Tag: Auto Finesse

Wax Comparisons

During the last quarter of last year, the UK had a few nice days of sunshine and as I had a few days off work owing to me, I decided to use my holiday up. That time was put to good use and completed a little project I wanted to try for myself. It’s often done on YouTube, but not to this degree, I think.

There are often a few car cleaning products compared on YouTube channels, but not ten side by side, with the same testing criteria by the looks of it. When I say “Top Branded”, I mean top manufacturers and their best selling products for normal weekend washing warriors on the street. Those of us who like the best products that work and at reasonable prices using traditional waxes, not the latest in thing of ‘Hybrid’ or ‘Ceramic’ waxes. Lets face it, there are some truly great products on the market at the moment, some of which are even essentials of my own cleaning routines, still. To put this into context there are waxes out there that are expensive for expensive sake, like Swizöl International’s Divine costing £2,150, Brough & Howarth’s Definitive Wax Marble costing £24,000, Zymol Vintage Glaze costing £2,400 or The Ultimate Shine costing an insane £65,000 which can be seen here:   http://www.performancemotorcare.com/car-cleaning-product-news/worlds-most-expensive-car-wax/1808

However, there has been (a strong) rumour that the ‘Ultimate Shine’ wax itself is actually made by Mitchell & King in Scotland. I can’t verify this, but can only state what I have read so far. The original mix (allegedly) sold by M & K is called Gold Rush Rally at £75 a pot which is a mere 0.11% of the price! This brings me back to my point, although these ten waxes are (mostly) affordable and will last a good number of applications, they are not in that stupid silly money league. However there is an in-between level of Luxury car waxes such as Swissvax Crystal Rock at £300, BMD Prometheus £120, Auto Finesse Desire at £120 and Mitchell & King’s top of the range wax ‘Lily’ around £600 where only One pot is made a year, or anything in between from M&K for a comprehensive range of waxes between £45 to £600.

I will be reviewing Mitchell & King’s ‘Lily’ in a very special review coming soon. This was purchased with my wife’s very own money for a special Christmas gift. Before anybody asks – No, I’m not on commission or paid by them.

If you can afford those crazy sort of prices I suspect you will get somebody else to clean the car for you. I’m guessing most of those super high end waxes are being applied to Veyron’s, Ferraris or any other super or hyper car where money is no object. Then there is the other end where Poundland stores sell car shampoo for £1. Pure logic dictates that there has to be a difference right? But somewhere in the middle, there is a sweet spot and that’s these sort of products I have reviewed here.

Anyway, back to these standard off the shelf and top selling waxes, I have been very happy with most of these waxes and will continue to use them on my daily cars. Some do a great job and perform well after application. That’s why I really wanted to compare these particular mainstream products. Picking the best of the best that I like, then at a later date this summer step up to the ‘Real Luxury’ car wax to see the real differences, if any. But a couple of these waxes are getting close to treading on the toes of the ‘Luxury wax’ end of the market; Dat Wax and Illusion based on their cost to volume ratio. The scores I have given in the past to some of these products I stand by. At the time I didn’t know any better or had anything else better to compare them against until now that is.

Costs:

Multiple products which varied from a very reasonable £12 to a eye watering £75.  All these products I purchased myself, no sponsorship to skew reviews. These are my own thoughts and findings for the products with my own hard earned cash I parted with for each of them.

Meguiar’s :

Gold Class paste  £21 for 311g  click here for individual review

Ultimate Wax Paste  £40 for 311g  click here for individual review

Mirror Bright Polish Wax  £23 for 226g  click here for individual review

Nxt Gen liquid Wax 2.0  £26 for 532ml

Auto Finesse :

Glisten £12 for 500ml

Illusion Show Wax £75 for 150g  click here for individual review

Chemical Guys :

Butter Wet Wax  £23 for 473ml

Cherry Dripping Wet wax  £23 for 473ml  click here for individual review

Instawax+  £16 for 473ml  click here for individual review

Dat Wax :

£25 for 100ml  click here for individual review.

YouTube video of this written review:

The full video of this test can be found on my YouTube channel or here for the shortcut or paste the link to YouTube. It’s easier to see what is going on rather than read about it. The video lasts for thirty two mins or so and has be trying to film, commentate, wax and buff all at the same time. I think I pulled it off after a bit of editing.

https://youtu.be/mfUyFS-hRk8

Date Of Review:

October 2019

Background:

I have reviewed many products for detailing, especially waxes and quick detailers. Some have been rated 10 out of 10 by me when I tested them. Which at the time was correct as I used the product in isolation. However, there are always those nagging thoughts in my mind; what about side by side comparisons? Are the expensive waxes worth it? Can you tell the difference? I aim to answer these questions the best I can.

When you apply a wax on it’s own you can only gauge by what you are working with, application may be great and buffing at the time. But, you forget how others perform that you had previously used or reviewed.

So; I got my favourite waxes out and decided to compare them. That’s five hard paste waxes – old school and my preferred option. Then five soft or liquid waxes of similar products not made in a wax form.

The top three big boys are Meguiar’s, Chemical Guys, Auto finesse and a wild card of Dat Wax.

There are only really three actual ‘hard’ paste waxes which are the Meguair’s trio, Gold Class, Ultimate and Mirror Bright Polishing Paste Wax (made by Meguiar’s). The Auto Finesse Illusion and the Dat Wax are both very soft butter texture type waxes not quite liquid, but not a hard paste in comparison either.

The Sales Pitch(s):

These are found under each of the reviews I have done to date. See the links above. I still have a proper Glisten review to do and my latest purchase of the Butter Wet Wax.

Each of these products claims to have the best shine possible and protection, but they can’t all be right can they?

Instructions:

The instructions were followed on the tins and bottles of each product. The donor hood was my 2014 Toyota Avensis in a metallic grey. I divided the hood into roughly ten even sections via some masking tape. The day was overcast and sunny, but not enough to make the metalwork hot to the touch.

