[Burly]

Is the CarPro FlyBy Forte worth it? Does it fill fine nicks in the glass?

[DangerZL1]

Originally Posted by Burly

Is the CarPro FlyBy Forte worth it? Does it fill fine nicks in the glass?

It has no fill properties. If you use the kit with the cerium oxide, it might remove some very fine scratches though. I have the flyby30 on my car, and I think it's barely on par with RainX. I didn't know about flyby Forte when I tried it, and will try it next time.

[KirkH]

Originally Posted by bobby35ny

You are working to cheap...

Mobile guys here get 30 bucks just for a wash and vacuum.

-Bobby

That is my price for my friends. He said his friend charged him $1200. I couldn't do that to a friend.

My prices for a sedan or coupe are $35 for wash & vacuum, $75 for outside wash & wax & inside quick clean, $150 for full detail inside (qtip) or outside (1 step polish), $350 full detail + paint correction, $500 show car treatment.

For a friend to do a coating I charge $150 + cost of the coating. If they are VERY lucky, I will have some coating left over from a previous job, and they don't have to order a full bottle.

[bobby35ny]

Originally Posted by KirkH

That is my price for my friends. He said his friend charged him $1200. I couldn't do that to a friend.

My prices for a sedan or coupe are $35 for wash & vacuum, $75 for outside wash & wax & inside quick clean, $150 for full detail inside (qtip) or outside (1 step polish), $350 full detail + paint correction, $500 show car treatment.

For a friend to do a coating I charge $150 + cost of the coating. If they are VERY lucky, I will have some coating left over from a previous job, and they don't have to order a full bottle.

$350 full detail + paint correction, $500 show car treatment
Kirk that's still too cheap, maybe your market is saturated and that would suck but those prices are still too low.

[355spider]

Originally Posted by bobby35ny

$350 full detail + paint correction, $500 show car treatment
Kirk that's still too cheap, maybe your market is saturated and that would suck but those prices are still too low.

Really? That's probably 6-10 hours of work. At 10 hours that's $50/hr. Pretty good for general labor prices.

[355spider]

Originally Posted by Glen e

I have coated 8 to 10 cars as long as I’ve been in this hobby. I’ve used opticoat, cquartz, 22 PLE, and one other one I can’t remember. I get perfect results I don’t need 25 hours to do it. Usually it takes 6 to 7 hours of polishing, using two polishes and many pads, and a lot of elbow grease on a Saturday. Then I come back on a Sunday and it takes me 2 to 3 hours to actually apply the coating. You definitely can do it yourself if you want to, And there are many detailers that will do the car from bumper to bumper including the tires and interior and everything else and maybe get 15-20 hrs. out of it. The real key is finding out what the detailer is going to do. It doesn’t take 15 hours to polish a NEW car, which is what we are talking about here. It might take a lot longer for a five-year-old car that had major damage to it. But this is a new car forum. In my opinion you should be paying somewhere between 600 and $1200 for a nano ceramic coating. All just my opinion and my experience . By the way , the first Google link that spider put above is my car. That’s my C7 i wetsanded..... It took about a weekend to do it just working during the day.

There are many detailers out there that are , in my opinion unscrupulous, when I comes to coatings, because they know you don’t know what’s going on, so they charge $1800 and do $900 worth of work. I have had detailers tell me directly, that they love guys with new expensive cars, because we will pay anything to protect it.

Detailers in New York and Los Angeles maybe getting $100 an hour for labor, but the rest of the country it’s more like 60 to 75. Do the math ,asked him how many exact hours it’s gonna take for each particular stage, and then post it here. Remember this is a new car, it shouldn’t have to have major paint correction having to be done. And keep in mind that coatings just wipe on and it’s done. It’s not rocket science.

I also might add that it’s not absolutely necessary you do it. A good polymer sealant or even a nano ceramic sealant like reload will get you great protection for 6 to 7 months. And that’s just a wipe on type deal .....my car is not coated. I’m a carpro essence/reload guy.

So would you say a really good wet sanding job followed by just a regular polymer will actually look better. I think the wet sanding on these unfinished orange peel paint jobs is more important.
I mean if you've ever seen a really good paint job that's show quality you quickly realize that nearly every manufacturer short of Bentley and Rolls puts out an unfinished paint job. Even Ferrari is just ok.

[Glen e]

A wet sand would look better because the base is better. But a coating lasts much longer. Coatiggs were not invented because they had a higher gloss,, they were invented because they’re much easier to care for. Dr G at Optimum, one of the pioneers of coatings (opticoat) said in an interview the reason he invented it was for detailers who couldn’t get back out to a person‘s house for 6 to 9 months to keep the car in good shape.

Not to say they don’t have amazing gloss. But so do many show waxes and many polymers. The magic secret to getting an unbelievable show like quality is always in the polish, not in the wax, coating or polymer that you put on top of it. It’s all about getting the clearcoat reflectively smooth.

