Claying and LSPs

[Accumulator]

Even though this comes up fairly often, I still find this topic sorta interesting. People often assume that clay removes LSPs, sometimes from their own past experiences and sometimes just by assumption. I do not believe the "proper" claying removes an appreciable amount of LSP, though it will remove *some*. From my perspective, it's a simple matter of my knowing what I've experienced many times. It's something that, IMO, anybody can prove to himself (or herself) by experiencing the same thing. I've shown it to nay-sayers in in-person demonstrations and you can prove it yourself.



Sometimes I'll inadvertently seal in some contamination when refreshing my LSP and I'll spot it at the next wash. It takes a much more aggressive approach to claying to remove this "sealed in" contamination than it does to remove "regular" contamination.



Here's a simple way to prove to yourself that *gentle* claying doesn't remove much LSP:



Find an area of your vehicle that has a little speck of contamination that you would normally remove by spot-claying. Something that's on there good enough that minor rubbing *without clay* won't remove it (not something that'll easily wipe off).



Apply your LSP to this area, right over the contamination, and buff it off normally. Now you'll have a freshly LSPed area with the contamination sealed away under your LSP. Note that this experiment will work best if the LSP is something sorta tough (Zaino/SG/Collinite will work better for this example than Souveran, for instance).



Next time you wash the vehicle (the experiment will work better if you let it go for a while), clay the area in question *very* gently, using either your clay lube or wash solution, or *something* to keep the clayed area well lubricated. Clay as gently as you can, a lot more gently than you normally would.



After a few gentle passes, *not enough to remove the "sealed in" contamination*, look at your clay. Even though you were being unusually gentle, you'll probably see dirt on the clay that has been cleaned off the LSP, but the contamination will still be there. This is the kind of claying that I do. Enough to clean the LSP, but not enough to remove it.



Now clay more/harder and see what it takes to cut through the LSP and finally remove the "sealed in" contamination. It'll take a lot more than what you did earlier.

 

[rmaurin]

Hi Accumulator,



A few days ago, I clayed the panel above the rear wheel. When I was finished, I noticed a "grid like pattern" on the surface of the the paint. If you could imagine, the pattern was made of dots about 1/8 inch in diameter. Each dot was spaced about 1/8 inch from the adjacent dot. The dots had a matte finish. The pattern looked like a crystal lattice structure from a chemistry/physics text.



I used the Sonus gray clay with the good amounts Glyde lube. I also got the same pattern with Clay Magic blue clay using the Clay Magic lube. I dont remember the clay grabbing at any location. It was about 40 F in my garage. I was able to remove the pattern with Pinnacle Paintwork Cleansing Lotion.



The car is red with about 5 layers of Menzerna FMJ.



It looked to me as if had I rubbed of the FMJ on the high portions of the orange peel on that panel. I dont think this is what I did, because the pattern was ordered. I would think if this was the high spot of orange peel, it would have been more random.



Any idea? Did you ever see this before?



Thanks

Rich

 

[Accumulator]

rmaurin- That's a weird one all right! I've never seen anything like that. I'd guess that you might be correct about the possibility of it being orangepeel related, that you wore the FMJ off the high spots. but I understand how the uniform pattern makes you wonder.



OK, something *does* come to mind- maybe there is/was some kind of contamination on the area that compromised your FMJ. Claying then caused the dots where the contamination had been. All kinds of weird stuff can get kicked up around the wheelwells.



Also, perhaps something (such as a fabric) got pressed against the panel and what you were seeing is where your LSP got compromised- the pattern being from the texture of the fabric.



I've never used FMJ, but I'd expect it to act sorta similar to my UPP with regard to claying (and I use Sonus clay). I spot clay the UPPed S8 all the time and I've never had something like that happen. And it has a lot of orangepeel too. So I'd suspect something along the above guesses about weird contamination/contact or the orangepeel explanation.



I do think that 40F is a bit cool to be using Sonus though, so I hope you kneaded it or something to warm it up first.



Heh heh, that's a real head-scratcher :nixweiss

 

[togwt]

:xyxthumbs



Accumulator, thank you for the information and your insightsâ€Â¦/

 

[REX-RACER]

Accumulator,



This is a very interesting and intruiging point you make. I am a real newby to this and I've only clay barred my first few cars this past summer w/ Clay Magic. I had great results!



Given what you're saying here, I'm wondering would it ever be appropriate to clay after polishing?



Say for instance if you used this approach:



NXT wash > AIO > Clay > SG > #26



or even



NXT wash > Clay > SSR2 > Clay > AIO > SG > #26



I'm really interested in knowing if this would be of benefit or could it really screw things up by taking too much off the clear coat or paint?



BTW, what is LSP? I could not find it in the "Secrete Decoder Ring".