The top five sections were for the hard waxes, and the bottom five sections were for the soft waxes.

Top; left to right – Meguiar’s Gold Class, Meguiar’s Ultimate, Mirror Bright Polish wax, Auto Finesse Illusion, Dat Wax.

Bottom; left to right – Auto Finesse Glisten, Meguiar’s NXT Gen 2.0, Chemical Guys InstaWax+, Chemical Guys Butter Wet Wax, Chemical Guys Cherry Dripping Wet Wax.

Application:

The hood was first given a wipe down with quick detailer to get the light dirt off.

The hood was then clayed with Auto Finesse clay bar and a Megs Quick Detailer, not the greatest detailer it has to be said, it’s recommended by Meg’s as a clay lubrication product as well.

The hood was then given a good spraying with 99.9% Isopropyl Alcohol to remove anything left, which was quite a lot based on the clean white 100% cotton cloth.

My fingers dragged and squeaked across the paint, I knew then it was clean. The hood was the taped up ready to apply the products. 

Each Product

Rather than going into pages and pages of what I did and how I did it, the video will show you each product as I went along.

Each product was applied with a clean applicator or cloth. The pastes and liquids were left to haze except for the Auto Finesse Glisten which could be buffed off straight away. It took around 15 minutes for all the waxes to cure / haze over.

Each buffing was done with a clean 280gsm microfiber cloth all from the same manufacturer for consistency, the only difference being the colours. I tried to apply each product in the same way, and buff off in the same way. The only difference being the Mirror Bright Paste as that required working into the paint as it was a polish as well. Failing to apply that correctly would have compromised the product. It’s interesting to note that the Auto Finesse Illusion and the Dat Wax never actually hazed over probably due to the oil content not evaporating.

I tried to apply the products to the paint for the same amount of time, and buff to a shine for the same amount of time for continuity.

Each product was only applied once to the cleanest of my paint work I could muster up. That way they all have a same starting point. It was obvious that some required additional coats to get to the desired levels of coverage. But, to be honest, you do need to actually build up the wax layers. It wouldn’t be fair to apply two coats of one and just a single coat of another.

The Video

This is a full half hour video I uploaded to my YouTube channel. The Video has me narrating (some say droning) on what I was doing and what I had found on the comparisons. Put thirty minutes aside and enjoy.

Results:

Don’t get me wrong, I like these products or I wouldn’t have bought them in the first place. I have previously given some of them 10 out of 10 for a review. They are all (mostly) great products from the top suppliers.

HOWEVER; when they are side by side there is a difference and I didn’t think for one second that the results I got were what I was going to predict below, that actually shocked me.

The results I decided to do in three categories. Touch, Shine, Water Sheeting/Beading.

The Touch Tests:

No matter where I go at a car show and my car is all shiny, somebody wants to feel the paintwork. Not sure why, but they do. So I decided to make that a test. No amount of photos will ever show you the feel of a wax.

Process:  I had a single cloth soaked with Isopropyl Alcohol that I could wipe my fingers on between each touch test. That way I had no other waxes on my fingers to cross contaminate to the next touch test.

After a single application of the products and allowed to cure then buffed, touch test was ready. This was a simple feel for the surface, was it smooth, was it streaky or still there. My fingers really could feel a difference. The Meguiar’s Gold Class applied an adequate coating, but no doubt about it that it needed two or three applications to become a nice smooth barrier like the rest. It was really odd to feel the paint roughness still though.

I often refer on the video to a wet feel, of course it wasn’t wet, but just sort of feels silky or smooth buttery texture.

The touch test results are for the Pastes waxes:

1) Mirror Bright,

2) Dat Wax,

2) Auto Finesse – Illusion,

4) Megs – Ultimate,

5) Megs – Gold Class

Conclusion for Paste Waxes: The mirror Bright just felt like glass  where as both the Dat Wax and the Illusion felt more oily which was to be expected by their constitution to be honest. Some may prefer that type of feel. Ultimate was in no way a let down and felt like the Mirror Bright but not quite as deep feeling as it were. The Gold class could be felt as a coating there but certainly not great on a single pass.

The touch test results for the Liquid waxes:

1) Chemical Guys – Butter wet,

2) Chemical Guys – Insta Wax+,

3) Megs – Tech wax 2.0,

4) Chemical Guys – Cherry Dripping Wet,

5) Auto Finesse – Glisten

Conclusion for liquid waxes:  The CG Butter Wet Wax was the clear winner here with the Instawax+ with hardly any difference and a close run for top place. Megs Tech Wax 2.0 felt just like the Ultimate and a glassy feel to it. The CG Cherry Wet Wax was super smooth but just shaded a little by its siblings, a second coat and I would say it would be right up there with the winners. Glisten was on there but felt more watery based and you could feel there wasn’t much of a coating on the paint work, although a little better than then Gold class for a single application.

Overall: There is a difference between the feel of the waxes. The pastes are applying a thicker coating than the misting of Glisten for sure. Especially when you run a finger from bare paint to the waxed areas. It’s a very close thing between the Butter Wet Wax and the Mirror Bright. For a straight forward wax on the Butter Wet takes it, for a little cleanse and slightly harder work the Mirror Bright takes it. The Dat Wax and the Illusion over car show coatings feel like an oily coating to give that much desired consistent smooth look across all panels.

The Visual Inspection

Process: After the applications I was going to look at the colour and how the reflectivity, gloss, depth and warmth of colour of the waxes looked on a paint job. As my car has metallic flake this would be a real tell-tale of shine.

As I mentioned before this was a single application of waxes and inspected from their. The sun was in and out during the inspection. When the sun was out the metallic was made to pop by some waxes better than others.

The results are for the Pastes waxes:

You can clearly see from the top of this picture that the Meguiar’s has warmed the colour of the paint and clear to see.

The results for the Liquid waxes:

This picture shows the same warming glow to the paint from the Chemical Guys Butter Wet Wax.

Conclusion:

As each of these products are now applied they should be performing as a finished product as it were. That’s the look of the waxes once applied and the effectiveness of the waxes.

