Comparison: Tuf Shine vs Griot's Garage Tire Rejuvenator

[alfadub]

For the past few years, my preferred tire restoration product has been Griot's Garage Tire Rejuvenator. (It used to be sold under the name Weatherproof Tire Dressing.) This product has the consistency of a thick gel. It restores the dark black color to tires with a black dye and leaves a satin finish. The two things I like most about this product:
-Durability lasts months.
-It leaves the tire with a very clean, natural feel when you swipe your finger across it. It leaves no oily residue, and does not wash off in the rain.

I haven't seen this product mentioned much on this forum, perhaps because there are numerous other tire dressings and gels on the market.

However, recently I discovered Tuf Shine on the forum, which is touted as a permanent clearcoat for the tires. The manufacturer claims that if the tire is properly maintained, the tire clearcoat can potentially outlast the tire. So, as much as I like the Griot's Garage product, I was interested in Tuf Shine for the possibility of greater durability. Durability of a tire dressing is important to me because I hate cleaning tires. I usually don't bother spending much effort cleaning them, because the tire will get dirty with the next drive, and it often feels like a futile battle to keep tires clean. Usually, I'll just rinse off my tires with water and car shampoo.

I thought about doing a comparison of GG Tire Rejuvenator and Tuf Shine. Swanicyouth has previously posted an excellent review of Tuf Shine:

New Tires Tuff Shined !

It showed that the product works great, but on page 3 of that thread, there are some pictures of what the tires looked like after getting scuffed on a curb. In the areas that got scuffed, the scuffed rubber underneath the Tuf Shine tire clearcoat was brownish and unappealing.

Swanic's thread got me thinking about whether I could first dye and restore the rubber with GG Tire Rejuvenator, and then apply the Tuf Shine clear coat on top. Would the clear coat bond to the tire on top of GG Tire Rejuvenator? The only way to find out would be to try it.

These are the steps I took to prep each tire:

1. Sprayed Amazing Roll-Off, manually scrubbed with a tire scrubbing brush, and rinsed with a jet stream of water.

2. Sprayed Amazing Roll-Off, machine scrubbed with a 3” GG and yellow foam scrubbing pad on speed 4, and rinsed with a jet stream of water

3. Sprayed Amazing Roll-Off, machine scrubbed with a 3” GG and yellow foam scrubbing pad on speed 4 a 2nd time, and rinsed with a jet stream of water

After machine scrubbing the tire a 2nd time, the foam on the tire looked white, with minimal brown residue coming off the tire:




4. Sprayed Griot's Garage Rubber Cleaner, manually scrubbed with a tire scrubbing brush, and rinsed with a jet stream of water, and allowed to air dry.

5. Applied Griot's Garage Rubber Prep to each tire.

Here is the product description of Rubber Prep:

“Strip Off Previous Dressings And Protectants For Better Results!
For more serious cleaning, there's our Rubber Prep. Rubber Prep strips away silicones, sealants, waxes, oils, and greases to properly prepare the rubber so you can achieve the best results with our rubber dressings. A couple swipes and it's gone; no scrubbing necessary! A quick application leaves you with a virtually new surface, perfectly prepared for any of our tire dressings.”

After cleaning/scrubbing the tires and prior to application of the Rubber Prep, the rubber looked and felt squeaky clean. However, swiping the tires with Rubber Prep did remove a surprising amount of additional dark residue:




After the Rubber Prep, the tires were ready to apply the products.

