The ilogikal1 test thread

[ilogikal1]

I can't believe I just wrote I enjoyed water behaviour.

 

[ilogikal1]

Okay, update on the looks of the three waxes;

 

Aside from the bonnet, the rest of car is wearing the 50Cal samples from the branded Waxybox (Pentawax topping Fortress), so I'll get the Fortress review out of the way first; It doesn't seem to have much, if any, corrective abilities of it's own despite it's claims (it struggled to remove even the water spots in places). However, it does both darken the paint and enhance the gloss. I haven't tested it as an LSP though, even though it claims to contain wax so I can't comment on that. Again, like the 50Cal wax it's very easy to to work with, both in application and removal, and is very workable. I would liken it to Autoglym SRP - it's not really a polish but rather a decent glaze. It's not a bad product, but it won't be replacing Black Hole in my arsenal.

 

It should be noted that the paint hasn't been properly prepared since some time before winter. The prep for this consisted of an APC foam on top of the usual wash routine and then a single coat of Fortress. No decon, no clay, no paint cleansers, no polish. I'm not expecting miracles with the finish here.

 

With that said, Pentawax has disappointed me somewhat. It looks great... until you catch it at certain angles in direct sunlight.

Not the best photo, but after a brief drive today (hence the evidence of a body count on the windscreen & trim) I noticed this which isn't actually visable unless the sun is in exactly the right place. Observe;

 

 

Take a step to the right and...;

 

You may not be able to make out from the photos, but that is a big patch of oily residue. Despite being buffed twice. Now it may well be application error (most likely over-application), but basically it makes Pentawax not quite as forgiving as I originally thought. As the sun moved around the car I discovered more and more of these on every single panel. I'm pretty sure I've even now I've not got them all. The solution however was very simple; move to Scotland. No sun, no problem. Failing that a once over with a QD removes the residue that no amount of buffing seems to lift. Until I get round to QD'ing (or more likely re-washing) the whole car, that's going to bother me... until the sun goes away at least.

 

When you do find a good angle, out of direct sunlight though, you do get good gloss, nice flake pop & some depth (this was pre-QD;

 

 

Desirable (middle section) and Desire (right/passenger side section) had no such issues. And they look like this (please ignore the swirls);

 

 

 

And the Pentawax section (note, that's poorly removed residue due the headlight rather than swirls - I added a 2nd coat of each wax to the bonnet shortly before these photos and tried to remove Pentawax before it had cured fully. Very much user error this time!);

 

 

In the unlikely event of anyone being interested, I have some pictures of the shiny Seat on the left along with a review of the AM Seal it's wearing, but I won't post that now unless anyone asks for it.

Edited May 17, 2014 by ilogikal1

[GIXXERUK]

I can't believe I just wrote I enjoyed water behaviour.

 

 

Mmm beading

[GIXXERUK]

Post the Seat

 

More people read than post in here

[ilogikal1]

So that's what the waxes look like in the dry. Let's add some water;

 

 

 

Sheeting wise - all three sheet quite well for a wax. Desirable seemed best at this, followed by Pentawax and then Desire, but to be honest there was very little between the three. Beading... well you can see that above. But have some more pictures. Because I have them.

 

My thoughts; Desirable produces the biggest beads which tends to lead to more of the water running off and probably relates to it sheeting so well. Desire produces more, smaller beads. Pentawax is pretty much bang in the middle of them. Again though, there's not a massive difference between the three really. All three of them bead very well.

 

Pentawax;

 

 

 

Out of focus Desirable;

 

And what Desirable beading looks like when it's in focus (just in case you prefer that sort of thing);

 

 

Desire;

 

 

 

And some random shots;

 

 

 

 

 

I have more. Many more. But I'll stop now.

[ilogikal1]

Post the Seat

 

More people read than post in here

 

Ask and ye shall receive eleventy billion more photos.

