coatings useless or fantastic? what do you think??

[MarkD51]

Love the thread, and the intro post.

After 45+ years, I've tried every major product to come around the bend.

I'll save the bandwidth, and the amount of different products, which amount probably in the 100's. From old school, to some of the lastest showcased here today.

I do believe the new coatings have great worth, and value. And from my somewhat limited sampling have found not all are created equal, there's different chemistries.

All have limitations, I cannot expect a product like CQuartz or GTehniq C1 to protect my paint finish, from some ultra nasty 4' diameter Tumbleweed blowing across one of my local roads-highways at 40mph when it collides with my paint, and I'm coming away with no damage. Ain't happening.

With show cars, and I've owned some, and known many who've owned them, one can get away without any protectants, just Glazes. These cars are garaged for most of their lives, sometimes driven on bluebird days, and even trailered to shows/meets.

I see good economic value to coatings. Especially with daily driver vehicles, and vehicles which are placed in harsh everyday conditions.

As for looks, this may be paint system dependant, but many can get superb stunning looks with either Megs #26, or GTechniq EXO, CQuartz.

There's limitations. I know I cannot expect any product to somehow magically come along and turn something like my chevy's factory applied paint, and have it look like 15 coats of Laquer Candy, or other uber expensive custom applied finishes. Just the nature of the beast.

Advances seem to be made as time passes. I predict coating technology will even get better than it is as time passes. And I think that's pretty cool with the sciences involved.

[Belair]

Let me say up front I've never seen a paint job with a coating so I can't comment on the appearance, durability, or much else; have just read about them. Yep, I'm still using sealants & impressed by them compared to carnubas. I'm not the first to jump on most bandwagons. Hell I was still running DOS 3.3 when the second edition of Windows came out. Remember when the announcement was made that it would be released in a few weeks at midnight, and people were standing in very long lines in the cold to be the first on their block to try it (I still refer to that as a beta tester mentality). I didn't upgrade until Win 3.1, when the system seemed stable enough for me.

Coatings to me are the next logical step in our art. There are so many pluses and so few negatives that it's nearly at the point where you just have to pick the brand that meet your and your paint's comprehensive needs. Reviewers here and on other forums are clarifying what each will and won't do, and I commend them for their work with the coatings and their written reviews/opinions. As for me, I may be ready to stick my toe in the water next summer when my sealants are gone. Until then, keep writing your reviews/opinions and I'll keep reading them. And thanks again.

[Moldavite]

Nice thread op
i personally choose to use durable sealant but would be interested in the similar layering concept of GC

[SYMAWD]

Fantastic in my opinion. I sometimes have to go months without a wash so it is nice to have a sacrificial barrier. Bugs can be removed with ease, I can see the rain take dirt off the surface with it, and I was even able to wash off road tar with just water. I love having a coating because even if it needs to be polished off due to defects, the cost was still worth it. I got 30 mL CQuartz in a package with 600mL of Reload, 500mL of Iron X, applicators and some microfibers for just $60 from AG last year. Subtract the price of the other products and the price of a long term sacrificial coating was well worth it.

[brondondolon]

You know, I applied a coating to my black truck a while back. Im not going to say which one though because I have a lot of love for the company. Here is my gods honest opinion of coatings. Mind you I have only used one. I spent 28 hours doing a flawless paint correction among a few other things. When I applied the coating I ended up with a ton of streaks. Also the gloss I was looking for was not achieved and I got better gloss from collinite. I still got scratches and I hardly noticed a difference between a coating and a wax. For me the effort was not worth it. But like I said I have only used one coating. Unfortunately that one coating has made me not ever want to apply a coating on my own vehicle again.

[PiPUK]

Mixed views here. I think that many coatings are only marginally superior in durability to some of the more advanced 'traditional' sealants. On the flip side, very few coatings come anywhere near the cost or ease of use of such traditional sealants. Our manufacturing of such products has led to VERY permanent coatings which are genuinely great BUT they are a bit of a pig to apply and, if you get it wrong and let it cure, there is little coming back - it doesn't even polish off nicely. So I tend to favour this product type on wheels and then a good sealant, which can give me 6-8 months easily, on the paint. To me, this means that the wheels don't need much touching (ever) but they are less sensitive than paint so application is not so hard. The paint is well protected but has been done in a shortish time and would not take long to re-do. In a year, the customer can come back and it wouldn't take long to do a touch up job. Customer remains pretty happy, detailer gets repeat business... perfect. With coatings, my experience, is that one of two things happens. The customer expects that it is permanent so does not expect to need it done again. So they either get it done and forget about it and the detailer never sees them again or the get it done, look closely and then come back a year later because they can see it starting to degrade or it starting to mark, at which point they question the detailer's claims.

[JSFM35x]

For me my experience is limited to EXO v1 EXO v2 and Opticoat 2.0. All 3 great in their own right. EXO v1 easy to apply, great shine and durability super hydrophobic, fair amount of mar resistance EXO v2 seems to be the same with a different application system. I prefer the aerosol. It was much faster than dosing a makeup pad. I most likely used more ml to coat my car with the aerosol. I got 2 solid years, over 30k on the EXO v2 on my daily driver. It's time to reapply as soon as the winter ends. Beading really fell off at the 2 year mark. Application was easy.

The Opticoat 2.0 is slightly more mar resistant than the EVO in my observation. Not much but I have accumulated less marring over the 2 years. There was a difference in mileage but both sit out 24 x 7. Opticoat 2.0 had good gloss, durability and lasted about the same 2 years before the beading stopped. Application was easy.