There IS a difference in the way that these waxes can effect the look of a paint, say on a white car using a yellowish based wax will give a warmer glow compared to a white wax for example. It not as immediately obvious on much darker colours. I picked my Toyota as an example to test for the metallic and the neutral grey. My hunch was correct as the colour differences can be clearly seen.

Consider the look of the paint you require if you are that into it, or not worry it’s up to you.

Overall:

The waxes either the paste or liquid made little difference in the end to the look of the paint. A personal preference obviously comes into play as it does all the reviews. But I found the liquid of the Butter Wet wax and the Ultimate wax paste was virtually undisguisable.

1) (Meguiar’s) Mirror Bright Polishing Wax

2) Chemical Guys – Butter Wet

3) Megs – Ultimate

One thing to remember here, the hard waxes will last way longer than the liquid versions just by the nature of how they are applied. This could be a major factor when considering a purchase – value for money.

Water Tester Sheeting and Beading

Process:

I filled a gallon pot with clean water and chucked it over the car. This would show the clearing capacity of the wax properties for sheeting and beading.

I did multiple tests of the water deluge on the video and it’s very easy to see the differences.

On a personal note: to see the beading looks great as there is a barrier between the paint and the water. But as the car moves it will run off anyway. I prefer to see the water run off the car completely, but ‘Bead Bragging’ rights is a huge thing in the detailing circles.

Why do I prefer to see it all run off? Well if dirt lands on the car or dust it will sit around the beads. Once the beads are gone it will leave a dusty layer looking like a moon surface. With sheeting it will at least be a uniform film of dirt.

For the hard wax beading I found the following;

  1. Meg’s Ultimate Wax
  2.  Mirror Bright
  3.  Meg’s Gold Class
  4.  Auto Finesse Illusion
  5.  Dat Wax

For the liquid wax water beading I found the following;

  1. Meg’s Nxt Gen
  2.  Chemcial Guys Insta Wax+
  3.  Auto Finesse Glisten
  4.  Chemical Guys Butter Wet Wax
  5.  Chemical Guys Cherry Dripping Wet Wax

For the Overall Sheeting ability I found the following;

  1. Chemical Guys Butter Wet Wax
  2. Meg’s Mirror Bright
  3. Chemical Guys InstaWax+
  4. Dat Wax

Conclusion:

Without a question some waxes bead better than others, Meguiar’s take that crown here with both the paste and liquids.

Large amounts of water should run of quickly, and small rain drops tend to form together until the beads are to big and run off.

A little misting and ALL these waxes will bead very nicely and there isn’t a lot in it at all. In fact I would go far as to say you wouldn’t be able to tell the difference.

Perhaps by full on pour of the water is a little unfair, but the sheeting tests is similar to those used on ceramic coating demos. I was just showing the same type of reaction from a well applied wax.

The difference between the hard and soft waxes is minimal if at all.

Overall:

Such a difficult thing to sum up.

It has to be preference for application. Traditional or old school – Hard wax on, cure and buff off. Great results and little goes a long way. New or time saver – Liquid waxes apply and buff off to a great result. This method tends to use more product, but is cheaper.

Beading / Sheeting, under heavy water its easier to see the ones that deal with it quicker, but allowing for beading they all performed well with the hard waxes being the more consistent beaders.

Scores: 

Various out of 10 for these as I have reviewed most of the products before, but more to come soon.

Conclusions:

I’m not convinced that the fine mist spray waxes like Glisten are on a par with the liquids / hard waxes from the other suppliers. Personal preference is a huge factor for application, you either see it as an art form process – hard waxing, or an exercise to keep the car protected and looking good – soft waxes.

Costs between these waxes is insane – £75 for Auto Finesse Illusion that applies beautifully and smells nice looked no different from Chemical Guys InstaWax+ at £16 once both buffed off to a shine.

There is an amount of snobbery regarding brands between users out there. But the big boys vs the cheap end of the market there is a difference no doubt about it. However when you get to these high quality level of suppliers, all their great products in relation to each other there is virtually nothing in it.

Some prefer the wax of ‘So & So’ because it doesn’t streak, but on another car’s paint it may be difficult to buff to a shine. I found that I am using mixtures of brands to get what I want from a detail for a show. No one brand has everything covered better than the rest. You just have to try it for yourselves. If you buy it again then you have a product that works for you. I have a couple of friend’s Craig and David who are both as sad as me when it comes to detailing, we swap products between us to see what we like. I may like the look, but not the process, where as he may like the gloss that I don’t. We have different cars and they are very different colours, white, grey, black, dark blue, light blue etc so we can see the varying results.

I do need to mention that the waxes are dyed. Thats the Chemical Guys Butter Wet Wax after applying it to a car for two coats it looked like had been smoking 60 a day for the last twenty years. Same with the Cherry Dripping Wet Wax which left me with red fingers like I had been picking strawberries all day. Just saying!

So, when I go to a car show and a want a wax on the car not just a quick detailer, then it’s a liquid wax. At home with plenty of time it’s back to the hard waxes. I never thought I would hear my self saying that, but I use both types of waxes now. So I have moved on with the times, I think.

Would I buy them again?

To be fair most of them I would, but not the £75 Auto Finesse pot or the Auto Finesse Glisten, not my favourites to be fair, but both are at the opposite end of the price scales to each other. The hard waxes will last me a good few years yet and will probably still be some left to polish the handles on my coffin when I drop dead! Having to choose, the Butter Wet Wax I would buy again, as I would the Mirror Bright polish paste.

Would I recommend any of them?

Without a doubt some I would; such as the Meg’s Ultimate and Gold Class (when multiple layers applied), Butter Wet Wax and Mirror Bright. However, it’s hard to recommend a wax for £35 for few fluid ounces in a little jar or a £75 for a wax that don’t last long as it’s a “show wax”. Especially if there is no real difference that can be seen straight away after application.