To the Left Front tire, I applied 2 coats of GG Tire Rejuvenator with a paint brush. This is what it looked like after application. (By this time, it was dark outside and the picture was taken in the garage with a swirl finder light for illumination):



Here is another shot of the Left front tire, and you can see some streaked lines on portions of the tire:




To the Right Front tire, I applied 2 coats of Tuf Shine with a paint brush:




To the Right Rear tire, I applied 1 coat of GG Tire Rejuvenator. After drying, I topped it with 2 coats of Tuf Shine:




To the Left Rear tire, I applied 2 coats of GG Tire Rejuvenator. But the next day, I decided to top half of the tire with 1 coat of Tuf Shine to get a direct comparison. This is what the left rear tire looked like with 2 coats of GG and tape, prior to topping the GG with TS:




Here is a 50/50 shot of that tire, with 2 coats of GG on the left, and 2 coats of GG topped with 1 coat of TS on the right (daytime, without flash):




And another shot of the same tire. In this sideways shot taken in the garage during daytime with flash, the GG side is on the bottom of the picture, and the GG topped with TS is on the top:




My observations:
-Tuf Shine is a white, watery liquid that is easily applied with a paint brush.
-Griot's Garage Tire Rejuvenator is a thick, black gel. I have previously used the GG blue applicator sponge to apply it, but used a paint brush for the first time on this application. I think the applicator sponge is better with this gel for ease and speed of application, but a brush gives more precise control especially along the edge of the tire where it meets the wheel, as well as getting into all the ridges in the tire. But a brush takes more time with this product.

-Both products make the tire feel clean to the touch, leaving no dirty or greasy residue. Tuf Shine feels slicker, but GG Tire Rejuvenator feels more like natural, supple rubber.

-Tuf Shine is more glossy.
-GG Tire Rejuvenator has a matte to satin finish. On the GG tires, you can see some streaked lines. I think this is most likely due to either:
1) marring of the rubber while scrubbing it. My tire scrubbing brush has stiff bristles, and the strong scrubbing might have marred it; or,
2) I waited too long after the first coat before wiping off the high spots with a damp sponge and evening out the finish. On some of the photos, you can see some black residue on the edge of the wheels where I accidentally got some excess product during a previous application (probably over a year ago). This product can be tenacious if you leave it on to dry.

-As noted previously, Tuf Shine is a superficial clear coat, but does not appear to rejuvenate the underlying rubber. Even if it is only superficial, it does make the tire look nice and glossy, and is amazingly durable. GG Tire Rejuvenator restores the tire with a black dye that penetrates into the rubber.

-Tuf Shine sells for $24.99 for 6 oz. GG Tire Rejuvenator is $14.99 for 8 oz. The cost comparison would initially appear to favor GG, but I found that with Tuf Shine, less product is needed to coat the tire than with GG, which has to be applied quite liberally. Additionally, if the Tuf Shine is truly more durable, that might make the higher price of Tuf Shine worthwhile. Properly and thoroughly scrubbing tires with cleaner is a real pain. If I only have to do it maybe once a year rather than once every 3 months to keep my tires looking nice, I would probably pay more for the Tuf Shine.

I think both are excellent products. The Griot's Garage Tire Rejuvenator has always “wowed” me with its results. However, I do like the glossy look that Tuf Shine gives to the tire. Time will tell if the Tuf Shine applied on top of GG Tire Rejuvenator is able to maintain its bond to the tire, or if the base coat of Tire Rejuvenator prevented bonding of the Tuf Shine clear coat.

[Biff Webster]

Im not seeing any pics

[Chris@AutoCleanse]

Im not seeing any pics

+1

[Ray@Autogeek]

Im not seeing any pics

Fixed!

[HateSwirls]

Great review.

Thanks for taking the time to do so.

[rjd598]

Wait is the gg rejuvenator a coating or just another tire dressing? If it's just a dressing it was kind of pointless topping it with a coating. Like putting wax and then placing a coating over it.

[alfadub]

Wait is the gg rejuvenator a coating or just another tire dressing? If it's just a dressing it was kind of pointless topping it with a coating. Like putting wax and then placing a coating over it.

I wouldn't call GG Tire Rejuvenator "just another tire dressing," as I might categorize Armor All. It contains a dye that restores the black color to rubber, and the tire feels very clean after application of the Tire Rejuvenator. It changes the look and feel of the rubber for months, but it has never claimed to be a coating as Tuf Shine is.

