Dummys Guide to Waxing a 7
 

First off this thread is for experienced cleaners only.

Wow one day and a half my car is done from being detailed buff job etc and shes back!...i thought it was a totally different 7. I was very surprised and excited about the cars new look. The deep red and glassy body stuck right out to me. Anyways to the bottom of the purpose of this thread. I was told to wax the car twice a month. Problem is I never waxed a car before. Please if someone can explain in steps very meticulouslyhow to perfectly wax a car. I want to be able to preserve this well done job and enjoy it. Thanks guys I WILL APPRECIATE THIS 2 MUCH

EXAMPLE:

1. Wash car with mild soap

2. Make sure dry and place in shade before begging wax process

Well ill tell you what I do before a car show.

1. Wash the car , make sure you get off all dirt ( I even do undercarriage)
2. Dry off immediatly (Prevent water spots )
3. Pick a spot to start waxing your car. I always start at driver side fender.
4. Apply a little bit of wax (Mothers, Maguires , Nu finish)
5. Use the circle pad that comes with the wax.. Swirl clock wise in a 1 foot radius , giving the paint a slight glaze.. Wait 30 seconds. Now with a clean cloth that does not leave lint , whipe off the glaze... Stand back and admire the shine. Now continue around the car doing the same thing... Just do 1 foot at a time.

Rule 1: DO NOT get wax on the window. It is a pain in the butt to get off.
Rule 2: Take your time , its not a race.
Rule 3: DONT press to hard , you do not want to wreck your paint.
Rule 4: Avoid rain , its happened to me before , it rained for 30 seconds and I had to re-due the whole damn thing.
Rule 5: DO NOT wear jeans , sometimes you will have to lean over the car just a bit , you do not want to run the risk of your buttons scrapping your paint . Wear sweat pants or track pants , or shorts.



And after you are done waxing it , Girls will want to put there bums on it because it is so nice looking.


http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y26...Picture061.jpg

i learned alot from this forum

what i do is

1: spray the car with water thoroughly to remove as much dirt as possible
2: use one bucket for the soap and another bucket to rinse the rag/mitt
3: do section at a same, rear first, then rinse mitt, middle of car, rinse mitt, front of car, rinse mitt
4: rinse car off thorougly
5: using a microfiber towel (it picks up water better than a 100%cotton towel), squeezing it at times, then rinsing it off in clean water.
6: allow the body to dry for about 15 minutes, as this is happening, i will clean the windows more thoroughly
7: apply favorite wax, in my case, mothers carnuba wax with a 100% cotton towel.
8: with another new 100% cotton towel, wipe down the car to get any left over wax residue..
9: look at the car shine like a mofo
10: say thank you and ask for a number to every girl that says, "nice car"..:D


i have a question, some people say dont wax your car soo often..i do my car about 3 times a month, maybe 4 max..is this bad?

also i been using zymol recently, but its a cleaner wax, is this a protectant wax as well? or should i use the mothers protectant wax after zymol?

any help would be appreciated..

rob

nope, that's not bad. in fact, that's nothing.

my friend used to own a 91 MR2 turbo. the previous owner told him that he used to do a full detailing on his car (interior cleaning, exterior wash+wax) once every other day.

he also mentioned that his neighbours thought he was crazy.

what's so bad about waxing too often anyways? as far as i could tell, that MR2 had the best paint i've ever seen on a daily driven and track raced 10 year old car i've seen in my entire life.

Thanks for the feedback guys, THE OFFICIAL DUMMY GUIDE TO WAXING A 7..all in my hands MUHAHAHA. I feel overly powerful and im ready to make every sexy female with a ONION in VA rub my paint job until the wax drips inbetween heerr....whhhooa okay thats enough. Thanks again RX7 owners are so smart because when we put our brain to use we help remove carbon build up within our brains.

^^^ Waxing to much just wears the paint down.... Basically everytime you wax it , your are scratching the paint... But I mean , its nothing you are really going to notice , I wax the car about once or twice a week ... and my neighbours are just as crazy as me , so it is all good.

As for waxing every other day , its not bad , just exspensive =P

I was told to wax twice a month and that will protect the car. If you are garaging your 7 like me I dont ever see the need to wax the car that much.

I had my 7 details after i bought it, and this is the steps we took to detailing it.

Wash car very well with dishwashing soap to strip the previous wax
spray water down on a certain panel ( hood )
use clyabar, to clean the paint of any dirt and to smooth everything out.
when using the claybar, you need to keep the surface wet
after i got done using the claybar on a panel, i would go over it with the carnuba wax
then i would buff out the carnuba wax and then move onto the next panel.
after all the panels have been done, i go back over it with some poorboys wax. ( http://www.superiorcarcare.net/poorboysworld.html )
we started off with a heavy wax to get rid of any scratches and what not, then after that we buffed that out
then we applied a lighter coat of wax, kinda like a sealer wax, so we did this to the whole car once again and then buffed it out as well..

the car shined like new after we got done, and it still shines very well everytime i wash it in the sun.

when we waxed it, we applied the wax with an electic buffer and then buffed off by hand. and for the diff kinds of wax we used, we used a diff buffing pad for each wax.

and thats what we did and i love it to death, and cant wait to use some more wax that my friend has that uses 3 coats of wax, but you have to wait 24hrs between coats.

thats 2 nutz

When it comes to our cars, nothing is 2 nutz. ;)

^^ I agree , we are completely normal =)

so has anyone used zymol?

do you know if its alright to use your prefered protectant wax after zymol since zymol is just a cleaner wax?

This in my opinion is the best way to go about waxing a car. I started using this methoid not long ago and have had amazing results.