Like I said earlier, I am looking forward to using a premium hand blended quality wax which I will review and apply before some car shows – weather permitting of course. To suppliment this post I have also created a Dual Action pad comparison & guide from the manufacturers. Once I have written that up I will also post that very soon before the car show starts again in earnest. This post may not all be exactly Mustang related, but it could be for any car and I hope useful. I have learnt a lot from speaking to the designers of the products and I will share a little of that information in the next forthcoming posts. I am really pleased to say that the blog is also attracting some car detailers to and not just Mustang fans.

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Strike Three – But Not Out!

Last weekend I went to a car show at the Enfield Pageant of Motoring, and guess what? It rained; OK it wasn’t a bad downpour, but it was still wet stuff from the sky which landed on my car. That’s the first three shows this year that I have attended and rain has appeared, although to be fair it wasn’t until later in the afternoon. This won’t put me off car shows, it just makes me check my useless weather apps more to see what lies they are going to tell me. It seems as though my luck this year with car shows is not going very well at all. I drove to the end of a field and parked up on the Mustang Maniac stand where I meet Adam, Yogi and Paul who were busy getting their priorities right, making the cups of tea. My priority was to start cleaning my car. Simple reason being that the previous day Saturday was a hot day for a change at the show and the entrance car park had dried to a dust bowl. The show cars that were driving into the event were going slowly so as not to kick up much dust and gravel. In other words, showing respect for other people. However some selfish a-hole in a van decided to do mini burnouts every time he moved. Needless to say the dust cloud that enveloped the car park was like cloud of nuclear fallout and just as toxic. Not a great a great start to the show, I wasn’t best pleased.

I have continued to review lots of car cleaning and detailing products as I get a few questions now and again about what products I use on my Mustang as well as the daily driver cars too.

Contrary to popular belief I am not a one brand product devotee, far from it in fact. A big pet hate of mine is where somebody will buy a single product and be brand loyal refusing to admit that some of that brands products are in fact a useless waste of money. Those same people will have blinkered and tunnel vision when it comes to trying other products. My outlook on the matter is simple, I’m still looking for the perfect combination of products for each step I perform whether it be; snow foam, drying, decontamination, cleaners for paint, cleaners for wheels, glass cleaners, polishes, waxes, microfiber cloths, brushes, carpet stain remover, rubber restorer, vinyl cleaner etc. Just about everything I use is in a combination of many products such as Meguiar’s, Auto Finesse, Chemical Guys, Poor Boys World, Mirror Bright, Valet Pro, Dat Wax and so on depending on what is need, and what I intend to do to get the results I want. This time I decided to use a Chemical Guys EcoSmart which is a waterless wash & wax product I have been using for a while now, but just couldn’t get it right to use it properly. The results are amazing (now) which have improved a huge amount since I started to use top quality plush, deep pile microfiber cloths at £5 each and not the 25 cloths for £5 scenario, which aren’t much better than toilet rolls if the truth is to be known. Round two was onto the quick detailer, a brand new product recommended to me which is Chemical Guys – P40. (Yes, I buy ALL my own car cleaning products, and I am unbiased in my reviews.)

The car finished and it looked quite clean again.

The Mustang Maniac stand was starting to get full as I was almost done and was easily the Mustang place to be. There were customers who turned up for a chat, people interested in getting a Mustang, and people who were just happy to be around the cars.

With the car finished some one and half hours later I went for a wonder around the show to look at the cars and stalls.

It was an fairly good show in general, but I think that this show is getting more mainstream rather than car focussed stalls. There were lots of house clearance stalls selling cheap rubbish, stalls that sell plenty of plastic toys and stalls selling a selection of tools (I use that term very loosely), which were aimed at people with an extremely tight budget should we say. For once I didn’t buy anything at all from anybody. The wife says I should take her out for the day with the money I saved, she’s right of course, there is a car show this weekend, I could take her there and maybe get her a burger and buy more stuff for the car.

Classic car owners second worse nightmare? Stone Chips.

The worst nightmare has to be rust, the second has to be the dreaded stone chips. I always drive with an extra spaces between the car in front of me and I back off if somebody pulls into that gap. It seems as though I have been caught out with the hated stone chips. Let’s just say I was pretty pi55ed off and the air was filled with the colourful language that may have slipped out of my mouth on a repeated number of occasions.

I spotted the evil craters from the previous car show and fixed them up before the trip down to Enfield. Although I got another one on the way back from Enfield, I spotted this one when I cleaned the car on Monday. I have done a walkthrough or tutorial guide that works for me under the Menu ‘How To…Projects/Fixing Stone Chips’. Here is just a taster of what I did to fix them. This is only the basic explanation, I fully explain it all here.

Identify the location of the chips by marking with a piece of masking tape.

Thoroughly clean the area with Isopropyl Alcohol (or similar) to remove all waxes and sealants, use lint free panel wipe or similar. Then take a little colour and place into a pot. I had some left from the original paint job so I was lucky in that respect for colour matching.

isopropyl alcohol
lint free cloth

There are various ways to apply the paint, with a brush, paper, matchstick, toothpick or similar. I use a wooden burger skewer as they are longer, easier to hold and I can sharpen them well without splintering.

tooth pick

The idea is to place a tiny droplet into the centre of the chip so that it sits just proud of the rest of the paint around it. Place the tip of your choice of applicator into the paint and remove it which should now hold a tiny droplet which is held in place by the wood and not running straight off. If you get a big drop you have the chance of it dropping onto places it shouldn’t be, with a lot of recovery work for yourself later.

With the paint drop as small as possible, covering the chip itself and sitting proud of the paint – leave it to dry and cure. Not an hour or two, I’m talking a couple of days, I left mine for a week. This will also allow any waxes to apply to the fresh paint properly.

Next is to get the sanding paper out, I got a wide selection of wet & dry papers starting with coarsest being 1500grit all the way to impossibly fine 8000grit. They are different colours for identification.