 

The Seat is your basic, run-of-the-mill, flat white. So gloss was the order of the day because... well, there's knack all else you can do with flat white really. So I searched through my unused Waxybox samples and found AM Details AM Seal. Very simple to use, spray on, spread, leave a couple of minutes to cure, buff off, job done. Supremely simple to work with, it spreads forever and a day which makes it easy to get a thin layer and there's absolutely no effort required to buff off once it's cured fully. My only "issue" with it was that it's quite difficult to see where you've been with it, although that was as much down to working on a white car with inadequate lighting as much as the product (I really need to get that lighting sorted thinking about it).

 

Anyway, once buffed it gives tremendous gloss which gets better with each coat. The 50ml sample was enough to do three full coats on the whole car (and even a fourth coat over the lower panels... just because I wanted to use it up). And that leaves you with;

 

 

 

 

 

 

Obligatory 350Z content for relevance

 

And considering it's a sealant, the beading's pretty good too;

 

That's Nanolex Trim Rejuvenator beading like a good'un on the random plastic section of the bonnet by the way, it's "only" been 5 months since it was applied

 

 

 

 

 

 

You might notice the brief hint of sunshine in some of the beading pictures, well whilst I was taking those pictures a ninja rain cloud was sneaking up behind me and before I knew it, this was occurring;

 

 

 

And whilst I did get wet, it did mean I could get this, my favourite shot taken to date;

[Stutopia]

Nice work, the final rain snap especially. Seat looks sweet too. Not a Zed obviously, but it goes to show that looking after your paint on any motor can make it look a bit special.

[GIXXERUK]

^^^^ amazing gloss white is like silver, difficult to get a shine and the focus has be gloss

Nice results, great work

Just emailed this to my brother, he has a white rs and always looking for a higher gloss

[ilogikal1]

Cheers chaps.

 

Nice work, the final rain snap especially. Seat looks sweet too. Not a Zed obviously, but it goes to show that looking after your paint on any motor can make it look a bit special.

 

It looks pretty when it's shiny, but it's soooo horrendously dull to drive.

[GMballistic]

Great write up mate and loved the pictures. Very pleasing that last shot with the rain hitting the bodywork.

[Stu_2424]

Any plans to do a snow foam test as I see a lot of people asking about which one is best

[ilogikal1]

Any plans to do a snow foam test as I see a lot of people asking about which one is best

 

Sadly doing side-by-side snow foam test is both a lot of faffing about (even with 2 lances) and hugely expensive. I may do a side-by-side with the two foams I've currently got but I'd need a suitably filthy car to do first and the three cars I regularly maintain are currently spotless so it may take a while to get round to that.

 

However, I can review the numerous foams that I've used over the years. Firstly it's worth noting that a thick, shaving cream like foam doesn't necessarily mean it's any good at cleaning and vice versa. Also foam will only really cling to dirt, so a relatively clean and well protected surface will sheet foam a lot quicker than a much dirtier unprotected surface. So, in no particular order;

 

Megs Hyperwash - as this was the first foam I used, I'd like to revisit this one to give it a fair shot now knowing what I do that I didn't at the time, however it does foam very well and cleans suitably. It's got a fair clinging ability but I was using way too much when I had it so it wasn't very economical for me at the time - it might be more so if I used it again properly but at the time I was basically just guessing my way through the dilution ratios and focusing more on getting thick foam than on cleaning ability. Priced at ~£35 for 5 litres.

 

Valet Pro PH Neutral Snow Foam - this produced a thicker foam which had decent clinging ability, but it needed that to clean anywhere above average - the longer it was on the panel the better it cleaned, but it needed somewhere around 10 minutes or so to make the effort anywhere near worth it. It's not a terrible foam, but it's one that I've tried and moved on from. Priced at ~£16 for 5 litres, it's well priced.