I am not an insider with Tuf Shine or Griot's Garage, so I don't have inside knowledge of the chemical composition of either of these products. I am not a chemist either, so even if I did have insider knowledge of the composition, I don't have the expertise to know for a fact whether the Tire Rejuvenator would prevent bonding of the coating.

I think it's reasonable to have some doubts about whether Tuf Shine will be able to bond to rubber with Tire Rejuvenator already on the tire. I share those doubts. However, without knowledge of:
-the chemical composition of these products, and
-expertise regarding the chemistry of those substances,
any claims at this point about the results of topping Tuf Shine over Tire Rejuvenator are speculation. It is possible that as time goes by, the Tuf Shine on top of the Tire Rejuvenator may flake off, and only at that time can we say that it was pointless to do this.

Either way, I thought it would be an interesting experiment. The worse thing that can happen is that I wasted my time doing it.

[rjd598]

I wouldn't call GG Tire Rejuvenator "just another tire dressing," as I might categorize Armor All. It contains a dye that restores the black color to rubber, and the tire feels very clean after application of the Tire Rejuvenator. It changes the look and feel of the rubber for months, but it has never claimed to be a coating as Tuf Shine is.

I am not an insider with Tuf Shine or Griot's Garage, so I don't have inside knowledge of the chemical composition of either of these products. I am not a chemist either, so even if I did have insider knowledge of the composition, I don't have the expertise to know for a fact whether the Tire Rejuvenator would prevent bonding of the coating.

I think it's reasonable to have some doubts about whether Tuf Shine will be able to bond to rubber with Tire Rejuvenator already on the tire. I share those doubts. However, without knowledge of:
-the chemical composition of these products, and
-expertise regarding the chemistry of those substances,
any claims at this point about the results of topping Tuf Shine over Tire Rejuvenator are speculation. It is possible that as time goes by, the Tuf Shine on top of the Tire Rejuvenator may flake off, and only at that time can we say that it was pointless to do this.

Either way, I thought it would be an interesting experiment. The worse thing that can happen is that I wasted my time doing it.

hope you didn't take it the wrong way, your time and review are appreciated. it just seems like common sense to have tuf on the bare surface as that is how it is intended to be applied. i'm sure you'll still get great results

[alfadub]

hope you didn't take it the wrong way, your time and review are appreciated. it just seems like common sense to have tuf on the bare surface as that is how it is intended to be applied. i'm sure you'll still get great results

No problem.

I think most 'geeks would naturally think that applying Tuf Shine on bare, clean rubber would give the best result. But sometimes when someone thinks outside the box to try an off-label method or use for a product, they get a result that you might not expect. The only way to really know is to try it.

I see at least 3 possible outcomes for the tire(s) having Tuf Shine topped over Tire Rejuvenator, ranked in order of least-desirable to most-desirable:

1. The base coat of Tire Rejuvenator applied prior to Tuf Shine interferes with the bonding of Tuf Shine. Not only that, but the application of Tuf Shine on Tire Rejuvenator degrades or interacts with Tire Rejuvenator in a way that decreases the longevity of not only the top layer, but the bottom layer as well.

2. The base coat of Tire Rejuvenator applied prior to Tuf Shine interferes with the bonding of Tuf Shine. The top layer of Tuf Shine essentially becomes a sacrificial barrier, protecting the bottom layer of Tire Rejuvenator from the elements. Having a sacrificial top layer increases the longevity of the bottom layer of Tire Rejuvenator.

3. The base coat of Tire Rejuvenator increases the bonding of Tuf Shine on top.


I think that #3 is highly unlikely. I am guessing that #2 is the most likely outcome. The question is, how long Tuf Shine will last being topped over Tire Rejuvenator. That could be days to months. If I were to speculate, I'd say it lasts at least a few weeks.

[Jimbo187]

awesome review. thanks for taking the time to capture it all.