I then take my special stone chip tool, a pencil eraser and mark out the width I need on the grades of paper to cut to the size I need. These erasers come in various sizes and shapes for your needs or what suits you.

The idea is to start with the courser grade and work finer to remove the previous sanding marks. I prefer the rubber eraser as it will give slightly to a contour as it’s not rigid, but firm enough to hold the paper flat to the surface. I marked the back of the papers as the cut strips may not show the grit grade itself.

Patience, then use lots more patience.

Wet the area, I use a small travel spray you can get from eBay. Then gently rub the paint drop down keeping the paper flat as possible. A few gentle rubs then check. This will give an idea of how the paint is reacting to the paper and also you don’t want to sand the topcoat or lacquer of the paint if you can help it. You can adjust your technique accordingly.

water spray bottle
wet area
initial paste rubbing
after drying

When you are getting close to the flat paint, swap the papers over to a higher grit. With the sanding the paper may shed and give you a light paste look depending on the type of paper you bought.

The higher the grit number will reduce the previous marks and stop you from rubbing the paint to hard, keep the area wet. Repeat as necessary all the way to the fine grades. When you rub your finger over the chipped area you shouldn’t feel anything at all, it should be glass smooth. If the paint has sunk and you have a pit, stop sanding and add another tiny drop of paint by repeating all the application steps above and let it dry.

Once you are happy with the sanded area then it’s time to bring the car paint back to life. Use a polish that you normally use to remove swirl marks or light scratches. This will remove all the sanding marks, I used Tripple on this occasion as it’s hardly abrasive. Rub into the area using a DA machine or by hand as in my case using the ‘Handipuck’ to get the shine back.

With the area polished it just leaves the protective wax to be applied, this after the hand polish. Pointed out stone chip area with the wooden paint pick tool.

My next step to wax and protect the area. Dat Wax which is show wax and is heavy on oils not the paste style which is ideal for this type of work. Oh, its also blue and smells of beautiful bubble-gum which I reviewed here.

The finished results:

The trouble is, I have to do it all again soon. 🙁

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Double Wash Out (part 1)

Last weekend sees the start of the car show season for me with a double show weekend. Starting on the Saturday was the Fast & Loud show held at the West Suffolk College. Sunday was the Stonham Barns Spring break.

Saturday was looking to be a good day with a chance of rain. As I was itching to get to a show I thought I would risk it, when I left it was overcast, but importantly still not raining. I left early to be there before nine and I arrived some fifteen minutes later. No sooner had I pulled into the car park it started to spit with rain. Baring in mind I had just had a Day in the Bay at Meguiar’s I was not happy. The show was to be for four hours ten till two so my car wouldn’t be exposed to the rain. I meet with my car club Bury Retro Car Club and parked next to their allocated spaces which just happened to be under a tree. Reluctantly I parked up.

Shortly after parking a huge Chrysler 300 pulled in next to me. Now I thought my car was long, but just look at the extra length on this land barge! That is a seriously big car and it sounded amazing too.

This car show was catering for the younger cars and mainly Japanese car scene with wheel cambers that looked like the suspension was collapsing and exhausts the size of my wheelie bin (garbage can for my American readers) that I put out each week. There was a period of around fifteen minutes where they started the cars up and revved them hard to see who could make the most noise, with over run back fires added for the final touch of aggravation on progressively worsening rain cloud.

The funny part was that the Chrysler 300 was louder on tick over than the cars trying to be loud. Not that I was laughing, much. However, I can appreciate the time and effort they had put into their cars, although it’s not my scene at all. The rain started to hammer down now and I was getting rather angry and wet to say the least, my car had been looking the cleanest it had ever been, now it was the dirtiest within same time it took the loud scene to finish their little audio scores to be settled.

Leaves and tree sap were now trying to eat their way through my multiple layers of wax, this was now starting to give me the hump. I started a little walk around to look at the other cars before I decided to leave early from the show. The fast fords was fairly well represented and well-behaved I might add, and they were at the other end of he car park.

You don’t often get to see the Ford Capri now days, but here we had three line up together. These UK Mustangs, did look pretty cool and I think they were my favourites for the day.

On the way back to my car I spotted some visitors which the kids seemed to love;

Just as I was thinking of leaving the big Chrysler was leaving too, but he decided to leave his mark, literally.

Pretty spectacular leaving statement I must say. 👍😉

The rain also did me a bit of a favour as I have just reviewed a couple of products and the water would help me test the resilience of these newly applied products.

The first being the Mirror Bright Wax Paste which can be found here, or cut and paste the link;  https://onemanandhismustang.com/mirror-bright-wax-paste/

The second was my first tentative steps into ceramic coatings, this was from Auto Finesse for the Caramic range for glass, which can be found here, or just click the link;  https://onemanandhismustang.com/auto-finesse-caramics-glass-protection/

Then finally Auto Finesse product Iron Out which can be found here, or again paste the link;  https://onemanandhismustang.com/auto-finesse-iron-out/

After arriving back home I pulled straight into the garage and put my dehumidifier on dry while I started to dry and clean the car again ready for the next days antics. It took me two hours in total, which included the wheels.

First car show was a wash out, surely it had to her better?

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Shiny Chrome Is Now Silver

There is an age-old saying in the car scene, whether it’s custom build cars, restorations or just something to bling a car up a bit; ‘Chrome don’t get you home’. When I first bought my car I needed a one wire alternator to go with my American Autowire kit. So I bought a Tuff Stuff Chrome case version, It was a thing of beauty. (Note the box tag line!)

Tuff Stuff box
Tuff Stuff Alternator
Tuff Stuff Rear connections

However after a year or so of being in the car without moving and outside, its beauty started peel off. The chrome started to pit and looked a bit rubbish, but you couldn’t really notice it. Then over the space of last year or so it just started to get worse, lifting the hood on my car at a show was now me hoping people wouldn’t look at the alternator. So I decided that for this year things were going to change.

I took the alternator out and decided it was going to get a freshen up. I couldn’t use ordinary spray paint unless I roughed up the chrome first with a little sand paper. As I didn’t know how this project was going to work, I decided on something a little different.

