Jay Leno’s Garage Hand Wax - Review and How-To by Mike Phillips

[Mike Phillips]

Jay Leno’s Garage Hand Wax - Review and How-To by Mike Phillips





The two most common procedures the majority of car owners perform to their car's to maintain their appearance is to wash them and wax them. Pretty straightforward stuff. If a person will do just these two things and do a good job plus use quality products, they can preserve the factory finish over the service life of the car or at least until they sell or trade the car in.

Exclusive distributor
Autogeek is the exclusive distributor of Jay Leno's Garage line of quality car care products. As such, I get to test out Jay's new line and tell you what I think.


Cleaner/Wax of Show Car Wax?
In the car wax world there are two general categories for car waxes.


Car waxes that clean the paint
These are called cleaner/waxes or AIOs. Note, lots of cleaner/waxes don't actually say "cleaner/wax" anywhere on the label or in the product description yet they can and will be a one-step cleaner/wax especially if the target market for the wax is Joe Consumer. The reason for this is because the average person drives a daily driver and the paint becomes stained over time as well as accumulates swirls, scratches, water spots and oxidation. A quality cleaner/wax will clean, polish and protect in one step and this means it will address "some" of these paint issues so after wipe-off the user will look at their car's paint and see a visual difference.



Car waxes that don't clean the paint
There's not specific name in our industry for these type of products but all of my working life, in my articles, videos, TV and my how-to books I designate these non-cleaning waxes as either,

Show Car Waxes

Finishing Waxes

And the reason why is because they don't offer any cleaning ability, they can really only be used on paint that is either new, like in a brand new car or excellent condition, for example before using the product you washed, clayed, compounded and polished the paint so you have restored it to new or like new condition.


In reading the information about this product on the AG store and also the label copy on the product, it does not mention any ability to remove light defects like swirls, scratches, water spots or oxidation. And while I hate to assume, I went ahead and assumed that this product is a show car wax, that is it is NOT a cleaner/wax. And as such if you purchase this product you should know this ahead of time and use it on cars that have paint in excellent condition.


My tester car - 2013 Camaro Daily Driver
This car belongs to my wife's daughter. It is a daily driver and not really taken care of on a regular basis. In fact, I think I was the last person to detail this car and that's when I used it to showcase RUPES tools when I used this car in my RUPES how-to book on the section that covers how to use RUPES tools to do production detailing. That is how to machine apply a one-step cleaner/wax. That was 3 years ago.


So when this car arrived, after washing it as documented in this thread,

Jay Leno’s Garage Vehicle Wash - Review and How-to by Mike Phillips


The next thing I did was inspect the paint for swirls and scratches as documented in this thread,


SCANGRIP TV COMMERCIAL - SCANGRIP Swirl Finder Lights - Review with pictures by Mike Phillips

And as I documented, in the above thread, the Camaro was filled with swirls and scratches. So before using the Jay Leno Garage Hand Wax I first removed all the swirls and scratches using a brand new compound and polish being introduced to the market. These new compounds and polishes worked AWESOME and you'll see a review for them this week.



So after perfecting the finish.... I was then ready to test out the Jay Leno Garage Hand Wax. Here's a picture of a SCANGRIP Penmatch Light lighting up the paint to show that it's swirl free.







Perfect paint in new or like-new condition

[Mike Phillips]

Continued....


Here's the wax - says right on it...

Hand Wax

Not a deal breaker for me but I'm a machine guy and prefer to machine apply everything when possible as I know from experience you get better results faster. It's that simple. Plus here at Autogeek... we don't sell hands.






The Jay Leno Garage Vehicle Care Kit comes with 4 products, one plus microfiber towel, a foam block for applying the included tire and trim dressing and a microfiber wax applicator for applying the wax. That's what you see in the picture below, the included microfiber wax applicator.






After working in the first application of wax to the applicator I applied some more and kept moving around the front of the car....







One half of the hood done... moving to the other side...





I was trying to look serious in this picture but instead I think I look bored or tired...








