Review: SONAX CC36 Ceramic Coating - LC HDO Foam Pads - Makita PO5000C - Supercharged Dodge Yellow Jacket

Review: - LC HDO Foam Pads - Makita PO5000C - Supercharged Dodge Yellow Jacket


Supercharged 2012 Dodge Challenger SRT8 392 Hemi Yellow Jacket

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A friend of mine wanted to sell his Supercharged 2012 Dodge Challenger SRT8 392 Hemi Yellow Jacket with only 8,000 miles on it. He asked me if I could help him prep it for pictures. He was in luck because I needed a car with the "wow" factor to test out the SONAX CC36 Ceramic Paint Coating.

At the same time, I wanted to test out the new Lake Country 5.5 Inch HDO Foam Pads on the new Makita PO5000C 5” Dual Action Random Orbit Polisher.


First here's what makes this car super cool besides being #262 of 1,316 built, and that's the Whipple Supercharger!

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Here's the actual car before I started...

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Paint Condition


Tactile Inspection
The word tactical means to touch. So a tactile inspection of your car's paint means to touch your car's paint.

Don't confuse the word tactile with the word tactical as they are very close in spelling. The word tactical of course means of or relating to tactics, especially military or naval tactics or more general, actions that are planned.

When Vince arrived with the car he had just washed and dried the car. At 10 feet away the paint looked good. It was shiny but I could tell there was some missing shine that needed to be restored.

I asked Vince if he had ever used the Baggie Test to inspect paint? He said 'no'. I always do the baggie test so I know myself the true condition of the paint and I used this as a teaching moment for Vince. We felt the paint and sure as the sun rises in the East, there were little bumps all over the paint.

How often do you need to clay your car's paint?

This is a very common question and a general answer is, once or twice a year. But the technically correct answer is,

Question: How often do you need to clay your car's paint?

Answer: As needed.


So how do you now if you need to clay your car's paint? By feeling the paint after washing and drying or after wiping or washing using spray detailers, waterless washes and/or rinseless washes. The BIG PICTURE being that how often you need to clay your car's paint depends on WHAT'S IN THE AIR AROUND YOUR CAR. And because you can never really know what's in the air around your car the only way to know if you need to clay is to feel the paint with your clean bare hand and also with the baggie test.


So the paint on this Yellow Jacket failed the tactile inspection.


Visual Inspection
While the paint looked good under the florescent lights in the garage, that don't mean squat. We put the SCANGRIP Sunmatch light on the paint and while not bad there were light swirls and scratches throughout the finish.

So the paint on this Yellow Jacket failed the visual inspection


Using ceramic paint coatings
YES you can apply a ceramic paint coating over paint with swirls and scratches. You'll see the swirls and scratches but you can solace knowing they are protect.

No you cannot apply a ceramic paint coating over paint that has above surface bonded contaminants. The fact is, if you can feel little bumps on the paint and you can see swirls and scratches, chances are very good the paint also have a film build of surface impurities like oxidation, road film and other sources of chemical contamination.


Diagnosis
Before applying the SONAX CC36 Ceramic Paint Coating the paint on this car will need to be both mechanically decontaminated to remove the above surface contaminants followed by compounding and polishing to remove the below surface defects like swirls and scratches.



Process

Step 1: Remove contaminants using the SONAX Claydisc on the Makita PO5000C using the SONAX Glass Cleaner as a lubricant.

Step 2: Remove swirls, scratches, oxidation and other defects using SONAX CutMax with a Lake Country HDO Blue Foam Heavy Cutting Pad on the Makita PO5000C 5” Dual Action Random Orbit Polisher.

Step 3: Refine the results created by the SONAX CutMax by re-polishing to maximize glass and clarity using the SONAX EX 04-06 with the 5.5 inch Lake Country HDO Orange Foam Polishing Pads on the Makita PO5000C 5” Dual Action Random Orbit Polisher.

Step 4: Chemically strip off any residual polishing oils off the surface of the paint using BLACKFIRE Crystal Coat Paint Prep

Step 5: Apply the SONAX Basecoat (step 1 of a 2-part coating system), to the paint. Work one panel at a time wiping off any high spots approximately 1 minute after application to the panel.

Step 6: Allow the basecoat to cure for approximately 1 hour.

Step 7: Apply the SONAX GlossCoat (step 2 of a 2-part coating system). Work one panel at a time wiping off any high spots immediately after application to the panel.



Here's the final results....

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Amazing gloss!

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:)

Continued...



Process

Step 1: Remove contaminants using the SONAX Claydisc on the Makita PO5000C using the SONAX Glass Cleaner as a lubricant.


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Step 2: Remove swirls, scratches, oxidation and other defects using SONAX CutMax with a Lake Country HDO Blue Foam Heavy Cutting Pad on the Makita PO5000C 5” Dual Action Random Orbit Polisher.