Rubber coating spray, the stuff you spray on and then can peel back of again. That was my plan so I bought a can of silver, I was looking to get more of an aluminium colour, however my choices were limited to fluorescent pink, yellow, orange, white, purple etc. That just wasn’t going to happen. I could have ordered some from the net in different colours of course, but I wanted to do it there and then as the weather was nice. So silver it was to be, it turned out to be an inspired choice. So I removed the front pulley section and masked up the holes in the alternator. I didn’t want the spray going inside to mess the components up. I masked up the centre part of the case with tape and carefully cut the tape with a fresh scalpel blade to fit inside the break all the way round the middle.

My problem was the rear with lots of holes, so how do I protect them? Then I had a mad moment looking through my tool box for ideas. I found a pack of Blu Tack, that was the cunning plan for the day.

I tore a chunk of and made it workable and picked of smaller parts to fit the holes. Making sure that I didn’t press it through the holes of course. I shaped the tack to the straight edges and curved areas using the back of my scalpel handle. I aimed to be on the limit of what I could get away with, some of the holes had parts just underneath so that was fine, just a small blob inside the holes that wouldn’t go over the chrome at the rear.

I took the masked up alternator out into the sun, no breeze and started to apply the first of six to eight coats that would be needed to make the paint thick enough to peel off, just in case I didn’t like it. Starting on the front and rear sections then the barrel around the sides.

The paint was quick drying and only took a minute or so to dry ready for touch. Standing on the spindle end and balanced I could turn the whole piece round to spray it up in layers at a time.

Yes I did get rubber coated silver nails from over spray, but it just rubbed it off when thick enough. Anyway, with the eight coats applied it dried soon enough to take back into the garage to remove the masking tape.

Laying on a nice clean microfibre I needed to create a clean edge. With another new scalpel blade I cut around the Blu Tack and tape very, very carefully and lifted out the tack and tape parts. If I had of just pulled the tack out it would have lifted the paint away from the chrome. I forgot to take pics of the back, but it all came out spot on, cutting the inside the holes and at a slight inward angle. This allowed the tack to come out leaving the rubberized paint coated right up to the wholes with no chrome showing.

I didn’t paint the pulley or the fan parts as they were in perfect condition, so I simply impact gunned them back onto the spline.

I was well chuffed with how it came out, it looked like the aluminium colour that I was after. The thickness of the coats filled the pits in the chrome and the tin of paint only cost me £12, with just under half still left.

I fitted the unit back into the car and wired it all back up. Overall now it’s in place it just looks right now.

There is polished chrome at the front for a little bling, but not over the top. This pic below shows how close the paint is to natural spacer of aluminium;

Not perfect, but close enough, I could even spray the spacer if I wanted to. I also love the slightly textured look too from the paint.

So it’s all fitted and like I say, very happy with the result. Masking up and cutting the masking tape back out from the paint and the tack was a pain, but worth the time and effort. Now I can lift the hood without worrying again.

I have been busy doing reviews of lots of car detailing and cleaning products. I have reviewed a couple of snow foam products. One from a well-known supplier and the other from a little known supplier. Looking at these can you tell which product is which? One slightly more expensive than the other.

I have been sceptical of snow foam for a while, it turns out snow foams are not all the same! I certainly looks like that have been using the wrong product in the past. On the same day I washed two cars with different snow foam products for a comparison between Auto Finesse Avalanche vs ValetPRO PH Neutral. Exactly the same settings on the snow foam lance were used, here are both those reviews;

https://onemanandhismustang.com/auto-finesse-avalanche-snow-foam/

https://onemanandhismustang.com/valetpro-ph-neutral-snow-foam/

There will be many more reviews added soon and the list under the ‘Car Detailing Reviews’ is getting bigger all the time – Remember these are all bought with my own hard-earned money so the reviews are completely independent.

Roll on the show season, I don’t want to keep taking bits of my car, just because I can!

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It’s All In The Details

It’s pretty much common knowledge that I am a bit OCD when it comes to my car and cleaning it. In fact I go a level above car cleaning and it’s called ‘detailing’. It means you go the extra mile to achieve excellence where ever you can. I am not at the ridiculous levels of Concours cleaning with cotton buds etc. But, I do have a selection of brushes to make sure I get in all the little places that I need to. I buy all my own products at retail prices and don’t get them given to me by anybody. If I did, I would say so and it certainly wouldn’t change my opinion when I get round to reviewing the product either. My reviews are always honest and unbiased. I mention all this because I get  a few questions now and again at car shows, along with the odd email asking me what I use to clean my car. I have one or two products in my stash to choose from. However, this little lot doesn’t include all the various types of micro fibre cloths, glass cloths, drying towels, application sponges, hand pads, brushes, sponge brushes, tyre applicators,  gloves, buckets with different types of dirt collectors, wash mits, snow foam lance, Karcher pressure washer or my Meguiar’s MT320 Dual Action polishing tool as I couldn’t get any more in the photo.

My favourite brands at the moment are Chemical Guys, Auto Finesse and Meguiar’s. I’m always open to using other brands as long as they work, an indeed tried some random brands with great results, such as Dat Wax.

I review my products and rate them on a score out of ten with two follow-up questions; ‘would I recommend it?’ and ‘would I buy it again?’ Both of these questions adding to the depth of the review when parting with my own money.

My reviews can be found on the main heading under ‘Car Detailing Reviews’. This is a section that gets added to regularly, even if I haven’t done a main post as such.

What I do have trouble with is giving a product a top score, then I get another similar product that I like even more and that gets a top score as well. That’s not to say I would go back and mark the score down for the other product. Indeed I would have no problems in going out to buy the top scoring products again. An example is that I love DoDo Juice Red Mist Tropical as a quick detailer, but it takes a couple of applications to remove any streaks if applied on top of Meguiar’s Ultimate Wax. (I did have a conversation with DoDo Juice themselves about this very issue, and they told me that they are aware of the problem). Auto Finesse Finale on the other hand doesn’t have that issue, but I don’t like their bottle spray mechanisms. Both are great products, but have their own quirks as it were.

