Preserving fresh paint (and LA recommendations)

[ATB88]

My car now has a fresh respray on most of it, and has had paint correction on the panels that weren't resprayed. It looks great, and I want to keep it that way, which means changing the way I approach cleaning and protecting my car.

There's obviously a ton of information out there, and I'm doing a lot of reading.

I'm considering a ceramic coating, but I feel like it'll take me at least a couple of months to learn enough to make an educated choice, find an installer, etc.

In the meantime, it seems like taking my fresh car to a pro that can apply a good wax/sealant without messing up the paint, which can last until I figure out my long term solution/strategy, is my best bet? If so, any specific recommendations on this? Any recommendations on places to have my car cleaned/waxed in/around NELA?

My long term goal is to wash my car ~once per month and not have to do anything crazy to keep the paint in good shape. Is ceramic coating what I should be looking at? I've heard wildly varying suggestions of how much a ceramic coating should cost to apply, ranging from a few hundred to $3k. I know that often a lot of the cost comes from prep and paint correction before applying the coating. Given that my paint is fresh and correct, how much should I expect to have a good professional apply a durable coating (and any recommendations in the LA area)? Would anyone steer me away from ceramic coating and just opt for regular waxing as a cheaper alternative?

Open to anyone's advice on getting into this kind of stuff. Honestly seems kind of overwhelming at the start.

Thanks!!

[Tbonem3]

I'll give my advice, but there are always differing opinions. I think most of the differences of opinion come done to circusmtances, often local climate and car being garaged versus street parked daily.

I don't beleive there's any extra step you need to take with newer paint versus 10-20 year old paint. The only thing would be that this would be the time to PPF, even partial (front nose).

For detailing, you can keep it pretty simple or you can go down the rabbit hole and spend thousands on deionized water/pressure/fancy tool/products. I shoot for a middle ground. I have good water pressure, and I don't wash the car in the sun, so I don't mind hard water (water spots) and don't see the need for a pressure washer. I spend my money on premium products like korean made towels, carpro reset, gyeon pure/cure, griot's fall out remover etc.

For what touches the car, ideally, you'd only use 70/30 split (polyester versus nylon [polyamide]) micro fiber - that would be wash mitt, drying towel, and detailing towel. This will help mitigate light swirl marks, esp on dark paint. You can get away with the less soft 80/20 split MF on a light colored car where the light swirls don't show. These aren't swirls that will pose any issue or be cause for a deep cutting paint correction - they're purely an annoyance visually, if you're the type of person to be so bothered by them (I am). Another note about towels, you want to stick to short nap terry or pearl weave. The plush, long nap is only good for washing the car (where it can grab and "hide" dirt). For drying or applying sealant/spray, they'll just lint and be a headache.

We're at a point where old school wax is bascially obsolete. You can get the same look out of newer products now, with much longer durability and ease of install. Ceramic coatings are now very easy to apply, with plenty of time to remove, and fairly easy to avoid high spots. products like Gyeon Pure give you about 10 minutes before needing to level. Gyeon mohs will start to "sweat" beads after a bit to indicate time to level. Some coatings give a more "new scool" sharp, "HD" look, but them some give a more old-school "candy" gloss that's more wax like (but even deeper, glossier, "wetter").

A true coating allows you to touch the car much less which in turn buys you more time before you'd need to polish the paint again (and apply new sealant). That's because a coated surface is so hydrophobic and chemically resistant, it stays cleaner longer (easier to wash, less scrubbing) and you can blow dry and remove 99% of the water without even touching the car. Then you just go around and "dab" any left over water drops with a soft 70/30 towel. A coated car does require a little more maintance, which means applying iron remover spray every so often to keep the coating from getting too plugged up. You'll know when because the surface won't shed and bead water as well. Coatings rarely come off that quickly - it's more a case of it getting contaminated and no longer doing its job.

There are a couple of ways to look at the coating versus wax/sealant argument. For me, the first questions are - what color is the car and how anal are you about fine swirls. If you don't mind too much, or the car is alpine or tiag, for example, then you can "touch" the car more which means you can apply wax/sealant after every wash, you can use a drying towel (since you likely won't be able to blow dry it as well). If the swirls did get to a point of bothering you, you could do a light polish to restore the perfect finish, then cheaply and easily apply a new layer of wax/sealnt. If you have a coating, a polish would remove the coating and you'd spend more money and time applying a new one. The idea with the coating is that it will allow you to not touch the car so as not have the need to polish it again for like 24 months or whatever time period the coating allows for.

I don't buy much into the whole "sio2 booster" sprays. If you apply a quality coating to fresh, bare paint, you're done for 12, 24, 36, 60 months whatever. as tempting as it is, adding sprays on top of a coating will not help, and likely hurt. No $20-40 16oz liquid product is going to have better properties than the $100 coating you already laid down.