 

Autobrite Direct Magifoam (blue & purple versions) - firstly, there's no difference between the colours other than the slight hint of that colour in the foam. The colouring isn't really that noticeable on the car unless you're working on a white car and it's very much just a gimmick. Magifoam is a very thick foam and, despite it's fans, I found it absolutely useless. It clung to the car well but then once it's rinsed off it hangs around on the drive for days to weeks afterwards. The only way to get rid of it is to let it dry out and rinse your drive the following day or hope it rains for a month after you use it. It's very messy! It's cleaning ability was poor for me, regardless of what dilution I used and it made very short work of clogging up the gauze in the lance (to the extent that I had to clean the gauze every 2 or 3 uses, regardless of what steps I took after foaming to clean it out without dismantling the lance. In case you were wondering, this is why I have 2 lances so in my experience Magifoam is blooming expensive as it cost me another £40 on top of the foam). I wouldn't even entertain the idea of using this again even if I got a lifetime supply for free. Priced at £30 for 5 litres of the standard stuff and £40 for the coloured foam.

 

Chemical Guys Mr Pink - technically this is a shampoo, but Chemical Guys, in typical Chemical Guys fashion (serious, check out their websites), claim that all their products do all things, ever. One of things they claim Mr Pink does is make a decent snow foam, so I tried it. It doesn't. You need to use 300ml+ neat to get any sort of contactless cleaning from it and even then it's quite poor. Does foam well though, so if you like using a lot of shampoo it's bad way to apply the shampoo to the panel for the actual wash part but even then you'll end up using more than just the small amount you'd use in the bucket. Priced at £8 for 500ml

 

50Cal Ambush - I only had 100ml sample of this to use, so based on just the single use I got out of it, it's one of the thicker foams, clings okay but not spectacularly and lingers on the drive for a day or two but even at lower-that-recommended dilution rates (I believe it suggests 10-20% in the bottle, which is meaningless as it's the panel ratio that matters but anyway I used mine at 4% on the panel) it cleans quite well, not spectacularly but still significantly. Priced at £15 per 500ml it's not cheap though.

 

Auto Finesse Avalanche - produces a very thin foam which, if you don't get the dilution rates right, can be too thin to get any decent cling time. However, get the dilution right and it's easily one of the best cleaning foams I've used. Priced at £30 for 5 litres (or £13 for a litre) it's not the cheapest though.

 

Car Chem Snow Foam - no fancy names here, no fancy packaging either, but Car Chem products tend to 'just work'. Their snow foam is no different. It's one of the thinner foams, although slightly thicker than Avalanche and thus less difficult to get the cling time right and it's cleaning ability is very good even in a short amount of time. Priced at £17 for 5 litres, £12 per litre, £7 per 500ml or £67 for 25 litres it's one of the most economical in larger qualities. However, they have changed their larger containers, so you'd need to buy of their "taps" for the 5litre sizes and up at £4. This is okay as a one off cost, albeit a slight annoyance, but the tap isn't anywhere as good a the pump dispenser (£3) that you'd need for all of the others.

 

Bilt Hamber Auto Foam - Again lacking the fancy packaging just a great product. It produces a similarly thin foam to the Car Chem offering and cleans every bit as well that works between 4-8% on the panel. I use it at the lower 4% which gives it a good cling time and makes it very economical at £17 for 5 litres.

 

I've probably forgotten some.

 

And although it's not a snow foams, they are is still a pre-washes;

Auto Finesse Citrus Power - spray on neat, allow to dwell, rinse off. Serves the same purpose of snow foam but doesn't require either a lance, a pressure washer (although not required, it is still advised to rinse off) and no setting up. Works very well, wax safe and a decent degreaser as well so has quite a few uses but at £35 for 5 litres or £10 by the litre, it's not cheap.

 

Valet Pro Citrus Pre Wash (previously Orange Pre Wash) - this is a concentrate, so dilute to taste, spray on, allow to dwell, rinse off. It works well up to 1:10 dilution but not quite as well as Citrus Power. It is a economical alternative to Citrus Power though at £19 for 5 litres or £9 per litre which can produce up to 10x those amounts in usable product.