At this point I have the hood waxed and I'm pretty much done working by hand...the wax works well by hand but I think the microfiber applicator drags as you try to spread out the wax. Simply switching to any foam wax applicator pad will make spreading the wax faster and easier and enable you to lay down a more thin and uniform layer of product. As you can see below, by the time I did the passenger side I was laying down a fairly thick layer of wax. I don't know if that was me or the applicator becoming wet with wax but it was noticeable in person and on film. Again... I'm a machine guy by nature.





Welcome to the machine -Pink Floyd



So after hand waxing the hood I had enough fun and so it's time to break out the Griot's Garage 6" DA polisher and get in and get busy.

Yes that's a happy face of wax on the surface of a Lake Country 5.5" blue waxing pad.









This my friends is called,

Kissing the finish

You'll find this technique shared on page 131 of my how-to book, The Complete Guide to a Show Car Shine






Speed setting to spread out a show car wax using the Griot's dual action orbital polisher is low, like around the 2 setting. Pad rotation isn't neccassary because I'm not trying to remove defects, (already did that), BUT pad rotation helps the pad to glide over the paint easier.





Mark your backing plate
Been teaching guys to do this for about 20 years now easy... if you don't know about this little trick then here's what you do. Take a permanent marker and draw a line on the backing plate. This will make it easy for our eyes to see and monitior pad rotation. If you have a dark colored backing plate then use a light colored marker or touch up paint.







How to pick up the splotches of wax after kissing the finish
With the polisher on, lift the leading edge of the pad off the paint but be sure to keep the trailing edge of the pad on the paint. Then run the pad over the splotch of wax and immediately re-adjust how you're holding the polisher to move the pad to the flat-against-the-paint position and then spread that bit of wax out.










That's how you do it!





Looks like the paint has a poka-dots...




Then about as fast as you can slow-walk around the car you can use the above technique to spread out a uniform layer of wax that will dry fast and make wipe-off easy.

[Mike Phillips]

Continued....


Wax on, wax off!

Okay - now that the entire car from top to bottom, side to side and end to end has a layer of wax on it, let me share a few tips for removing a show car wax or finishing wax.





Inspect your wipe-off towels
First, inspect your microfiber towels by look at them and also feeling them. A lot of the time your hands will detect contaminants lodged in the microfiber nap that your eyes cannot see. If you do not inspect and catch these contaminants you risk instilling scratches back into the paint. So always inspect both visually and tactically. (You should actually inspect all your towels, clearcoat paints scratch easily)






Next - fold the towel 4-ways and then press it down on the paint and twist it in a circle back and forth....





This will create a shiny spot.

This is called,

Breaking the wax open





Then, place the towel back down on the shiny spot and creep out. I don't mean get weird on me... I mean move out from the shiny spot using small, overlapping circular motions to gently and safely remove the layer of wax. Flip your towel to a clean side or re-fold your towel to a clean side and swap out to a fresh, clean, dry INSPECTED towel often to make wiping the wax of effortless.






Almost done....






And BOOM!

You've remove the wax to reveal beautiful shiny paint!























That's what I'm talking about!





My experience
I found the Jay Leno Hand Wax to be an easy to use, high shine wax. The product wiped off easy, even on the passenger side of the hood where I laid it on kind of thick. It left a high gloss, shiny slick feeling finish which is what I like my paint to look like and feel like.

It has a blueberry scent to it that makes using it a pleasure.

Because it's a non-cleaning wax, it's important that you only use it on paint that is in new or like new condition. This would make an excellent wax for anyone with a new car that like's to wash and wax their car on the weekend and is looking for a simple approach that works great. This would also make a great gift to anyone that has purchased a new car and needs a push in the right direction for some quality brand products.

If you're just starting out or just now getting back into taking care of your car's appearance, I'd recommend getting the kit like you see below. The car wash, tire and trim dressing and the quck detailier all work great by themselves or work toghether as collection of quality products to get you going.





On Autogeek.com


Jay Leno’s Garage Hand Wax

Griots Garage 6 Inch Random Orbital Polisher

Blue Lake Country 5 1/2 Inch Flat Foam Machine Waxing Pad

Gold Plush Jr. Microfiber Towels 12 Pack

Jay Leno’s Garage Vehicle Care Kit

All Jay Leno Garage products











Here's the car after,

1. Washing
2. Using detailing clay
3. Compounding
4. Polishing
5. Waxing
6. Dressing the tires

Knowing Stacy's daughter... you'll probably see this car back here in 2-3 years for a refresher detail...