As far as cost, coatings have gotten much cheaper. My favorite, Gyeon Pure, is $65 (or $85 for 2 cars). Let's say your spray wax of choice is only $12 at walmart! But if you apply it every week or two, you might need 4 bottles in a year. Well, 4 x $12 is $48 x 2 is $96 (2 years becasue gyeon pure lasts 2 years). Cost is about the same. Maybe applying the coating uses up a bunch of towels, but then you won't need many towels to maintain the car. A wax or sealant only needed 1 or 2 towels to apply, but then you need more towels to apply more and dry the car every wash. I think it all comes out to be the same in the end more or less.

I would strongly urge you to DIY. You don't need a correction now, so you could use a panel wipe and apply a new coating yourself for less than $100. Then in 2, 3 years you could pay for a single step correction to clean the paint up, and then again do you own coating for $100. The single step correction would run only like $700-800 or so. Doing a light polish is easy and safe - you could grab a $50 polisher from harbor frieght or whatever and DIY. The potential damage to the paint comes in when you're using compound and MF or wool pads on forced rotation, not a light polish with soft foam pads on a d/a tool.

[ATB88]

I'll give my advice, but there are always differing opinions. I think most of the differences of opinion come done to circusmtances, often local climate and car being garaged versus street parked daily.

I don't beleive there's any extra step you need to take with newer paint versus 10-20 year old paint. The only thing would be that this would be the time to PPF, even partial (front nose).

For detailing, you can keep it pretty simple or you can go down the rabbit hole and spend thousands on deionized water/pressure/fancy tool/products. I shoot for a middle ground. I have good water pressure, and I don't wash the car in the sun, so I don't mind hard water (water spots) and don't see the need for a pressure washer. I spend my money on premium products like korean made towels, carpro reset, gyeon pure/cure, griot's fall out remover etc.

For what touches the car, ideally, you'd only use 70/30 split (polyester versus nylon [polyamide]) micro fiber - that would be wash mitt, drying towel, and detailing towel. This will help mitigate light swirl marks, esp on dark paint. You can get away with the less soft 80/20 split MF on a light colored car where the light swirls don't show. These aren't swirls that will pose any issue or be cause for a deep cutting paint correction - they're purely an annoyance visually, if you're the type of person to be so bothered by them (I am). Another note about towels, you want to stick to short nap terry or pearl weave. The plush, long nap is only good for washing the car (where it can grab and "hide" dirt). For drying or applying sealant/spray, they'll just lint and be a headache.

We're at a point where old school wax is bascially obsolete. You can get the same look out of newer products now, with much longer durability and ease of install. Ceramic coatings are now very easy to apply, with plenty of time to remove, and fairly easy to avoid high spots. products like Gyeon Pure give you about 10 minutes before needing to level. Gyeon mohs will start to "sweat" beads after a bit to indicate time to level. Some coatings give a more "new scool" sharp, "HD" look, but them some give a more old-school "candy" gloss that's more wax like (but even deeper, glossier, "wetter").

A true coating allows you to touch the car much less which in turn buys you more time before you'd need to polish the paint again (and apply new sealant). That's because a coated surface is so hydrophobic and chemically resistant, it stays cleaner longer (easier to wash, less scrubbing) and you can blow dry and remove 99% of the water without even touching the car. Then you just go around and "dab" any left over water drops with a soft 70/30 towel. A coated car does require a little more maintance, which means applying iron remover spray every so often to keep the coating from getting too plugged up. You'll know when because the surface won't shed and bead water as well. Coatings rarely come off that quickly - it's more a case of it getting contaminated and no longer doing its job.

There are a couple of ways to look at the coating versus wax/sealant argument. For me, the first questions are - what color is the car and how anal are you about fine swirls. If you don't mind too much, or the car is alpine or tiag, for example, then you can "touch" the car more which means you can apply wax/sealant after every wash, you can use a drying towel (since you likely won't be able to blow dry it as well). If the swirls did get to a point of bothering you, you could do a light polish to restore the perfect finish, then cheaply and easily apply a new layer of wax/sealnt. If you have a coating, a polish would remove the coating and you'd spend more money and time applying a new one. The idea with the coating is that it will allow you to not touch the car so as not have the need to polish it again for like 24 months or whatever time period the coating allows for.

I don't buy much into the whole "sio2 booster" sprays. If you apply a quality coating to fresh, bare paint, you're done for 12, 24, 36, 60 months whatever. as tempting as it is, adding sprays on top of a coating will not help, and likely hurt. No $20-40 16oz liquid product is going to have better properties than the $100 coating you already laid down.

As far as cost, coatings have gotten much cheaper. My favorite, Gyeon Pure, is $65 (or $85 for 2 cars). Let's say your spray wax of choice is only $12 at walmart! But if you apply it every week or two, you might need 4 bottles in a year. Well, 4 x $12 is $48 x 2 is $96 (2 years becasue gyeon pure lasts 2 years). Cost is about the same. Maybe applying the coating uses up a bunch of towels, but then you won't need many towels to maintain the car. A wax or sealant only needed 1 or 2 towels to apply, but then you need more towels to apply more and dry the car every wash. I think it all comes out to be the same in the end more or less.

