Product Reviews...mixed results!

[pointillistic_practitioner]

Hi everyone! Hope you're having a fine Sunday. I received my shipment of AG supplies maybe a week ago and was very excited to try out all of my products! Well, there's good news and bad news. I like to save the best for last so we'll start with the bad news. I was very very excited to use sonax full effect for the first time. I didn't buy it for so long b/c of the price, but I decided that I needed to go for it. Dad's alloys were starting to look pretty bad. Brake dust, and this brown/gold staining that didn't seem to want to come off with anything but didn't feel oily/dirty... were on the wheels. So, I spray on the sonax, following all directions, and wait maybe 7 min per wheel for the product to soak in. It says rinse off, but I wanted to be extra thorough, so I used my wheel brush (not daytona the stiff tan one with more scrubbing power) to get the wheel barrels. Then, I used a "rough" terry towel with a decent amount of agitating power to get the back of the wheel spokes near the base of the barrel. I spent probably a good 5 min on the scrubbing. Then I rinsed off. I repeated this procedure for all wheels (Actually, I sprayed sonax on all wheels first before I did anything, but wheels were cool, it didn't dry etc). So I finish, and here's my $16 bottle of sonax (about an hour and a half of work mind you lol) almost down the drain (theres about 1/4 left of the bottle). I applied liberally and was very careful, but my wheels came out spotty at best. There are still brown stains around the base of the barrel and in the barrel itself. Maybe those stains are irremovable? I've seen such dirtier wheels than mine be cleaned though on this forum...so I don't know. For the price of sonax this is completely absurd. Do I need to re-apply? If so, I'm certainly not buying this product again, I'll go for megs WB. Oh well, it was very dissapointing.

On to better things though:)... On the Bright side, my foam gun came in. I used 2 oz of gold class & water and WOW I LOVE IT! Made washing the car easier, faster and way more fun! In conjunction w/ the honeycomb pad I got, washing was a breeze! I was very very pleased with both of those products. You win some you lose some eh? Now I just need to do another car so I can make up the money lost on sonax lol xD Hopefully it'll have steelies w/ hubcaps so I can get away with simple green or wash soap in the meantime haha...

[Robert8194]

No doubt Sonax full effect is not the most economical way to go but it usually does a good job. You must have some serious staining there.

[pointillistic_practitioner]

No doubt Sonax full effect is not the most economical way to go but it usually does a good job. You must have some serious staining there.

I've never neglected the wheels...I've always washed them with wash soap when lightly soiled, waxed them, and used otc products to clean them up. They were never really neglected but more recently, I've been too busy with other cars and various other things to wash the family cars lol. Im dissapointed, but I'm going to try and have another go at the wheels with more sonax. If it doesnt work its onto WB. I don't know what the problem is but I'm not going to give up :)

[Nick McKees37]

Sonax is one of the strongest wheel cleaners available, but by no means is it a miracle in a bottle. If you're cleaning wheels (barrels especially) that are neglected, it's going to take time, time, and more time to get them squeaky clean - regardless of the cleaner.

For the wheel barrels, I would recommend CarPro TRIX (http://www.autogeek.net/carpro-trix-paint-cleaner.html) and for any heavy iron deposits on the face of the wheels, I would recommend CarPro Iron X Paste (http://www.autogeek.net/carpro-iron-x-paste-150.html). Spend about 20-30 minutes per wheel with these two products and they will be so clean you could eat off them. :)

[primo spaghetti]

also, once you do get them clean, hit them with some wheel wax, collonite or sealant...it will definately make cleaning easier in the future.

[pointillistic_practitioner]

Sonax is one of the strongest wheel cleaners available, but by no means is it a miracle in a bottle. If you're cleaning wheels (barrels especially) that are neglected, it's going to take time, time, and more time to get them squeaky clean - regardless of the cleaner.

For the wheel barrels, I would recommend CarPro TRIX (http://www.autogeek.net/carpro-trix-paint-cleaner.html) and for any heavy iron deposits on the face of the wheels, I would recommend CarPro Iron X Paste (http://www.autogeek.net/carpro-iron-x-paste-150.html). Spend about 20-30 minutes per wheel with these two products and they will be so clean you could eat off them. :)

I guess I was sort of expecting a miracle just because of the way people on the forum talked about sonax.Thanks for the tip, I will probably pick up some carpro trix. Hows megs WB in comparison to all these cleaners? The faces of the wheels weren't too bad.


also, once you do get them clean, hit them with some wheel wax, collonite or sealant...it will definately make cleaning easier in the future.

Yes I've waxed them in the past (the faces and as far into the barrel as I could get). Do you just wax the face? It's probably the lack of wax on the barrels that made cleaning so tough. I have some collinite 845 and wheel wax.

[pointillistic_practitioner]

I guess I was sort of expecting a miracle just because of the way people on the forum talked about sonax.Thanks for the tip, I will probably pick up some carpro trix. Hows megs WB in comparison to all these cleaners? The faces of the wheels weren't too bad.



Yes I've waxed them in the past (the faces and as far into the barrel as I could get). Do you just wax the face? It's probably the lack of wax on the barrels that made cleaning so tough. I have some collinite 845 and wheel wax.

Actually, how do sonax, Trix, WB, & IronX stack up to each other? and would I be better off with a bendable daytona jr than using the rag, b/c from what I've heard, a rag seems to have more agitating power for tougher stains...then again the brush may be easier to maneuver. What do you think? Thanks for all the help!:D

[primo spaghetti]

Yes I've waxed them in the past (the faces and as far into the barrel as I could get). Do you just wax the face? It's probably the lack of wax on the barrels that made cleaning so tough. I have some collinite 845 and wheel wax.

i had the wheels off and did them that way...barrels, behind the rim everything. i did a couple coats of wolfgang sealant and a couple coats of wheel wax on top. still look good months after. grime wirtually rinses off. if not, i use an APC like mean green or simple green...works good for me.

[pointillistic_practitioner]

i had the wheels off and did them that way...barrels, behind the rim everything. i did a couple coats of wolfgang sealant and a couple coats of wheel wax on top. still look good months after. grime wirtually rinses off. if not, i use an APC like mean green or simple green...works good for me.

Thanks for the tips! Unfortunately, I don't have a car jack or garage to make removing the wheels a reasonable thing to do all the time. I had to use the car jack incl. with my car to hold up the car while I removed the lug nuts & hubcaps so I could sand down & repaint my hubcaps last year. This was very precarious as I had to move the gravel from my driveway away & try to put the jack on firm footing in the packed down dirt. This was not an optimal process to say the least, and I'd rather not repeat it. Removing wheels unfortunately just poses too much of a risk for me. Perhaps a tire place that removes & replaces rims would remove the wheels and let me store my car at their shop while I cleaned/waxed them. Also not the best of situations but maybe something feasible. I may just have to stick with wheel brushes etc vs removing the wheels :/