REVIEW: Pinnacle Liquid Crystal Waterless Auto Wash with Carnauba

[Romans5.8]

In a previous review, I talked about Detailers Pro Waterless Auto Wash. I was tickled to death with it's performance. I even did a video to show you all how it melts away dirt and cleans even a daily driver sitting in a filthy parking lot. Truly, all the reviews of this product did it a disservice by washing clean cars inside a sterile garage in 65 degree weather. Here I was in freezing cold temps with a daily driver that had been subjected to the sort of road film and grit that occurs in the winter here in the midwest. Sand, fine bits of cinders (often used for de-icing roads), and even bits of ash and dust from fireplaces, wood stoves, and wood furnaces that occur when you live in a rural community that has a lot of folks who heat with wood (If you cut it down and split it yourself; there's no cheaper way to heat!). You got to watch me make my car show-car clean (well, parts of it anyway) in seconds with a fantastic waterless wash concentrate.

But, something was missing. It got the car clean, but didn't leave anything behind. No shine, no wax. And if you think I'm gonna stand out there in the cold for one more minute, much less another 10 while I spray it down with a spray wax or a quick detailer? You've got another thing coming.

So, enter Pinnacle Liquid Crystal with Carnauba. It's the same price- or is it? To add insult to Detailer Pro's proverbial injury, Pinnacle is far more concentrated, and thus- is far cheaper per-wash than Detailer Pro. It is infused with wax, AND comes in a bottle with a built in measurer, which is very nice!



I couldn't wait for it to come in! When I ran out of DP waterless, I quickly filled by Mercury Pro bottle up and went to work. Oh boy! A waterless wash that will clean my car in my apartment parking lot AND leave behind a little bit of extra carnauba to top my Meg's M26 (which is topping DP paint sealant). I can't wait!

So I take my little tote, my towels, and my spray bottle, and I begin with my first panel. Huh. Well, DP kind of lingers, almost like a foaming car wash. It then trickles down in a brown stream of dirt-suspended solution. This stuff kind of just... makes the car wet, and beats up and rolls away. Oh well! So I keep spraying. And spraying. And spraying...

Well, it's got Carnauba! And cleaning power! Well, actually the last one is kind of a fib. I mean, it cleans. But 'power' isn't a word I would use to describe this product.

So I spray, and I spray, and I spray. And I wipe gently with my microfiber towels and cringe as it feels like I'm dry-buffing the dirt. The solution is seemingly going OVER the dirt, instead of sucking it in like the DP. It works, kinda. It gets the car clean... kinda. But... there's a big problem.

It's a spray wax. Or perhaps a quick detail spray. Or perhaps both? But as a waterless wash, it fails. Perhaps for a corvette at the Show Car garage it would do a great job. But for my daily driver? Not at all...

Here's where things first start to go bad;



Previously, I was accustomed to my 'final wipe' being the plastic trim on the bottom of my car, leaving it clean and new looking. After the final wipe, it was still dirt. So I spray some more. Another wipe... still dirty. Spray some more! A SCRUB with a microfiber towel... still... dirty. So I give up. The above is the result of those efforts. Embedded dirt remains on the trim. Something the DP waterless had zero issues with.

So I move on and the frustration continues.

One thing I like about a waterless wash, is that you can saturate trim, emblems, and other things, and watch the dirt and grime melt away from them and be safely wiped away. This time? Not so much. The Pinnacle continues to bead up and roll away from the dirt as if the dirt itself had a coat of wax on top of it. That includes emblems;



While I could agitate these areas clean with a brush, I didn't need to before. A few blasts from my mercury bottle and they were clean, the dirt suspended in an orange solution, flowing down to my waiting microfiber towel. That means a cleaner car with less touching- that's a win.

I move on to the wheels and the frustration continues. Dirt and road grime laugh maniacally at me as they shout "nanana can't get me can't get me!" as the Pinnacle waterless wash solutions screams "Abort mission!" before it's even out of the spray bottle. As the cowardly pinnacle solution retreats to the asphalt ground, my microfiber wheel towel tries in vain to bring a cleanliness to my wheels that it had done nearly a dozen times in the past few weeks, effortlessly gliding along the painted surface of the wheels taking the dirt away. This time, I'm left with dirty wheels. Again, more tools are needed to complete the job, as wheel cleaner becomes necessary just for a thin film of road grit on wheels that had been cleaned just two days prior.

The back of the car had the largest accumulation of dirt, and again, showed that the product was completely incapable of picking up and carrying away the dirt.

There are some redeeming qualities though. The carnauba works. While I ended up using an entire LITER of the stuff (as opposed to 300-500mL as before with the DP solution, generally closer to 300 than 500 mL) it did get the car clean-ish and did leave painted surfaces with a gorgeous carnauba shine;



The product was incredibly easy to work with, and smelled great. It wiped easily and buffed easily. But perhaps that's because half of it was on the ground within milliseconds of touching the paint as beads of it raced towards the ground, afraid of going anywhere near the dirt.

Though there is the weird annoyance that this product apparently attracts bees. It is the middle of winter, but with every spray more and more bees began to swirl around me, landing on the car and dive-bombing my spray bottle and pile of dirty towels. Anything that smelled like the Pinnacle spray.

