[Traumamoma]

Greetings all. Let me start by saying that I realize there are 8 million car care products out there and everyone has their preference. What I am looking for here is if I am doing something wrong or out of sequence, NOT that I should be using wax A instead of wax B. Here goes: Car sits all winter covered. In the spring I do a paint correction as follows:

Wash car with Dawn dish soap and water
With car still wet and soapy go over with clay mitt
Rinse and dry. Let sit overnight
Next day, Carpro Essence hand applied and removed
Go over car with 25% etoh/75% h20 solution. Allow to dry
Black fire wet diamond sealant. Let sit overnight
Coat of Adams Buttery wax, hand applied and removed

Car is not a daily driver and rarely gets dirty. After paint correction, Once or twice a week I will power rinse it off, dry the car 80% dry, then go section by section with Ultima acrylic, spray on and complete drying.

Any steps you would add? Delete? Any suggestions/recommendations are greatly appreciated. Peter

[Soleil]

Hey Peter,
All sounds reasonable. Just for clarification do you clay once a week? That is too much. If you use your naked hand or with a plastic bag you will feel all areas which needs to be clayed the entire car is not necessary.

[Traumamoma]

I clay only once/season, when I do the paint correction. After that I use only the Ultima once or twice/week.

[Glen e]

Originally Posted by Traumamoma

Wash car with Dawn dish soap and water
With car still wet and soapy go over with clay mitt
Rinse and dry. Let sit overnight
Next day, Carpro Essence hand applied and removed
Go over car with 25% etoh/75% h20 solution. Allow to dry
Black fire wet diamond sealant. Let sit overnight
Coat of Adams Buttery wax, hand applied and removed

In My opinion, that's way way too much work. Besides the wax won't last more than six weeks. Then it washes off because you're not attaching the wax to the bare paint, the essence is doing that.

So I would do this :

First 4 step are fine.
Then Carpro reload, 2 coats 3 hours apart. The reload will be synergistic with the essence and lock on.

Siriously , multiple layering of various product is completely a waste of time, With the new silica products

You don't need to do the 25/75 echo, the black fire, or the Adams wax. And you will get just as much reflection, and just as much durability as all weekend full-blown procedure that you posted. Here's a good thread to go through:

http://www.camaro6.com/forums/showth...hlight=Essence

[Wierd Harold]

Covered in a garage or outside?Mine stays covered inside.Do all detail work before hibernation .Then uncover the bear and away we go.

[KirkH]

Your methods are sound. The only place I differ is that Dawn is for dishes (and cleaning oil spill damaged animals). There's plenty of videos on youtube showing that it leaves a surfactant on the vehicle, and it has been shown that it doesn't really strip wax, its an illusion. That surfactant is to keep spots off your dishes, The spot free stuff makes it look like the wax is gone and water is not beading. Wash off the spotless surfactant stuff and the wax is still there, and the water beads again. But whatever...I know there are gurus that swear by it, and it won't hurt.

I use a good quality car shampoo that removes wax like Chemical Guys Clean Slate or Citrus Wash & Gloss at a high concentration, clay and polish to remove wax or coatings.

[Joe M 2012 2SS]

I agree with Kirk in regards to the dawn actually stripping wax.

I would move the IPA wipedown in front of the Essence application. You want to do this first to remove any oils or residues that are on the paint's surface. This gives your Essence the best possible surface to bond to.

While Essence can be applied by hand, I strongly recommend getting yourself a D/A polisher. The machine will do the work for you, and the results are better vs. hand application.

You can also use it to apply the BFWD, and wax. You'll get a more even coat using a machine, and you'll apply it in much less time vs. hand application.

Since your car is not a daily driver, a rinseless or waterless wash depending upon what your cleaning off the surface. If the car has been driven in the rain, or has any stuck on dirt, do a foam/2 bucket method.

[Burly]

I don't "remove" Essence but do buff it with a towel and do wait awhile,depending on climate, to make sure there is no more hazing. Then apply a couple coats of Reload a couple hours apart.
Wiping off surface with IPA will, in my experience, create some marring. Skip the traditional wax.

[SSport16]

Skip the wax, no need over a sealant. If you are using Essence, then use Reload after instead, much better than Blackfire, silica to silica.

[Traumamoma]

Much appreciate the input. Less work is better!

[Glen e]

Here's a good YouTube on how to use reload. Compare this to what you were going to do… You can be out driving when everybody else is still waxing

https://youtu.be/PsAheg8Wtdk

[Joe M 2012 2SS]

Originally Posted by Burly

I don't "remove" Essence but do buff it with a towel and do wait awhile,depending on climate, to make sure there is no more hazing. Then apply a couple coats of Reload a couple hours apart.
Wiping off surface with IPA will, in my experience, create some marring. Skip the traditional wax.

Your leaving some high spots. Just go back over the Essence with your polisher. 1 slow pass.

Try a long knap 1100 gsm towel for your IPA wipe down. Light pressure. I've done some really soft body shop paint, and have no marring at all.



For the OP, if the only thing on your paint is garage dust, a waterless with a California duster will get the job done.