Popular Mechanics - Interior protectants harmful to your trim

[newbdetailer]

Back in the 90's, pep boys stopped carrying AA, and the people who worked there would tell everyone that it was because AA had water and alcohal, so it would dry things out and damage things. I don't know if they stock it now or not.

[Mike Phillips]

Aren't the dashboards of today's cars improved over the ones that unfairly made Armor All look bad. I doubt armor would make a dash crack all by itself; wasn't the greater reason of cracked dashboards due to the poor quality of plastic pieces auto makers used in the 70's and 80's?

I've talked to a chemist that has some background surrounding this topic and without getting deep you've summed up the issue pretty well...

First, vinyl dashes came out for the most part starting in the 1960's and in the 1960's the dash in your car would look pretty good... but it was early plastic technology.

I was told there is/was some truth to products with plasticizers leaching out the plasticizers originally in early vinyl, kind of a like attracts like action, don't know how strong of and action this would have been but this is what I was told. I was also told that since the 1970's formulas for vinyl dressings were improved to avoid any issues surrounding the issue of vinyl dashes cracking.

I think Armor-All got a black eye out of this that they don't really deserve but once an urban legend gets legs it's hard to stop it...

One thing for sure, I don't see the dashes on modern cars cracking at all... and any older car with cracking in the vinyl dash is in part because the vehicle is old to start with... nothing lasts forever...

When topics like this come up one direction I like to steer the focus back to is trusting in the name on the label, that is we can't all be PhD chemists so at some point instead of trying to be an expert on everything under the sun... find a brand that you trust makes premium quality products and trust that their chemists are doing their homework and providing products that are formulated for, tested and proven for the surface or process you're using the product for.

[Jumpingbean]

Hell if the stuff is so bad, why are using Tony Stewart to endorse their products? If the stuff was so bad, i would not want my name on it saying that the stuff works. JMO2Cents

Tony Stewart is just collecting a pay check. Do you think he really goes into the lab to check on the formula? Or even cares about the long term use of a product? He arrives at a location, shoots a commercial, collects the money and goes on to his next public appearance. He doesn't have the time nor the desire to care about any of that. And I'll guarantee that 99.99999% of all product endorsers are the same way.

He's done his job though. If someone likes a product simply because he's associated with it....

[kronos]

Tony Stewart is just collecting a pay check. Do you think he really goes into the lab to check on the formula? Or even cares about the long term use of a product? He arrives at a location, shoots a commercial, collects the money and goes on to his next public appearance. He doesn't have the time nor the desire to care about any of that. And I'll guarantee that 99.99999% of all product endorsers are the same way.

He's done his job though. If someone likes a product simply because he's associated with it....

I'm pretty sure he cares about his image too and his image is his brand. If he taints his image, he taints his brand and that may end up costing him money. If he's a smart fellow, he should protect his image and that means taking part in the decision making process when it comes to selecting who to sponsor.