Gtechniq W4 Citrus Foam

[kevincwelch]

Gtechniq W4 Citrus Foam Review

I've been a long-time fan of Gtechniq and their products. My first real venture into the coating world was with Gtechniq, and I frequently seem to come back to their products. In general, I think you can't go wrong if you bottle a bottle of Gtechniq off the shelf and put it in your virtual cart. I ordered some Gtechniq W4 about 1 month ago, and it was on backorder. It finally came in, and I used it this weekend to see how it compared to my other foaming solutions.

My collection of foaming soaps includes: DP Xtreme Foam, Gyeon Foam, CarPro HydroFoam, CarPro Iron Snow Soap. Also Gyeon Bathe+ and TAC Water Repel can be used in a foam lance as well. I'm a big fan of Gyeon Foam.




Product Description (Gtechniq website)

Why use W4 Citrus Foam?
Unlike traditional pre-wash snow foams that come loaded with caustic chemicals, W4 Citrus Foam is a pH neutral formula that removes hard to shift grime, without damaging sealants, coatings or waxes.
It combines an effective citrus degreaser with a strong foaming agent making it tough on road grime and bug spatter, but kind to waxes and coatings.

It can be used at a dilution of up to 1:400 through a foam lance, or up to 1:25 through a pump sprayer.
Storage and use

• We recommend to use in conjunction with a jet wash and snow foam lance out of direct sunlight
• For light dirt we recommend a 1:400 dilution, and 1:200 for heavier soiling
• Allow the foam to dwell on the surface for 5 minutes and then rinse thoroughly
• W4 can also be used with a pump sprayer at a dilution of 1:20
• Do not allow the product to dry on the surface

Cost Analysis
The regular pricing of Gtechniq W4 Citrus Foam at Autogeek is $18.99. For this exchange of currency, you get a 1L bottle of soap. Mine was filled virtually to the brim. A dilution of 1:400 breaks down to a cost of $0.05 per application. A dilution of 1:20 breaks down to 50 applications or $0.38 per application. Pretty economical, even when applied with the least dilution.

Instructions
As stated, the soap can be diluted up to 1:400. For a standard 1 Liter foam lance bottle, that's 2.5 mL of solution. At the 1:20 dilution, that's 20 mL of product.

Vehicle
2015 Toyota Highlander
Paint Coating: Gtechniq C1/EXO v2 (2015)
Wheel Coating: None (they're plastic POS)
Tire Coating: TAC System Tire Coat (2017)
Level of Soil: moderate (2 weeks without a bath)

Discussion
The opened soap does indeed have a pleasant citrus aroma. It is translucent but lacks total clarity. There appears to be no added colors or dyes. Despite a very clear warning not to get this on one's skin, I dipped my finger into the solution and found it to be thinner than most of the other foaming soaps, but it did not lack any lubricity as a concentrate.

For the first attempt, I made a dilution of 1:400 in the foaming cannon and foamed up the vehicle. Please refer to the video below for what this looked like and how the soap performed. For the second attempt, I made a 1:30 dilution and foamed up the vehicle. You can see the differences in the video below. The majority of the video is sped up at 4x to show the dwell time.





Clearly the less dilute the product is, the more it "foams" up the vehicle. By my test at the 1:30 dilution, there is quite a bit of clinging and dwell time. Based on timing of previous videos, it was about as long as Gyeon Foam, but it far exceeded DP Xtreme Foam.

Now, I didn't test the cleaning ability of the 1:400 dilution. In fact, after I opened up the cannon (not seen in the video), I thought something was wrong since it wasn't foaming up at all. I shook the cannon bottle and made another pass, which you can see in the video. Still, the foaming at this dilution is quite unimpressive. But, the real question that is unanswered is whether the solution at this dilution is capable of encapsulating the dirt or laying down some surfactants and cleaning solution that begins to facilitate vehicle cleaning.

I did, however, test the cleaning ability of the 1:30 dilution. After the foam was finished dwelling, I pressure washed the soap and and whatever encapsulated dirt away. With a still wet car, I wiped down the panels with a damp 1100 GSM towel. You can see various shots below. The dirtiest sections of the towel are from passes near the rocker panels. Unfortunately, I did not do a comparison of a section cleaned with just a 2BW and a white towel (I should have done this), but it's clear that foaming and spraying does not remove all dirt. You still need to agitate the paint.



All 4 quarters of this towel were used on a door. The cleanest sections (bottom of picture), were the top of the door.





Clean side folded over on dirty side.



Summary
Gtechniq W4 Citrus Foam is a versatile foaming soap that has in my opinion decent cleaning capacity without needing to agitate the surface. This is beneficial since the more contact we have with the pain (i.e., agitation), the more likely we are to induce swirls and scratches. While foaming a vehicle may not be completely necessary, it may be very beneficial for cars with softer clear coats or darker colors that tend to show swirls and scratches much more easily. Foaming a car does add significant time to the detailing process, so one would have to weigh the potential gains of foaming against the time/money lost when considering product price and time lost -- because you can't do much else while it is foaming (maybe brush detailing emblems, etc.). I never understood why cars are foamed before a major detail (compounding/polishing) since any potential savings in terms of inflicted damage would be obviated by the compounding and polishing. The exception would be when using Mike Phillips' Aggressive Approach. However, for maintaining a car, foaming of some method may surely help minimize contact with the paint.

Clearly the 1:400 dilution doesn't evoke those smiles of satisfaction we associated with spraying a car with shaving-cream-levels-of-foam like the 1:30 dilution, but perhaps the cleaning ability of the 1:400 dilution is similar or fair. In my opinion, if I'm going to foam a car up before washing it, I want to see foam, and you're gonna have to use the less dilute ratios to achieve that.

[Gtr197f1]

I don't rate it at all if I'm honest bilt hamber auto foam is a long way better than w4 ... nice review mate happy detailing

Sent from my SM-G955F using Tapatalk

[fly07sti]

Thanks for the review Kevin. I've had this in and out of my cart a half dozen times. Looks like I'm gonna have to get some.

[WRAPT C5Z06]

Nice review.

Does Gyeon Foam clean better?

[Marc08EX]

Great and extremely detailed review as always Kevin!

[kevincwelch]

Nice review.

Does Gyeon Foam clean better?

No.

But not worse either. I've always used it as a prelude to a 2BW.

(Sent via my mobile device...)

[kevincwelch]

Thanks all.

I've rarely been disappointed with anything from Gtechniq, except for their fabric coating. I like trying all these different brands, but I really should just settle down with one and start being monogamous.

(Sent via my mobile device...)

[fly07sti]

Real quick Kevin. Are those Everest towels?

[kevincwelch]

Real quick Kevin. Are those Everest towels?

They are.