A good radar speed trap story...

L

Lone Wolf

New member
Can someone explain the advantage of using a sealant like Meguires #20 instead of Carnuba?? From what Ive read it seems the biggest plus is that it will last a lot longer?? If this is true can I use Meguires #9 followed by #20 with Blitz or #26 as a topper?? Or would you just use #20??



Never used anything but carnuba and was thinking of experimenting..



Thanks
 
It gives a very factual summary on the weaknesses of carnuba waxes, most of which lies in limited durability, dust attraction, loss in gloss after every wash due to depletion of the oils, and failure to stand up to hot temperatures...ie a black car on a hot day............



I would go with the polymer, unless you like to wax every few weeks, or have a garage queen that rarely gets driven..........
 
So once you clean the paint and use a swirl remover, then you would apply your polymer of choice. After this do you top it with a wax or do you just keep applying multiple coats of the polymer??



LW
 
You can just keep layering, you don't have to put a caranuba on top but it's an option if you want to. If you do apply a wax, do not put it on until you are 100% happy with the way the polymer looks. Also, once the wax is applied you must strip it off before you can apply anymore layers of the polymer.



Remember 90% of a great shine is the prep work.
 
Thanks for the help..I think I get the idea now..

How long does the sealant last and how often should you re-apply it?? If you dont like it how hard is it to remove??



LW
 
I don't really buy into the "superior protection" arguement of polymer sealants. I do believe that they last longer in between coats. However this is just mho but to me bugs and sap and stuff stick more readily to a polymer sealed car than a car with a couple of recent coats of a good carnauba wax. I don't know why but my guess is that the wax leaves behind a smoother surface than a polymer sealant.



That is just subjective and I'm sure some of our members would not agree. One thing I think that you have to beware of, and this goes especially for polymer sealants, the manufacturers like to throw out some big numbers about how long a product will last. Don't take anybody's word for this. If you are losing the slick, smooth surface from your car and there is noticably more friction when you are drying, then it is time to to either rewax or reseal and quite possibly at this point you will need to reclean the paint.



Personally whether I'm using a sealant or a wax I'm not interested in pushing the envelope on endurance. To me that's like trying to push the mileage between oil changes.
 
Short Cut..I really dont mind waxing every few weeks..it really doesnt take me that long and I enjoy doing it so most likely I will stick with the carnuba's (Blitz) I just thought maybe I could get a better shine with a polymer..



LW
 
As an FYI, this weekend I detailed my car with Blackfire and Pinnacle Souveran carnauba. I applied a coat of BF polish, 1-4 coats of BF protectant (i'm playing with layers and looks) and 2 coats of Souveran as a topper.



The BF looked great after two coats but it didn't offer the slickness I wanted, especially to keep off bugs and other projectiles. The wax topper maintained the gloss, even improved it a bit, but also gave me the smooth slick finish I want.



So sometimes there is a reason to add a wax topper. I'm just starting to play with BF. I've been using Finish First and it gave me both the gloss and the super-slick feeling I like. But it doesn't seem to last like a polymer should. My experiences with polymers is similar to the Shortster's.



So far this combo has produced the best finish I've ever had on this car. But I've used both polymers and carnaubas on other cars and they all looked better to me with the carnauba. Polymers have come along way in the last 10 years and have a great future. Don't know how much better carnaubas can get - we may be experiencing the Law of Diminishing Returns with carnauba products.
 
<blockquote class='ipsBlockquote' >

<em class='bbc'>Originally posted by Lone Wolf [/i]
<strong class='bbc'>Short Cut..I really dont mind waxing every few weeks..it really doesnt take me that long and I enjoy doing it so most likely I will stick with the carnuba's (Blitz) I just thought maybe I could get a better shine with a polymer..
[/b]</blockquote>
Better shine is hard to define. Hey I'm a poet and don't even know it. What you get from a polymer sealant is a different shine. Better can depend on lots of factors including the color the lighting and certainly the eye of the beholder. That's why it's fun to experiment with different products.

Personally I like to use a PS on my daily driver truck and wax on my weekend fun car . Because just like you mentioned with the car I like waxing it every two to three weeks and I love the look of layered paste wax on black.

What's right is what's right for you. Keep an open mind and have fun experimenting with different products and combinations from time to time. :up
 
I meant a deeper shine..Ive had great luck with Blitz and my fire red paint looks wet and whats neat is that it actually looks better at night??

Go figure!! I always like to tinker with things..this is not always a good thing :p



LW



PS..thanks for all the good advice Bret!!
 
Check out the April 2000 issue of Motor Trend in an article named "Paint Care Myths

and Reality"

I am direct quoting here:



Motor Trend question "A wax made of 100 percent carnauba is superior to those using

lessor amounts?"