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Step 3: Refine the results created by the SONAX CutMax by re-polishing to maximize glass and clarity using the SONAX EX 04-06 with the 5.5 inch Lake Country HDO Orange Foam Polishing Pads on the Makita PO5000C 5” Dual Action Random Orbit Polisher.


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Step 4: Chemically strip off any residual polishing oils off the surface of the paint using BLACKFIRE Crystal Coat Paint Prep

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Step 5: Apply the SONAX Basecoat (step 1 of a 2-part coating system), to the paint. Work one panel at a time wiping off any high spots approximately 1 minute after application to the panel.


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Step 6: Allow the basecoat to cure for approximately 1 hour.


Step 7: Apply the SONAX GlossCoat (step 2 of a 2-part coating system). Work one panel at a time wiping off any high spots immediately after application to the panel.

Same application process as the basecoat except you use the SONAX GlossCoat and the applicator pad marked 2


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:)

Continued....


Products used

SONAX CC36 Ceramic Paint Coating

Lake Country 5.5 Inch HDO Foam Pads

Makita PO5000C 5” Dual Action Random Orbit Polisher

SONAX Claydisc

SONAX Glass Cleaner

SONAX CutMax

Lake Country HDO Blue Foam Heavy Cutting Pad

SONAX EX 04-06

5.5 inch Lake Country HDO Orange Foam Polishing

BLACKFIRE Crystal Coat Paint Prep



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:)

.


Review


SONAX CC36 Ceramic Paint Coating
This is an super easy to use ceramic paint coating kit. The kit is laid out well with all component marked visually for easy identification. The aerosol step 1 basecoat and step 2 glosscoat are easy to apply and spread out using the included applicators. Both coatings are easy remove any high spots as long as you stay within the recommended 1 minute waiting time. Basically for any large panel, apply and then by the time you grab a clean microfiber towel you can start removing where you started applying and then follow your path-of-travel.

The basecoat creates an incredibly glossy finish and then the glosscoat amplifies these results to create a super glassy finish.

The key with this coating as with ANY coating is to get the paint where you want it first as far as correction and polishing step.



Lake Country 5.5 Inch HDO Foam Pads
I found these pads to be a tick on the stiff side and my guess is that's due to the extra layer of intercore foam between the face of the pad and the backing. This stiffness softened up after buffing your first section of paint. The cut for the cutting pad was consistent for each panel I buffed. With a lot of foam pads, after they become wet with product the cutting starts to diminish, so Lake Country has tweaked the form formula for more longevity in cutting performance but I still switched to a clean dry pad as I moved from panel to panel.


Makita PO5000C 5” Dual Action Random Orbit Polisher
This is a solid performing gear-driven orbital polisher. It's incredibly well built and runs smooth as a sewing machine. If you're new to machine polishing and want a gear-driven polisher this is a great option that avoids the common problem of pad stalling with free spinning polishers.



Comments...

I'll have to do some side-by-side buffing with the Lake Country HDO pads on both free spinning and gear-driven polishers to really know if these are a good match for gear-driven polishers. My initial thoughts are I think I like any of the other Lake Country 5.5" pad options for at least this gear-driven Makita.



Here's a couple of parting shots.....

Interior

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Ready to sting....

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Comments, questions and feedback welcome...



:)

Great write up Mike. The car looks fantastic. I was wondering when your write up was coming on the CC36 coating.

I had the pleasure of using Sonax CC36 courtesy of Meghan sending it out for a review. The review is coming as I have had it on my personal daily driver for 3 weeks now. So far so good after 3 weeks.

You pretty much covered the ease of use and the application. Makes my review easier as I can piggy back off of yours :xyxthumbs:.

One other thing is that I had the privilege of attending a detail event locally about a month ago with the folks from Sonax demoing the coating. I was able to see first hand how the coating was applied prior to using it. Coincidently enough it was also on a yellow vehicle. Really makes yellow pop.

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Excellent review Mike!

Very cool car and awesome review and documentation.

Just remembered, we used the same two part coating system from Sonax on this 69 Camaro.


This custom built Camaro went on to win the Detailer's Cup Award this year at Detail Fest.

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The builders.
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Here's a shot of our team. From left to right: David Patterson (Lake Country Mfg), Jim Goguen, Me, Scott Voelz (Lake Country Mfg), Hector Romero and Jeff Bellantoni.

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Rob and Jason from Sonax gave us a quick demo beforehand.

Both coatings were very easy to use.

Mike, thanks for the great review and honest opinions, epecially on the HDO pads. Would you say the blue HDO foam composition is pretty much identical to the Green buff&shine low-pro? Not sure if you have used the low-pro's but am interested in trying the HDO pads and am trying figure out what to expect.

That's a lot of typing mike don't know how you do it.