 

 

For absolutely no reason at all, I prefer to use foam over the spray on pre-washes, but a direct comparison can be seen here; http://www.350z-uk.c...80939-pre-wash/

 

My choice for foam would always come down to either Car Chem or Bilt Hamber at the moment and the only real life difference between the two is that BH is green and smells nice, Car Chem is red and smells more chemically (but not unpleasant though) and Car Chem stuff comes in a variety of sizes. Also, it's easier to measure out the Bilt Hamber using the pump dispenser (x number of pumps = the required amount), however the Car Chem stuff can be decanted into another bottle with the smaller neck to utilise the pump dispenser or you can just measure once and mark the level on the lance bottle, so it's not the end of the world.

Edited May 18, 2014 by ilogikal1

[Stu_2424]

Awesome thanks

 

I was planning on going with the Bilt Hamber one next and you've just made my decision easier!

[Stutopia]

Nice write up, as per usual. I've got a couple of questions:

 

The 50cal Ambush was £15 per half litre direct from 50cal. Have you got a line on it cheaper?

 

When you point out the difference between the bottle dilution and on the panel. My lance has a big dial on top, but I just set it to maximum open for the thickest foam. How on earth can you tell the panel % ?

[ilogikal1]

The 50cal Ambush was £15 per half litre direct from 50cal. Have you got a line on it cheaper?

 

No, you're quite right, I'll correct my post.

 

When you point out the difference between the bottle dilution and on the panel. My lance has a big dial on top, but I just set it to maximum open for the thickest foam. How on earth can you tell the panel % ?

 

A lot of faffing about! Like this.

 

In essence, you need to measure how much water is drawn through the lance and then do some maths to get the required %. If I remember right I just fired the lance into a bucket for 30 seconds, measured then extrapolated rather than going to the extent of the guy in the link.

 

A quicker, rougher way of guestimating it would be to use the flow rate that your pressure washer is rated to as rough idea - it won't be exact but shouldn't be too far off.

 

I forgot to mention, this is the easier way of doing it rather than measuring it in the 25litre drum;

can I just say that there is an easier method of working out how much water you squirted out...

 

rather than going to the effort of marking litre marks on a bottle' date=' (which is a really inaccurate way of doing it to be honest) - you could just weigh the bottle before and after.

 

Water weighs 1g per ml or 1kg per litre. Most bathroom scales are pretty accurate (mine are to .1 kg - which is 100ml)

 

So, weight the bucket (or tare your scales with the bucket on), do the test, and then weigh it again.

 

if it's 14kg heavier - you got through 14 litres of water.

 

simple![/quote']

Edited May 18, 2014 by ilogikal1

[Stutopia]

Nicely explained. Makes sense.

[ilogikal1]

I've realised I've not actually concluded the Reload/C2v3/BSD, nor the HydrO2/Wetcoat/Bathe+ stuff from the first page. So I'll address that first; all of them were going strong when I got bored and started the wax test. The HydrO2/Wetcoat/Bathe+ were all clearly weakened because it didn't take anything more than a strong APC wash, but then none of them were applied with a pressure washer and Bathe+ was only used for the wash, there was no additional application after that. Both Bathe+ and Wetcoat have earned themselves a place in my arsenal, for simple ease of use I'll probably be going this route for my winter protection this year (yes, I know it's not even June yet!). HydrO2 would have earned a place but for the fact that my preferred distributor doesn't stock it, absolutely no other reason than that and it will be my 'go to' if I can't get Wetcoat for any reason.

 

Reload didn't seem to be holding up too strongly, in all honesty, but it was still hanging there. C2 and BSD were doing better, but again they were all removed fairly easily with multiple hits of APC. I doubt I'd buy Reload, and I still dislike the application of BSD but I will happily use C2 again.