There are numerous tutorials online and good ol’ YouTube on how to clean your car or detail your car properly, so I won’t bore you with that side of it all. However within my reviews I try to explain the price, the product’s sales pitch, product description, process, application, instructions, results, rating and conclusion all with photos. In fact I am still going through the process of working out what works for me and what doesn’t and in which combinations. I currently have got more than a dozen products that I need to create reviews for, but I just haven’t got round to doing them yet. It’s all a financial minefield and I would hate to think how much money has been spent on my car cleaning products, just one little pot of show wax I have costs £75 and it doesn’t look much different to Meguiar’s Ultimate after application, but I love the usability of that expensive wax, and that goes a long way to being in my preferred list of products as it were.

The other side to all these products is where to keep them, I have multiple bags of various types and sizes. In fact I have reviewed some of them, what they hold, how user-friendly and are they worth it etc. Some reviews will surprise you from the big names.

I hope my opinions help and save somebody some money on rubbish products out there, yes I have wasted my own hard-earned money on products reading other reviews that must have been written by the company employees. That’s the reason I started reviewing products, tools, equipment etc. My reviews are from a normal bloke that buys and uses them on his pride and joy. My goal is simple; to get a paint job that still looks wet and above all is protected. When you get to buy quality products, most of the time you get what you pay for, sometimes you don’t.

I get nothing for my reviews and I’m not on commission either, hopefully the reviews will help somebody one day.

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My Misplaced Post

I have to confess that I scheduled a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year post to be scheduled for the relevant big day so I didn’t forget. But, as I kept thinking 2018 to myself in my mind so that I didn’t make a mistake as I was scheduling the post, the opposite happened and I actually set the year for 2019 thinking that was in fact the next year. So my resolution for this year is; learn how to work the calendar function on WordPress. I appologise for that.

Resolution completed! Apparently I just have to put the correct year, simple really. Obviously not for a doughnut like me though! So I had time off over the Christmas break and went back to work on the Tuesday as did most people and by the afternoon I had filtered out the emails and got myself back to where I needed to be – thinking that I needed a holiday and asking myself; just where did the time go?

For christmas my wife spoilt me rotten and bought me a vast array of lotions and potions for the cleaning and maintaining of the Mustang. The selection was taken from a list that I had made for her in order to pick something from it. As she didn’t know which one to get so she bought them all, as well as an Auto Finesse Crew Bag to fit them all in. I must say that the “Crew Bag” is like a black hole with handles, it has so much storage space and easily the best bag I have, and I have a few now, trust me.

I will be reviewing them once I get to use them on here under my “Car Detailing Reviews” menu above. However the biggest surprise was the fact that my better half had listened to a conversation I was having with some retailers here in the UK for a classic looking fire extinguisher. Not any old fire extinguisher, oh no. I wanted one that looked old school but also did the job without additional damage. CO2 extinguishers can freeze electrical components with thermal shock, powder gets everywhere and creates a huge mess, water you can’t use on flammable liquids etc. So over the later part of the year I had been doing my homework. The best seemed to be HalGuard which is made in the USA, unfortunately not readily available over here in the UK. If anybody knows any different can they please let me know? Some of the benefits of this fire extinguisher are; no thermal shock, liquified gas gets to hard to reach places, no mess, rechargeable, recommended by aviation and many motor sports governing bodies, five-year warranty, oh it also comes in chrome! Nobody in the UK stocks or makes anything similar that has such good ratings or looks remotely like it should be from the ’60s. In the end, due to costs, I had all but given up on the idea. My wife had other ideas and picked up where I left off and ordered one from the USA. Inevitably there were all sorts of issues trying to get it past our wonderful HMRC customs people who obviously had nothing better to do other than check on fire extinguishers, maybe the could concnetrate on illegal immigrants a bit more like the ones hiding in the back of lorries maybe? Anyway, import duty, standard charges, handling fees etc. were a joke which added significant costs to the item. They had it impounded for a couple of weeks before they eventually released it to my wife mid December, by which time she was starting to panic a little. But, she got it and all credit to her. Once I had opened it and I asked “how?”  I was told all about the horror story and the customs episodes.

Between Christmas day and the New Year’s day I wanted to fit it. There are additional brackets you can buy like, roll over cage mounts, under seat, quick release flat mounting etc. I already had an idea where it was to go; in the footwell on the passenger side. I waited for a clear dry day and got my car out into the cold air where I started to look for the best place to mount the new (essential) accessory.

The extinguisher needed to be off the floor, but low enough for the fresh air vent door to be fully opened just under the dash. The kick panel is made of a fairly thick plastic and the bracket has lots of holes for various mounting positions. I decided to use them all in order to spread the weight of the extinguisher so the screws don’t pull out of the plastic or distort it. Using the larger slot I held the bracket in place while I finalised the position and made sure it was straight.

The Dremel was the tool of choice as it was small and neat in order to create a small pilot hole ready for the screws, two larger style ones at the top that are also polished which would be seen, the remaining screws were smaller headed ones also polished. Once the holes were marked up I could fit the bracket properly.

The extinguisher was put into place and the belt clamped up then I took a step back to admire a fire extinguisher that I think looks good and will do the job should I ever need it, which I hope I never will.

The car was cleaned up, the mat was put back down and then I polished the chrome extinguisher to remove any finger marks and refitted it. I think the look goes well with the car, it can be easily accessed, it’s easily seen from outside and I can relax a little when I’m out on the road now.

Something that I hadn’t considered which is an added bonus, it looks good when the interior lights come on too.

I hope you all had a good well-earned Christmas break and I hope you all have a prosperous New Year.

P.S.                                                                                                                                                                Another resolution: I must blog more regularly!