Observation after 2 years
The Opticoat 2.0 was never as slick feeling or as hydrophobic as the EXO s but it stayed clean as long and as easily.

The EXO was super slick and I loved the beads.

Even after the beading fell off the protection endures for both of these. The cars clean up easily. They are just harder to dry. I used Permanon platinum to boost the coatings, make drying easier to get me through the winter when I will polish and recoat with a product to be determined. Part of me wants to try the gloss coat but at 10 mls I think I might fall,short of 2 coats, paint , jambs and wheels. The other part of me says stick with EXO and finally a part of me says try something else like CQuartz.

We will see what I have learned here over the winter and make a decision then. In any case I say they are fantastic because they last many, many times longer than say a BFWD sealer or a colonite 845 and look as good or better.

The key to any good looking car is the prep. Polishing and decon. The LSP can boost it but without the prep it is a total waste. If you have not perfected your polishing routine skip the coatings until you get perfecting the finish it under your belt.

[Elex]

My experience has been limited to the DP and PBL coatings - I have our 2 daily drivers coated for 6 months now - a '15 X3 and '12 GMC Sierra. I've coated about 12 other cars for friends and family, different makes, paint hardness levels, washing routines etc. To me the test will be to see how these hold up in the next year or so.

I'm also with Bob on that I have yet to get a straight answer out of anyone on "how do I know when the coating is gone". I posed that question to Nick in another thread and never got an answer.

On the other hand, I sometimes wonder if I'm overthinking some of this on these more basic coatings (DP & PBL). Since one of the goals for a coating for me is to preserve clear, especially on the '15 X3 that has very soft paint, when I get to the end of the life of the existing coating, I may try to topcoat without polishing, depending upon how much swirling is present. The worst I could see happing is that the top coat fails to adhere and you go back to the drawing board and polish. Personally, I'd rather experiment a little rather than burning through clear unnecessarily (especially given that the cost per application of PBL isn't that expensive in the scheme of things).

Which brings me to another thought I've had - how much longer do we think it will be before polishing will be unnecessary when applying a coating? For polishing, I mean to remove swirls and defects. So I'm thinking there needs to be further development of the coatings to have more robust "glaze" properties. This would solve the problem of having to polish off clear to remove swirls. Rather, you would decontaminate the paint and then apply a new coating, which would cover and level over the swirls. Just a thought, or more so a hope for the direction of coatings. This is more of an "empire building" approach than just trying to maintain thickness as is the current approach.

One think I do like is that with the DP and PBL coatings is the lack of tar buildup that we normally experience on our daily drivers, mainly from the very poorly maintained roads in our area. That is one benefit I've appreciated.

So, all and all, through my ramblings, the jury is still out for me. I do have it on my list to try CQUK soon to compare (or maybe 22ple).

I hope the coatings don't go the route of a "fad", but rather further development and refinement takes it to another level of dealing with other issues such as swirls etc.

- Jerry

[Desertnate]

My biggest hang up with the coatings is the cost and the learning curve.

I'd happily take a wax or sealant I've never used before (in my normal price range) and "play" with it on one of my daily drivers. The costs are relatively small, and the risk low. The products are easy to apply and easy to remove with a non abrasive paint cleaner if I mess it up, but chances are low.

Coatings are a whole different animal in my eyes. From following the discussions here, they must be applied very carefully and specifically with very little margin of error in order to get the advertised results. You get it wrong and it seems they are a bear to remove. There is no way I'd take on an entire car without a lot of practice to ensure I got it right. The problem is due to cost, I can't afford/justify the expense of using up product just to practice.

I'm sure many are good and I'd love to coat a couple of our daily drivers, but at this point I'll happily hit my car twice a year with a good LSP and call it done. Doing the full routine on our cars twice a year vs once a year isn't that much extra work.

[CarolinasFinestDetailing]

I feel that most of "dislike" that has formed around coatings are due to the drastic claims made by the manufacturers themselves. A coating, as many have put it already, is a sacrificial barrier to protect your paint. IMO, it is not meant to be permanent. However, it is marketed as permanent by many manufacturers. Here are a few of my thoughts:

1. Coatings technically arent scratch resistant. They simply can help minimize. Also, many of these coatings have to be layered many times to be able to perform well in this area.

2. Beading vs sheeting. I myself want to see a coating sheet as much water as possible. I don't really care about beading. In fact, water beading can by harmful to paint. For example, you have a car with a fresh coat of wax or sealant parked in your driveway. The next door neighbor has their sprinklers going and you car gets wet. You ooh and ahh at the water beading. But when those beads dry, magnesium and calcium are deposited and begin etching through your LSP and then your clear coat. A coating perform better at being that sacrificial layer.

3. Longevity and when do you know the coating is gone? To answer your response Bob, it's impossible to tell when a coating is in fact gone, but there are clues just as we see clues when a wax or sealant has in essence worn out. The hydrophobic properties in essence are null and void. To further help in that decision, you can wash the car with a soap designed for coatings like Reset and Iron X, light clay, and IPA wipe down. If the coatings original behavior has not returned after steps such as these, then its safe to say the coating has diminished or is in fact gone.

4. Customer education!!! A customer that purchases a coating needs to be educated that it is not an end all product. The vehicle must still be properly taken care of. Inform them that waxes and sealants applied over can inhibit the coatings properties. Don't make outrageous claims how the vehicle will not be able to be scratched because of the coating. You as a Detailer will want to try to set up a maintanence program with the customer.