Many of us now use a sealant and a polish that contains the silica of a coating, so you get 6 to 12 months coverage And the best of both worlds. Not as long, but just as nice. Like here:

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

Wet sanding is not an option for a lot of people. These clear coats are not thick enough for you to do a lot of wet sanding and sometimes you can only reduce the orange peel not get rid of it. You’ll go right through the clearcoat. Many shops won’t do new cars because of this , especially volume production cars painted in the US.

Reduce but not eliminate, I’d never go deeper than this:


After polishing with 3 diff machines:

[hashtag]

Originally Posted by Glen e

I have coated 8 to 10 cars as long as I’ve been in this hobby. I’ve used opticoat, cquartz, 22 PLE, and one other one I can’t remember. I get perfect results I don’t need 25 hours to do it. Usually it takes 6 to 7 hours of polishing, using two polishes and many pads, and a lot of elbow grease on a Saturday. Then I come back on a Sunday and it takes me 2 to 3 hours to actually apply the coating. You definitely can do it yourself if you want to, And there are many detailers that will do the car from bumper to bumper including the tires and interior and everything else and maybe get 15-20 hrs. out of it. The real key is finding out what the detailer is going to do. It doesn’t take 15 hours to polish a NEW car, which is what we are talking about here. It might take a lot longer for a five-year-old car that had major damage to it. But this is a new car forum. In my opinion you should be paying somewhere between 600 and $1200 for a nano ceramic coating. All just my opinion and my experience . By the way , the first Google link that spider put above is my car. That’s my C7 i wetsanded..... It took about a weekend to do it just working during the day.

There are many detailers out there that are , in my opinion unscrupulous, when I comes to coatings, because they know you don’t know what’s going on, so they charge $1800 and do $900 worth of work. I have had detailers tell me directly, that they love guys with new expensive cars, because we will pay anything to protect it.

Detailers in New York and Los Angeles maybe getting $100 an hour for labor, but the rest of the country it’s more like 60 to 75. Do the math ,asked him how many exact hours it’s gonna take for each particular stage, and then post it here. Remember this is a new car, it shouldn’t have to have major paint correction having to be done. And keep in mind that coatings just wipe on and it’s done. It’s not rocket science.

I also might add that it’s not absolutely necessary you do it. A good polymer sealant or even a nano ceramic sealant like reload will get you great protection for 6 to 7 months. And that’s just a wipe on type deal .....my car is not coated. I’m a carpro essence/reload guy.

2 to 3 hours to apply ceramic coating? It takes three hours just for the first coating to dry. It’s more like a three day process. As I mentioned you get what you pay for.

https://youtu.be/S7F0Up58CJs

[Glen e]

Yes, three hours. Apparently you know a lot about your coating, but not others. Ceramic pro yes , use the lights and does the long cure and takes a lot of time, however cquartz and glosscoat don’t. . How do they look? You put them side-by-side and there’s not much difference at all. They certainly protect for many many months.

See the directions for CQ here:

https://www.autogeek.net/cquartz-50ml-kit.html

Or another great coating:Pinnicle

https://www.autogeek.net/diamond-coa...ion-guide.html

[hashtag]

That is a completely different application. That is not self healing & that will not give any protection against road debris & rock protection. You do not have enough layers & the protective ceramic hardness is not comparable. It’s all about how much do you want to spend. That is good protection not exceptional.

Your application is like comparing SS Camaro to ZL1.

[ninetres]

Hashtag, your car looks amazing. No doubt about it. Absolutely stunning. But I think you are scratching at the wall with this attitude that you need 10 layers of one specific brand of coating to achieve the look/protection that is similar to what you paid thousands for.

[hashtag]

Originally Posted by ninetres

Hashtag, your car looks amazing. No doubt about it. Absolutely stunning. But I think you are scratching at the wall with this attitude that you need 10 layers of one specific brand of coating to achieve the look/protection that is similar to what you paid thousands for.

Any car will look absolutely phenomenal with one coat.

Questions you would have to ask are
1. How long would you like the protection to last?
2. How much protection do you want? Daily driver?
3. Budget



You’re paying for lifetime protection & layers that are debris resistant.

A big rock hit my door, naturally it hit an area that did not have expel. Heat gun and a rag removed the mark. Certainly impressive.

[KirkH]

Originally Posted by hashtag

That is a completely different application. That is not self healing & that will not give any protection against road debris & rock protection. You do not have enough layers & the protective ceramic hardness is not comparable. It’s all about how much do you want to spend. That is good protection not exceptional.

Your application is like comparing SS Camaro to ZL1.

No paint coating will protect against road debris and rocks. Only paint protection film can do that.

[KirkH]

Originally Posted by 355spider

Really? That's probably 6-10 hours of work. At 10 hours that's $50/hr. Pretty good for general labor prices.

Yep, $50/hour is my rate. It’s what the market can bear where I live. The only overhead I have is product supply and fuel to get to the job. And I drive a diesel truck that runs on vegetable oil that I get for free.