I received Mckees 37 Krystal Diamond SiO2 Ceramic Wax today. It came packaged similar to other PBMG waxes (I know M37 is no longer PBMG, but w/e):
I decided to do a very small scale comparison test of this new wax versus 3 competitors.
I don’t have a car in need of protection right now, but the top, back tailgate panel of my X5 was repainted around 7 weeks ago and is currently bare, and would serve as the test specimen. I cleaned, polished and then prepped per the pic below:
The 4 ceramic waxes all include SiO2 plus carnauba:
A) PBL Synergy
B) Mckees 37 Krystal Diamond SiO2 Ceramic Wax
C) IGL EcoCoat Wax
D) Dodo Juice Supernatural Hybrid Nano
Control: Angelwax Enigma which is applied on the rest of the car.
Synergy and Nano are very hard waxes and have a mild smell of solvents (I think?), whereas EcoCoat and the new Krystal Wax are what I consider soft waxes if going by Dodo Juice standards (basically same consistency as most PBMG waxes as well). Both EcoCoat and Krystal smell good... EcoCoat like a fruit punch, and Krystal smells strongly like an oceanside resort. Nick explains it better in his new video, and I basically agree with his description. Here’s how the waxes look:
I applied each in the same order listed and shown above, going from driver side to passenger side of the top tailgate. Synergy and Nano went on very thin, Krystal and EcoCoat were a bit thicker consistency.
*Note that I also reinforced Enigma around the tail lights and paint adjacent to this panel since my polisher went over some places to get corners, and I didn’t feel like taping.
The directions for these vary from leaving on for 10 minutes, up to 30 minutes. I let them all sit for 35 minutes so everything is equal. Wiping off was easy for all 4, but if I had to rank, I would have Synergy as easiest, then Nano, then Krystal, then EcoCoat. Here’s some pics after wiping:
All pictures were taken in my garage at night time. I’ll let these cure 24 hours and snap some better pics. The car will likely stay dry until Thursday when it may rain, otherwise I’ll do some beading comps with the hose.
Thanks for reading my tiny test (better than nothing hopefully)!
Great initial post. Looking forward to how they all perform once the weather hits...
Man I’m gone for just a couple of months and I feel like I’ve missed out on so much new stuff I’ve never seen before. Lol.
Btw, what’s going on with your rear window? Lol.
Back window has some polish splatter... Or am I missing something else?
By the way, I forgot to mention originally: none of the four felt sealant-slick after application, but they all have that smooth carnauba feel. I couldn’t tell differences in slickness but had my wife come check it out. She thought the Ecoshine may have been the slickest, with no additional #2-4 rankings for the other 3.
How was application compared to synergy. Can you look at it in the sun to see which one wiped the cleanest.
Application wasn’t much different other than it loaded on the applicator thicker and therefore wasn’t as easy to apply thin. This makes sense I think because Synergy spreads really far and boasts about 25 applications out of 5oz whereas Krystal claims 25 apps out of 8oz. It wiped off easily though. Both directions are to wipe off after hazing which takes about 10 mins (I waited 30+ though). Both required almost no pressure to wipe off. If I had to give an edge, Synergy would get the win, likely because it was applied thinner though.
I will check it in the sun Monday night (if we have sun, it’s supposed to rain all day) or Tuesday morning to look for residue or other wipe off issues.... I do recall your Synergy issues with wiping off. I haven’t noticed any issues with Synergy leaving residue or marks, but haven’t put much effort to do so. I will check all 4 closely.
Update 9/26/19:
The test panel saw a bit of rain this morning. Not enough to see great accumulation on the vertical panel but here’s the pictures anyways (from left to right looking at back panel; NOTE: The bottom half of each picture is the panel. The top half of each picture is the rear window.)
PBL Synergy (Enigma on left side panel)
Mckees Krystal Wax
IGL EcoShine Wax
*Pulled out wiper which was blocking some water:
Dodo Juice Nano (Enigma on right side panel)
Not the most exciting pictures due to the weakness of the rain event. I’ll either do a hose-down later; or Saturday 9/28 it should rain again.
My observations, whether meaningful or not due to lack of rain / angles of panel:
- Synergy side has least amount of drops remaining and smallest drops.
- Dodo Nano is second for both (beads on top ridge look not uniform because of angle, not LSPs fault).
- Krystal is 3rd for both, but a few beads on the top ridge are not uniform.
- IGL EcoShine had the most beads remaining and largest bead sizes. Possible asterisk: the wiper above may have interfered with how and when the rain dropped down this section of the panel.
Hopefully some better results and observations to cone in the next few days.
I tried to take the sheeting photos (second photo) the moment after turning the hose off for each photo combo below. The third picture is a second, separate try to better catch the sheeting in a picture.
PBL Synergy
Mckees Krystal
IGL EcoShine Wax
Dodo Nano
All of them are newly applied ceramic waxes on a vertical panel, so it was hard to capture the speed of sheeting in pictures, but they all sheet awesomely. But this would be boring if I left it at that, and it’s easier to see small differences in real time than it is in pictures.
My observation/summaries:
- Synergy and Dodo reflect the water immediately, it appears to fall faster than gravity can cause. I can’t see any dripping effect, water bounces off immediately.
- IGL EcoShine sheets 3rd fastest, I can see the stream of water dripping down for a quarter second before the panel appears dry.
- Mckees Krystal sheets the slowest, I can see the stream of water drip down for a half second before the panel appears dry.
As I mentioned prior, the entire panel has amazing water behavior. But the slight performance edges are in order of price, as is how I view the ease of application/removal as well.
Application wasn’t much different other than it loaded on the applicator thicker and therefore wasn’t as easy to apply thin. This makes sense I think because Synergy spreads really far and boasts about 25 applications out of 5oz whereas Krystal claims 25 apps out of 8oz. It wiped off easily though. Both directions are to wipe off after hazing which takes about 10 mins (I waited 30+ though). Both required almost no pressure to wipe off. If I had to give an edge, Synergy would get the win, likely because it was applied thinner though.
I will check it in the sun Monday night (if we have sun, it’s supposed to rain all day) or Tuesday morning to look for residue or other wipe off issues.... I do recall your Synergy issues with wiping off. I haven’t noticed any issues with Synergy leaving residue or marks, but haven’t put much effort to do so. I will check all 4 closely.
Thanks I bought a can of mckees I might apply it today and post picks.
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Originally Posted by Eldorado2k
lol.
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