Answer by Mike Pennington, director of training for Meguiars "Carnauba wax has been a favorite among car enthusiasts

for years, but don't believe that any wax is made of 100

percent carnauba. As the hardest natural wax known, carnauba is much too hard to apply

directly to automotive paint. It comes in bricks that must be melted and added to a

company's formulation. If a paint protectant advertises "pure carnauba," it means the part

of the formulation that is carnauba is pure, not that it's 100 percent carnauba. According

to Pennington, todays synthetic polymer technology actually provides better protection than carnauba"

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



I think most of us here will agree that a quality polymer will retain gloss longer, bead water longer, and stay slicker longer than a typical carnuba.
 
I have been a carnuba user for over 30 years but after trying a polymer sealant (Zaino) I will never go back. My car is black and I always thought that the surface looked great ( clayed , swirl removal periodically and QD'd almost daily). The poly surface is now slicker by leaps and bounds, the surface does not attract dust as bad and the glossiness and lack of smeariness ( evenness ) of finished surface is far superior to carnuba. Durability is not a factor but the appearance of the finish is. I can not emphasis the improvement of polymer ( can only speak for Zaino ) over carnuba results on my garage queen. The depth or buttery appearance is also improved because of the improved optics. The car , especially, at night appears as if it has been dipped in liquid glass. In direct sunlight the shine is incredible if not blinding. :cool:.

I was a hard sale on changing to polymers but I curse myself now for waiting so long. This is only my experience so far. I still use carnuba products on my Lexus but that will change sometime this winter on a long snowy weekend ( if it ever snow here ). With this car I will be able to evaluate the durability because it is exposed (driven) in bad weather.
 
<blockquote class='ipsBlockquote' >

<em class='bbc'>Originally posted by Short Cut [/i]
<strong class='bbc'>Personally whether I'm using a sealant or a wax I'm not interested in pushing the envelope on endurance. To me that's like trying to push the mileage between oil changes. [/b]</blockquote>
ShortCut, thanks for the fresh perspective. I agree that traditional waxes still (and always will) play a large part in auto detailing. However I am still a fan of synthetic polymers. Pushing the envelope on endurance is a silly strategy, I agree. "It's been 6 months and my Klasse/Zaino is gone so now I have to reapply?" No way, it's been slowly dimishing since day one and for the last couple of months the car hasn't been getting anywhere near the same protection it did in the first couple of months. I guess the same holds true for waxes, except the level of protection you get diminishes much quicker. I rely on SP's as a base coat so that my car will suffer the least amount of diminishment in protection between detailing intervals, which i try to make weekly, but sometimes get stretched to a few months when busy or lazy.
 
I agree with what seems to be a developing consensus here...



This car was my first that I bought new, and that I spent as much on detailing supplies/chemicals as I have, ever. Never tried a polymer sealant before, but I can honestly say I regret not having tried one sooner.



That said - I wasn't pleased with the feel of the surface about a week or two after the application, so I decided to hit it up with some carnauba. When I was done - remarkable shine and feel to the surface.



I think that although the carnauba is sacrificial, and requires more work - it's probably offering a different level of protection here, in as much as it's protecting the sealant. No science here - this is just my guess. That layer of wax is so fragile, that it's protection probably only lasts a few weeks - so the polymer sealant underneath is providing the real protection, in between waxes.
 
On my car the Klasse protection lasts longer than most (cause of my conditions: garage, no pollution, no dust, no that much dirt, lack of extreme temps, but i do have snowy salty winters)



My car never really looks bad, especially in month six. If you look at the pics on my site you can see pic from week 1 and a pic from week 20. Not much different still very slick, and when I tried to remove the Klasse in the fall, it was a biznitch to get off with the PPCL. It's really easy to tell when slickness ends on cars but Klasse seems to be holding it's stuff all year long.
 
This is my concern in having chose Klasse - how the hell will I get it all off when I want to redo the entire finish? I don't want to wax every 3 - 4 weeks (not now anyway, but who knows how addictive this all may turn out to be :D ) but I don't want a "wax" that can't be romoved to allow me to start from the paint surface again once or twice a year.

So what IS the best way to completely strip Klasse or any polymer for that matter?
 
AIO. Two applications if you want to be sure. Although AIO has little or no abrasives, it has does have a lot of high solvents and is a stronger cleaner than PPCL (according to Detailking's propeller test).



Or if you really want to do a good prep job, machine buff with something like 3M SMR or Finesse-It. Then do the AIO to remove whatever oils are left over and then layer away with the SG.
 
Yep, the chemical cleaners in AIO should strip all the previous layers of Klasse you had, leaving the paint clean with one layer of AIO. I recommend "rubbing in" the AIO as a cleaner with a foam or microfiber applicator pad.



Or you can just add layers of SG weekly if you are careful you dont seal contaminates.
 
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