Jeweling Wax - Definition
New industry term
I'm not sure there are any laws or regulations in our industry that prevents anyone from coming up with a new term, if anyone else knows of any authority that regulates this type of thing feel free to share a link.
Thus I Mike Phillips on March 5th of 2016 hereby create a new term and a new category for products for using in the car detailing industry called,
Jeweling Wax
Definition: An ultra fine cutting polish and wax combination that when used with a soft foam finishing or jewelling foam pad will maximize paint gloss, shine, depth and clarity while leaving behind a layer of protection.
Questions and Answers
Question: What's the difference between a jeweling wax and an AIO or cleaner/wax?
Answer: A jeweling wax is a category of products that offers the same high quality finishing ability famous to high quality fine cut or ultra fine cut polishes except that because it also contains protection ingredients, unlike a dedicated polish the surface is left both polished and protected.
Cleaner/waxes are normally and historically products used to
undo damage like swirls, water spots, oxidation out of the paint on cars that have been neglected. They don't however tend to create super high gloss results like a jeweling wax.
On the flipside, because a jewelling wax offers very limited correction ability it cannot compete with or be compared to most cleaner/waxes on the market (also called AIO's), which offer more correction ability but don't and won't finish out like a true jeweling wax.
I love cleaner/waxes and use them when appropriate and even have a number of articles encouraging detailers to use cleaner/waxes when doing production detail work. I would not however consider the majority of cleaner/waxes I've used in my life to be the type of product I would use like a jewelling wax as they don't finish out as well as a true jewelling wax.
A high quality jeweling wax is too good to be lumped into the
cleaner/wax category already populated with hundreds of cleaner/wax options ranging from the extreme spectrum of
mediocre to
very good.
A jeweling wax can be used in place of your last machine polishing step to refine the results of the previous correction steps and/or correction and polishing steps to maximize the gloss, clarity, depth and shine while also leaving the finish protected, something a dedicated polish will not do.
Question: What's the difference between a cleaner/wax and an AIO or All-in-One product for car paint?
Answer: There is no difference. The terms cleaner/wax and AIO are interchangeable and are used to describe products that are used on car paint to,
- Clean
- Polish
- Protect
Question: What else separates a jeweling wax from traditional cleaner/wax or AIO?
Answer: Because a jeweling wax only offers very light correction and seals the paint surface at the same time a jeweling wax is perfect for regularly maintaining paint already in one of these three categories,
Category #1: Show Car Quality
Category #2: Excellent Condition
Category #3: Good Condition
See definitions and complete list of paint condition categories here,
Book: The Complete Guide to a Show Car Shine - Pages 37, 38 & 39
Book: The Art of Detailing - Pages 37, 38 & 39
Article: Paint Condition Categories
Question: Can a jeweling wax replace a cleaner/wax or AIO?
Answer: Yes if the amount of correction needed is light or when doing production detailing where the goal is to restore a shiny paint finish not undo years of damage and neglect.
The least aggressive approach
Because the factory clearcoat on a modern car is approximately 2 mils thin (a post-it note is approximately 3 mils thin), a jeweling wax is the perfect choice for removing minor imperfections like marring caused by washing or wiping with drying chamois or microfiber towels.
Educated car owners understand their car's paint is thin, they also understand that over time and with use defects accumulate in and on the paint reducing the shine, gloss and smoothness previously present or attained by a professional detailing session.
Thus a method is needed to remove any accumulated defects, staining or oxidation that is also the least evasive to the paint, that is a method that is very non-aggressive so as to remove only the minimum measure of paint to re-level the surface and restore the paint to maximum shine, gloss, clarity and smoothness.
A jewelling wax is the perfect choice since it is less aggressive than most cleaner/waxes and AIO's on the market and also because it has the ability to create the same high quality finish a fine cut or ultra fine cut polish is able to create.
Thus you can correct and protect while preserving as much as is possible the original film build of clear paint on a vehicle.
Perfect for regular maintenance of daily drivers
Vehicles that are used as daily drivers are exposed to all sorts of attack to the exterior finish. This is especially true for vehicles in geographical areas where it rains.
When it rains, the cars driving in front of your car spray water from the road onto your car. The water spray contains oily fluids dripped onto the road by the hundreds and even thousands of cars that drive over the road each day. This oily water spray also contain dirt and the effect is this oily, dirty water accumulates to form road film on your car's paint.
A jeweling wax is powerful enough to remove road film to restore a clean paint surface without removing measurable amounts of paint like compounds, medium cut polishes and medium cleaning cleaner/waxes or AIO's.
Perfect product for high quality production detailing
Production detailing usually has a negative connotation associated with it and sad to say all to often when a car is machine buffed using a one-step product by machine the results are either hologram scratches, buffer trails or micro-marring that leaves the clearcoat hazy looking.
The culprit for mediocre results when doing a one-step process to the paint by machine using a one-step product is either the product, the pad or the tool and in some cases all three factors.
With a true jeweling wax you can restore a shiny finish using only a foam polishing or finishing pad with just about any machine polisher for customer pleasing results. A true jeweling wax will remove the risk of mediocre results which are common in the production detailing world while providing technicians with a simple and easy to use product. The key to doing high quality production detailing always starts with setting the expectation of your customers and that's means educating them with a minimal understanding of the paint on their cars and the paint restoration process.
Summary
There's a time and place for all categories of products in the paint care spectrum of car detailing. For severely neglected cars the best product might be an aggressive compound or medium cleaning cleaner/wax. A jeweling wax by definition is a very non-aggressive cleaner/wax or AIO except that it has the ability to finish out better like a high end fine cut or ultra fine cut polish while leaving the finish protected.
:)