I would strongly urge you to DIY. You don't need a correction now, so you could use a panel wipe and apply a new coating yourself for less than $100. Then in 2, 3 years you could pay for a single step correction to clean the paint up, and then again do you own coating for $100. The single step correction would run only like $700-800 or so. Doing a light polish is easy and safe - you could grab a $50 polisher from harbor freight or whatever and DIY. The potential damage to the paint comes in when you're using compound and MF or wool pads on forced rotation, not a light polish with soft foam pads on a d/a tool.

This was super helpful. Thanks, Tyler. I definitely don't want to jump down the full rabbit hole and want to keep it on the simple side, otherwise I'm just going to hate thinking about my car. The idea of being able to apply something like Gyeon Pure myself and having that last 2 years is pretty appealing. Car is carbon black and I don't have a garage, so, definitely prone to becoming swirl city. And if I don't end up paying for professional coating installation, that definitely frees me up to the idea of PPFing the front bumper and maybe hood?

[Tbonem3]

Ya, I feel your pain with the dark dark blue basically black paint. Even with the softest towels and best methods, I still, now 6 months later, have some very light swirls in my paint.

Something that I used to scoff at, but could actually good for dark cars is glaze - it's a wax or sealant that also fills in scratches just a little.

I suggested PPF because it's fresh paint, but due to cost, I wouldn't do more than the front half of the hood/fenders. For a $160k M5cs, sure, PPF the whole thing.

Fortunately or unfortuantely, I don't think you're going to be able to avoid light swirls no matter whether you chose a coating or a sealant/spray/wax. It takes tremendous effort to avoid swirls on a black car. It's barely worth it, and it's put a damper on my enthusiasm to maintain my black car to 99% standards. Luckily the swirls only show in the right light, and never in photos.

The main thing about protecting the paint is mostly making sure it always has some protection on it. You could simply use one of those car wash soaps that has wax or sio2 sealant in it, and never actually wax the car.

It's very difficult to say what the right answer is. It will depend on the vehicle, its life, and the owner's level of patience/heart/money/time.

A middle ground could be using the high siclica content sprays like Gyeon Cure, Carpro reload/elixir/ech20, Shine supply clutch, Gtechniq C2V3. The easy of application of a wax/sealant/detail spray, but longeivity more like a coating (6m-12m). They're, naturally, in the middle range price-wise, but with enough shelf life to be applied over a year or more. Something just a tick better, but almost the price of a coating, would be Gyeon Cancoat. Probably the best all around product out there.

[ATB88]

Just picked up the car from the shop and, of course, it's filthy because I couldn't pick it up when it was ready last week, and it sat outside (my fault not theirs). Does anyone have strong opinions on how long after painting one should wait before washing? I've read some places insist on 4 weeks, some say 1-2 weeks, and the shop that did the paint work said it actually doesn't matter and I can wash it today (they did say I need to wait a month before doing ceramic coating or PPF though).

Would love to wash it today and enjoy the fresh paint, but is this a bad idea?

[jet_dogg]

There are a lot of mistakes a novice like yourself could make without having any knowledge of how to coat a car. You'll have to wash the car, do a thorough panel prep wipe and then follow the coating directions to the letter to avoid polish-only correctable mistakes. All this sounds easy enough but it's all in the details and you may very well innocently mar up the entire car using the wrong product or technique. If you took your car to a professional he will not coat it without doing a mild correction even though it's already been done. They make their money on the correction and overcharging for the coating they're applying.

The most important thing to note is to learn how to wash your car properly. The more you touch the paint, the higher the likelihood of introducing swirls and so the methodology is to remove as much dirt as possible before touching the paint. This involves additional steps like rinsing well initially, foaming, and rinsing again before the contact wash. By the time you touch the car it should be rid of 90% of the grime leaving only film behind. Having owned only black cars, I know exactly what causes swirls and how to best avoid them. A pressure washer has been one of the best tools for mitigating the touching aspect. Your choice of mitts, towels and chemicals will also dictate your success rate.

For a car parked outside I would definitely do a high level coating. Again, all of the means nothing if you're just negating all the steps you took to protect the car by not knowing how to wash it.

[Maxima SE]

To protect your car from the elements all you need is a spray bottle of meguiars hybrid ceramic wax. It’s beyond stupid how easily and quick it can be applied and there is no chance to mess it up. You could apply a layer of wax in literally 5 minutes. It’s so easy and fast that you never have to even think twice about your protective layer wearing off over time like you would with many other more time consuming product's. You just keep building it up layer by layer and it’s always there because it’s so stupid easy to apply. Seriously just watch a couple YouTube videos on how easy it is to apply. Spray it on a wet car, rub it in with a MF towel and rinse it off. Bam bam all done and good to go. It is my go to product and you couldn’t convince me to switch to anything else, whether ceramic or sealant etc.

go buy one now and a pack of quality towels. You’ll thank me later.