[Mike Phillips]

Continued....


Here's the other write-ups for the other Jay Leno Garage products tested out on this Camaro...


Jay Leno’s Garage Vehicle Wash - Review and How-to by Mike Phillips

Jay Leno’s Garage Tire & Trim Care - Review by Mike Phillips

Review: Jay Leno's Garage Quick Detailer by Mike Phillips

SCANGRIP TV COMMERCIAL - SCANGRIP Swirl Finder Lights - Review with pictures by Mike Phillips



Look for the compound and polish review later this week...

[ScottH]

Mike wonderful review as always, and needless to say incredible results. I always meant to ask you, as one of the most well known and respected folks in the business, do you feel an extra sense of concern (for lack of better words) to keep your vehicles (and family) spotless? I have to imagine your truck/cars are rolling examples of your skills/experience.

I am by no means in the same league as you, but have been enjoying detailing for well over 30 years now and always consider my personal cars a "business card" or "calling card" and therefore always keep them thoroughly detailed and spotless.

Didn't mean to hijack this thread, but I always meant to ask you this question and your review prompted me to.

Thanks Mike for another nice review,
ScottH

[Frank70]

Mike - hope your wife's daughter appreciates how you have brought back to life her nice car.

[Cruzscarwash]

hey mike you wrote "How to pick up the splotches of wax after kidding the finish" did you mean kissing the finish?

also I must say the happy face splotches all over the car were pretty neat, im gonna try that

[Mike Phillips]

hey mike you wrote "How to pick up the splotches of wax after kidding the finish" did you mean kissing the finish?

Yes, that's an example of typing faster than I'm thinking...

I fixed it. Thanks for the heads-up.

also I must say the happy face splotches all over the car were pretty neat, im gonna try that

It doesn't take much to entertain me...

[Mike Phillips]

I always meant to ask you, as one of the most well known and respected folks in the business, do you feel an extra sense of concern (for lack of better words) to keep your vehicles (and family) spotless? I have to imagine your truck/cars are rolling examples of your skills/experience.

Great question and the answer is "yes".

With an exception...

The wife's Mercedes-Benz has a Ceramiclear paint system. In my experience, one of the best paints on the market. I keep her car coated with PBL Surface Coating. I try to wash it about every other weekend or so. It's due for a wash right now as she was caught in a rain storm and thus has road splatter on the car and this means road film.

So I'll probably wash it this week early in the morning as I also have new product testing to do and can use a coated car.


For my own truck, it's too big to fit in a conventional garage and as such is parked out side all the time. This means the paint gets dirty from all the junk in the air and in the rain plus there are trees in my neiborhiood that drop sap and other crud. For this reason I maintain the paint with one-step cleaner/waxes.

I also don't get to worked up over whether or not it has a true show car finish because it is after all... a truck and a daily driver.

Just to note, I meant to wash it and wax it before this last Saturday's Cars & Coffee car show here at Autogeek because I planned to use my truck for the Boy Scouts Merit Badge class and let them change the oil in it. As it worked out, the boy scouts also washed my truck using a waterless wash and then I taught them how to wax by hand and wax by machine. I had 27 Boy Scouts machine waxing my truck with Griot's Garage 6" orbital polishers and HD Speed.

Pictures to be posted this week.

I am by no means in the same league as you, but have been enjoying detailing for well over 30 years now and always consider my personal cars a "business card" or "calling card" and therefore always keep them thoroughly detailed and spotless.

You never get a second chance to make a great first impression.


People judge other people by appearance. It's only natural. In the same line of thinking, people judge other people by the type of car they drive and the appearance of the car they drive.

I use to have a friend that had a car wash business based totally on this idea of creating a first great impression. The name of his business was,

Clean image

Didn't mean to hijack this thread, but I always meant to ask you this question and your review prompted me to.

Thanks Mike for another nice review,
ScottH

No problem and thank you for the question...

[The Guz]

Nicely done. The car looks awesome.