Bottom Line

The Carnauba shine is great. The product smells great. For a lightly-dusty show car needed a little shine and safe dust removal, the Pinnacle is the clear choice. It gives a warm, just waxed shine with almost no effort.

But the cleaning power is not there. Soiled parts of the car remain soiled. The product doesn't cling to or linger on the paint, and it doesn't suspend grit and dirt into the solution like other waterless washes do.

Because of the poor cleaning power, I cannot recommend this product as a waterless wash. This is the only product I've ever bought from autogeek that, if it had a 'satisfaction guarantee', I'd be returning it. The performance was very poor. As a quick detailer used in the strictest since (to quickly detail an already clean car), it would be tremendously effective. To wash a lightly-soiled car that had been driven (and washed just TWO DAYS prior), it is not effective. I am also concerned about it's lubricity and thus it's ability to be used on the paint safely without scratching the paint.

Tips for Success

Buffing after the initial 'wipedown' is crucial with this product. Else, it'll streak. That's to be expected with the carnauba. It seems to buff a lot easier with a thin buffing towel as opposed to the 'buffing side' of a fluffier wash towel.

Perhaps try using much more than the recommended concentration, as I will in the future.

Don't attempt to use this product on a car with any more than very light dust. Despite my car being freshly waxed and recently washed, it was unable to lift away contaminants, dirt, and grime.

Thanks for reading! Happy detailing!

[ralliartjuggalo]

isn't it funny how two peoples results could vary so much. i loved the pinnacle's cleaning ability and i thought the dp was horrible

[Matt-erhorn]

Nice review, but interesting that you found a huge lack of cleaning ability. Because it seems to be equal cleaning power with my UWW+. But maybe it's just my frequent cleanings that make it easy to clean.

[tommygee]

I had exactly the opposite results with this product. I wouldn't use any waterless wash if I thought the car was too dirty. But I used Pinnacle Liquid Crystal today and I was pleased with the results. If I have any doubts about Pinnacle Waterless or Pinnacle Rinseless I'll go Rinseless to be on the safe side.

[rjd598]

Pinnacle has very good cleaning abilities IMO. Can't speak for dp

[Romans5.8]

Interesting.

Well it's encouraging that you guys are having good results with the product because the shine is fantastic.

So here's my issue, compared to DP. If you click on the link to my DP waterless review, and watch the video (skip to near the end) you'll see my spraying a couple 'dirty' spots on my fenders. You can see the grit rolling off the car. This doesn't happen AT ALL with Pinnacle. It just beads up and rolls off, leaving the dirt behind.

Do you all run the recommended 'dosage' or do you use a little more? I'm thinking I may use a bit more in my bottle next time, maybe that'll help.

As you saw in the pic of the emblems, that's the other issue. While I had no problems getting the panels clean with my MF towels, it's areas like that that show the difference. Previously, I didn't have any need to agitate those areas with a small brush or anything like that. I would just spray 3 or 4 pumps on the emblems and all of the dirt would just wash away, it would clean out the emblems that way. The pinnacle didn't do that. The dirt just sat there. And of course, the plastic trim didn't come clean; which was bizarre. It took no effort before with the DP.

I'm definitely NOT an expert and this is only the second waterless wash I've ever used. So I'm curious as to what I'm doing 'wrong' to get such poor results with this product; because the shine is great- I WANT it to work.

Anyone have any suggestions?

As far as 'how dirty', my car isn't 'super dirty', not at least for what I would think. Basically I'm dealing with a really thin, fine layer of dust that accumulates after a day or two of driving, that is noticeable on my black car. Again if you look in the DP video you can see what I'm talking about. I usually do a waterless about every day or two to keep that off the car and keep it looking good. I live in an apartment, a two bucket wash isn't an option unfortunately. A rinseless is, though that's a bit less convenient.

(Gotta love how you mix water with a waterless wash solution and a rinseless wash involves a rinse bucket though! hehehe).

[tommygee]

I'm not using the concentrate. I picked up the gallon bottle as a Cyber Buster. So it's just fill the bottle and spray. I also use this as a pre-soak when needed before a rinseless wash. I wonder if the recommended ratio on the concentrate needs to be jacked up a little bit.

[Romans5.8]

I'm not using the concentrate. I picked up the gallon bottle as a Cyber Buster. So it's just fill the bottle and spray. I also use this as a pre-soak when needed before a rinseless wash. I wonder if the recommended ratio on the concentrate needs to be jacked up a little bit.

I'm gonna try that next. I went through an entire Mercury bottle this last time trying to keep areas saturated, so it's time for a refill. I may double or even triple the amount of product in there.

[valleyrider]

I've used this as a waterless wash and as a clay lube and it has worked great for me every time I use it. In a 32oz bottle I use maybe 1/6th of the bottle when I wash my car with it and the car comes out clean. I do have a small working area on a little 2 door convertible but I have yet to have any issues with the concentrate and I use it at the suggested dilution ratios.

[Romans5.8]

Well, it seemed to work MUCH better this time. I doubled the 'dosage' and it worked better than DP, plus the shine is incredible!

It's certainly possible I did something wrong last time, but this time it blasted dirt out of emblems (though it still doesn't do that as well as DP) and left my trim clean.

Can't beat the shine!