 

Now that, that's out of the way, have a teaser of what's coming next;

 

 

Edited May 26, 2014 by ilogikal1

[roscopervis]

Good tests. Despite the clinginess of BSD I think its a brilliant product, less a QD and more a spray sealant. It's a beader for sure, it has ridiculous water behaviour. What I like about it is how clean it leaves my car in between washes and how easy to clean it is at wash time. Some BH autofoam and a rinse and that will pretty much do it.

 

I do like the C2v3 too but prefer BSD, I find it more durable and dirt repellant.

[ilogikal1]

Whilst BSD does have some very impressive water behaviour, it's just too much of an ar*e to apply for my liking, even with the better spray head. I just don't get along with to be honest. It wasn't bad at the self cleaning thing though, as you mention, but I didn't find it any better than the FK Pink wax that was on the wings to be any worse really.

[HEADPHONES]

My experience with Hydr02 was despite it being the easiest sealant to use EVER, I didn't find it as durable as C2v3 using "my routine"

Reasons for me choosing these 2 were speed and ease of use.

For the reason of lack of time and speed i didn't have time to do a full decon.

Paint wasn't really bad so no clay or paint cleanse etc. Just wash and dry.

Hydr02 only lasted a few weeks this way for me.

Also works out alot dearer than C2v3 with 100ml only being enough to do body and rims maybe thrice.

 

I also only used storng hose pressure to spray off Hydr02.

Maybe with a full decon and a pressure washer to rinse it would fare better but I don't have the luxury of this.

 

So for me it's C2v3 for my paint and rims.

 

How about running a little of the old RainX alongside the screen protector as a baseline Mr Ilogical?

 

[ilogikal1]

And in no way related to that...

 

Those of you who follow me on Instagram will already know that about 4 weeks ago I did this;

 

 

Yep, that's right, I taped up the French doors and made them all smeary in different ways.

 

Actually, that's not quite true. I cleaned (some of) it first. I'm sure you can guess from the above pictures what's happening here, here's what's applied where;

 

Now you might have noticed that country has seen a bit of rain in the last month, but it actually has taken 4 whole weeks for any of it to actually fall on this particular window. I've since realised that the front of the house seems to get most of the rain. I haven't got a clue why. But anyway, it turns out this week that the rain was falling in the right direction. So, here's some pictures of rain...

 

The square(ish) sections

 

And for reference, with the tape lines marked

 

 

And for comparison, the untreated glass;

 

 

This is the Car Chem section (with the tape line visible above it);

 

PIAA section;

 

And the G5 section (which I would have sworn was in focus at the time, but hey ho);

 

In terms of beading PIAA appears to be little/no different from the control area with nothing on, whilst Car Chem and G5 both appear to be fairly similar. There's a visible line of resistance above G5, a similar effect was above the Car Chem section but no sign of anything about the PIAA section - the same was the case for the tape lines in the top section when it finally got rained on enough but if you've seen one picture of a wet window...

 

Sheeting is very different with G5 way out ahead. As can be seen in this short video;

 

Now it's worth nothing that this is on static glass. I've run all three on my own car numerous times each (although not all three together) and all three do what you what you want them to in real world application. On the car my thoughts are as such.

 

PIAA - works well at 35mph+ when freshly applied which slowly drops to over 40-45mph as it starts to fail, then just eventually stops working altogether,

Car Chem - works well at 32mph+ when freshly applied and slowly drops off to speeds of over 45mph for a while and then sharply drops off to higher speeds until it's failed completely.

G5 - works brilliantly at speeds as low as 23mph+ for several weeks then slowly drops off until it fails completely.

 

In case it makes any difference to you, my car was always running the PIAA Silicone wipers with all of these sealants and none of them ever smeared. G5 juddered for a minute or two in very light rain when first applied but nothing after that and none at all from the other two.