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Writings On The Wall

It’s not often I get an idea late at night and remember it the next morning. Last week was one of those days where I picked up my phone in the middle of the night, and made a note of it. In the process I managed to keep myself awake for ages and regretted it the next day at work. So what was my idea?

I have been looking around for literally years now trying to find a cleaner for my BF Goodrich white lettered tyres. To be exact it’s not the tyres, but the actual raised white lettering on the tyres. I have tried all sorts of cleaners and even read about using a fine grade sandpaper to rub the surface of the letters to remove the old dirty coat and leave the clean underneath. Then I thought of “toothpaste.” I have seen people clean old plastic headlight lenses with toothpaste to bring them back to life. After all up to fifty percent of toothpaste is in fact abrasives, all be it in a mild form of course. My thought was around the “whitening” sort of paste. My tyres are pretty clean and protected, but the tops of the letters and some of the letters have gone a brown tinge over time and not the sparkly white that they once were.

As my toothbrush was wearing out I decided to have a go and see what happened. I used Meguiar’s degreaser first to remove the old tyre gel and treatments. After that it was a wipe over with some Auto Finesse “Citrus Power” Bug and Grime Remover. No I’m not on commission before you ask!

As the toothpaste was almost empty I took it out to the garage before the wife noticed it had gone along with my toothbrush.

With most of the dirt and grime removed I sprayed some more citrus on and used that as the lather agent for the paste and got to work scrubbing.

It made a nice little mess but nothing some more Citrus Power couldn’t cope with. Once messy mixture was removed I found that it had actually worked and brought some white back to the letters. The final step was to re-coat the tyres with some AutoGlym Instant Tyre Dressing and allowed it to dry.

The other wheels followed a similar technique and used a tiny splash of water to activate the toothpaste and seemed to work a little better.

Before shots of the dirty letters than can clearly be seen:

The cleaning process:

The after shots:

I am well chuffed with the results. I suspect that next time I will use a white toothpaste which is a little more coarse. As this is still a working idea in progress I will tweak and modify the process until I am fully happy with the results. The best part of all this is that a tube of unbranded toothpaste is cheap and will last forever and a day. I’m not sure that I will need to carry a tube with me to a car show though. Only when I need to clean the writings on the (side) wall of the tyres. Let me know if you have tried similar ideas or have a better idea for the white letters, or indeed the full white wall tyres themselves.

In case you are wondering; yes the wife did notice the toothbrush and paste had gone and asked me where it was. Once I had explained that I cleaned my car tyres with it, she didn’t speak, instead I got another one of those “looks” of disbelief. You know the sort of “look” that women have perfected when a man does something daft. Me on the other hand, I know that I have done something pretty cool using just a little outside the box thinking.

Remember before this goes viral all over the internet – you read it here first. 🙂

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Wax On – Wax Off

I have to admit that I have a little bit of an OCD problem when it comes to cleaning my car, I take it out, I bring it back and she gets a clean before the cover goes back on. The guys at Mustang Maniac use my car cleaning obsession to wind me up about it all the time. I like to try all sorts of different cleaning products to find out what works best for me. I love the Meguiar’s products, but there are others products that I use for specific jobs by other suppliers, DoDo Juice, Auto Finesse, Chemical Guys, Poor Boys World, EZ Car Care etc. I have tried some products and I didn’t like them on the Mustang for various reasons, but I use them on my others cars as they are fine for those. I have started to add to the Car Detailing Reviews menu again now to let you guys know what I think of them.

Here in the UK there is a show that is held once a year just for a single day which has been held for the last five years now called “Waxstock”. The Waxstock show is also billed as Europe’s largest car care show. I wanted to go last year, but it clashed with a car show that Mustang Maniac guys and friends were going to be attending in numbers, so that was my choice last year to go to the car show. As it turned out that car show was a nice sunny day, a great day out and having plenty of laughs with the guys. This year the same clash was going to happen, but the car show’s location was predicted heavy rain or thunder storms. As much I like to see the Mustang guys it’s quite a trek to get there for me. So I decided with a heavy heart to leave the car in the dry and take a trip to the middle of the country to visit the Waxstock show which would be a two-hour drive to get there. The weather there was not going to be brilliant either, but at least it was going to be held inside.

Cost of the tickets was a little expensive at £15 per person to get in, but that included the free parking on the day. The show is mainly aimed at the professional car cleaning companies or the more specialised car detailing companies. The outside parking area was split up to have the show and shine area for people who wanted to show off their cars and hopefully win a prize and the general parking area. The down side was there was plenty of small cars with big exhausts trying to sound like big cars, if you know what I mean. To be fair there was some nice cars on show outside and some “less than average” examples should I say to be kind. It seems as though the slammed look is still the in thing, I personally don’t like the look, but beauty is in the eye of the behold and I can really appreciate the amount of work gone into those cars. A couple of the cars I think we’re there for a bet as the paint on the cars were scuffed and slightly worse for wear.

 

The doors opened at nine thirty in the morning on the dot and the long queue of people to get in started to move. There was supposed to be fifty-five stands representing over seventy brands. Most of the vendors were around the outside and the bigger sponsors were in the middle.

 

I never knew there was so many different suppliers of car care products. The main hall was not that big, maybe around the size of a football (soccer) pitch or there abouts.

 

There were cars at some of the stands all nicely polished and gleaming. From old fans to super cars and the Pagani Hyper Car.

 

 

It was obvious that many of the cars were trailer Queens and transported to the show without a tyre touching tarmac. There were some pretty spectacular old English Ford’s a Cortina and an Escort. Both highly collectible and can command some big money, especially at this standard. The sad part? They were never going to be driven and enjoyed, they are just large show pieces now.

 

There were a number of cars from private entries all trying to make a claim for the prizes of best in show.

 

There was a couple of demonstrations from vendors showing their products in action which was interesting.

 

I managed to walk around in about an hour or so and watched a couple of stand demos. There was a talk in the staged area from guests who were respected in the detailing industry. After a second look round it was time to part with some money, some old favourites and a couple of new products to try out.