnauba wax on the car, that area will show changed beading for weeks. Same if I put a spray sealant on. If these don’t shed off then I don’t see why ingredients in toppers would.