 

In terms of application, both PIAA and Car Chem are very similar liquids whereas G5 is a bit thicker (but still very runny). On the above window they were all applied with individual make-up pads (kindly donated by "Harley" Quinn... because my geekery actually knows no bounds ), but PIAA and Car Chem can be applied just as well using microfibre cloths. G5 can be too but it's hugely wasteful this way. I find it easier to get decent coverage of a not-too-thin-not-too-thick layer using the make-up pads for the PIAA and G5, but Car Chem doesn't seem to matter much whichever way it's applied.

 

PIAA is a squeeze/drip onto applicator, apply to glass, allow to haze, apply a second coat, allow that to haze and buff. It goes on as easily as it sounds, it can take 10-15 minutes to cure fully though and buffing takes a little of pressure to be thorough but nothing too strenuous.

 

Car Chem is a simpler spray on (either onto the glass or applicator), allow a minimum of 8 minutes to cure and then buff. It's just as easy to apply, if not easier because it's a spray, but does take longer than 8 minutes to cure (again, about 10-15 minutes) and I've found if it's smearing at all it's because it's not cured fully. Buffing is p*ss easy when it's actually cured though, absolutely no pressure is required at all.

 

G5 however is a bugger to apply (comparatively). It's a drip onto the applicator, apply to glass, allow to cure, buff method, again a second coat is expressly advised in the application instructions. The problem (such as it is) is that it cures very quickly, so you don't get much working time with it whereas the other two you've got a good 10 minutes, this you've barely got a full minute before it starts to cure. Buffing is a chore too, if you leave it too long it just doesn't want to come off. You've got enough time to do the full windscreen, but only if you don't f*ck about really.

 

PIAA costs £4.99 for 150ml

Car Chem costs £6.99 for 100ml (on it's own, or for an extra £1 you get their (excellent) glass cleaner, 2 (very good) microfibre cloths and even a funky little carry bag. Bargain!)

G5 costs £9.98 for 100ml.

 

Personally, I'd happily recommend any of them as they're all very capable. PIAA works out the cheapest. Car chem is the quickest, easiest too apply (and if you spend the extra £1, you get everything you need for clean, protected glass). G5 works the best once it's applied.

 

 

Nanolex is next on my list, so look forward to yet another review coming forth... eventually.

 

 

Update on post #92 and the follow up to that on post #99.

Edited July 24, 2014 by ilogikal1

[ilogikal1]

I also only used storng hose pressure to spray off Hydr02.

Maybe with a full decon and a pressure washer to rinse it would fare better but I don't have the luxury of this.

 

I have a bit left over, so I might reserve a panel to test this on a properly prepared panel with a pressure washer and see if that makes any difference. What I would recommend though is Bathe+, it cleans really well, feels very lubricated and adds protection at the same time. It's a great maintenance product for a well protected car and it'll save you all of ten minutes of your life topping up the HydrO2/C2... Yeah, it doesn't sound that great an idea when I put it that way actually.

 

 

How about running a little of the old RainX alongside the screen protector as a baseline Mr Ilogical?

 

I don't have any Rain X, unfortunately, otherwise I would have gladly shown it what a proper glass sealant is like. I really don't rate Rain X at all, as such it is actually blacklisted (along with Rim Wax and most things Simoniz ) from my house so I'm afraid I'm even going to have to object to obtaining even a sample of this from anywhere for any purpose other than having something to throw at the neighbours intrusive cat.

[Stutopia]

What have you got against Rim Wax? It's the first dedicated wheel wax I bought and it's running out...

[ilogikal1]

What have you got against Rim Wax? It's the first dedicated wheel wax I bought and it's running out...

 

Ooh, I've got a test of that somewhere too actually (I think it was another Instagram jobbie, that). I'll have to dig the pictures out.

 

It's never lasted more than fortnight for me, regardless of how many layers I applied. I just think there's better (and much, much better) products available that are just as easy to use but last considerably longer.

[ilogikal1]

I've found the pictures, I'll upload them and do a write up on here tomorrow for the wheel sealants.