Cobra Flex Foam Tire Dressing Applicators - It's a Buy

[theparmachine]

I wish that I had some pictures to share with you guys but was not really planning to do a review.

I got my last shipment with a 3-pack of Cobra Flex Foam Tire Dressing Applicators. I had been using some cheap foam applicators from O'Reilly to apply tire dressing previously. I had been through a bunch of tire dressing and had never been too impressed - Wolfgang, Pinnacle, Optimum and Detailers Pride. I got the 3-pack of Cobra applicators mainly because I thought the size would be easier to work with my hands versus the little ones that I was using.

Not only were the Cobra applicators much more ergonomic and comfortable to use but they got a fabulous shine on the tires. I used the Wolfgang, not too much product and bam! The results were excellent.

I can't speak about durability but for performance only the Cobra applicators are worth the $12.99 for three - try the for yourself tire foam applicators, tire swipe.

[loudog2]

I use the same ones. They last a pretty long time and your right, they are a lot easier to hold.

[Setec Astronomy]

I guess I don't get why the closed-cell part (non-black part, they keep changing the color of that part) which is supposed to keep your hands clean, doesn't extent past the finger-groove...so your palm will be clean but your fingertips will be in the groove which is in the porous black part of the foam and will get all greasy.

Hopefully I'm wrong about that, I bought some of these but I haven't gotten to try them yet.

[Niebelung]

With the old BF tire gel, they get saturated after 2 full uses (8 tires in total). Meaning that you better wear gloves or it's greasy fingers time.

There are other tire applicators out there where the grip section is dense foam rubber... those tend to get saturated much faster (which is good because you don't have excessive product lurking below the applicator surface away from the tire). The tire gel eventually seeps its way around the dense grip surface though.

All in all, my lessons learned are:

1. To avoid greasy fingers, either wear gloves or use a foam paint brush with a handle.

2. Unless you are constantly washing the applicators clean (which IMO is a huge waste of time and detergent), all applicators will eventually be binned after a couple of uses as the combination of chemicals and constant rubbing against hard ribbed surfaces takes it toll.