-Wash car with Dawn to remove old wax and debris
-Dry with leaf blower (works wonders, but looks stupid)
-Claybar
-Wash with Mothers gold, zaino Z7
-Dry with leaf blower
- Zaino Z5
-Remove wax with microfiber towel
-Zaino Z6 with microfiber towel
- Zaino Z2
- Remove wax with microfiber towel
-Zaino Z6

I chose the porter cable 7424 dual action polisher to apply the wax. You can apply Z5 a couple times if you choose, the more you apply the more it shines :) This methoid worked wonders for me. If your car has heavy swirl marks then I would apply Meguiars Dual action cleaner polish before all the others.

ahhh yes.... it's great to be among fellow fanatics!!! :)

I thought I was pretty crazy about how much I take care of how my car looks, but it sounds like there are more of you out there! hehe... From the steps that most people have given here, it all sounds good. I, however, have never had the need to use Dawn or a claybar. My paint is still extremely glossy and smooth. The only other thing I can add to everybody's comments is to USE DETAIL SPRAY. You can use any kind you want, since we all have our own preferences. But I do so every other day, and also after waxing. I wax 1x a month usually. I don't usually "wash" the car per say, since I detail spray it often. It never sees rain, so it never gets actual dirt on the car, save for dust, which I brush off with a duster. I also detail spray the bugs off after a highway drive.

As far as Zymol goes (someone asked this earlier), I used to use Zymol quite often and have had great luck. I use something else now, which Zymol doesn't even come close to. But when I was using Zymol, I used to use it everytime I wax, and haven't seen any ill effects. With it being a cleaner wax, I would imagine it even helped smooth out the paint and eliminate the need for clay bar once in a while...

this should be a sticky

is your car garaged?

cause after like 2+ days, my car will develop a film of dust which i know is normal and using detail spray on that doesnt really sound good..i mean wont you just be pushing that dirt into the paint with the spray?

thats why i wash my car every week cause the wax actually prevents dust longer..i mean i can understand using detail spray after a couple of hours after the wash and wax to keep it perfect but after a couple of days? idk, can someone verify?

Sure thing... lemme clarify.

1) Yes, my car is garaged... as I said, it never sees rain, mud, track, etc... I use it as my "stress reliever". After a long day of work, I am off, running and gunning, and the on-ramps are my prey, and also windy roads (I have a few picked out that I frequent a lot).

2) As far as the dust scenario goes... yes, you have a good point. However, what I usually do is, use a duster (California duster is a good brand) to get the dust off first. THEN I detail spray. My detail spray actually is Production Car Care too, and it's a Showcar spray too, so it actually de-statics (I know THAT'S not a word :)) the car also, resulting in minimal dust. So what usually happens on a day that I feel like waxing, is a) dust off, b) detail spray, c) wax, d) detail spray again to "settle" the wax. Been doing this for years now...

See my VB garage for pics, and I also posted some threads before. Lemme dig up some pics and I can post em up.

p.s. I can't stress how important it is to take bugs off the bumper after a drive... IMMEDIATELY. Bugs are kindda like bird crap on your paint... they eventually eat away at the paint/clear coat. Especially on a warm sunny day. That's where detail spray is your friend again... 2 rags, one to apply, one to remove. Use MICROFIBER! :)

some pics
 

here are the pics I discussed in my previous reply above... enjoy

OK, detailing pros: now we know how to spend 20h/month detailing the car. But that's not my definition of 'best method'. I don't have that time, and the paint on my FD doesn't justify it.

How about a recommendation for a quick/easy method? How do you do your daily driver? What are some longer-lasting products that don't take much time to apply? Can any products last 6 months?

Dave

I'm not a pro but I've been doing a lot of research on detailing. There really is no quick way if you want really good results. Swirls are inevitable no matter how hard you try. The quickest way to apply polishes would be using a buffer rather than by hand. But it sounds like you don't want to spend any time at all.. the only option for you seems like you should wash your car/zaino Z6/liquid wax. I also use http://www.costco.com/Browse/Product...pnav=&cat=&s=1
every day in the morning, the duster picks up the dust great.

Naturally, if I spend less time less often I don't expect the same results. My question is what products will protect the paint and hold up the longest. I'm realistic in that 'once-a-year car polish' doesn't exist, but there has to be something that lasts longer than a week.

Actually I have a buffer, but it's an older style - not the orbital fancy type. I think it would work well, but I still have to apply by hand or else it gets all over everything. I might dig it out now that there are 4 vehicles in the household.

I also did a lot of research, and my results suggest that unless you have a showcar, all the detailers' information makes a mountain out of a molehill. I cannot find a detailer who will share how to keep 'normal' care of a car. You know, with bang-for-the-buck as the goal, with minimum hours per year waxing.

Dave

Dave... yeah, I know what you mean... for those folks who don't have all the time to take care of their car, they (you) want something that will last the longest, right? Before I start, I am sure you already know this, but you pretty much get out of it, what you put into it. Those folks who don't wax/wash as often, their cars will inevitably not be as pristine as those who do :) I'm pretty anal about my cars... so I make time to actually put in a lot of effort, and I really enjoy doing it, so to each his own.

But anyways, on to your question... as far as a good wax for an everyday car? (By the way, I take care of my daily just as much as my 7... I also attached a pic :) it's daily driven, through snow, rain, etc... It's 5 years old). I think in reality, ANY wax you pick holds up pretty good. The trick is to MAKE IT LAST. What usually makes wax not last as long, is driving in rain, and of course washing. Make sure that the wash you use, DOES NOT strip wax. A long time ago, I would wash my car, then suddenly, water wouldn't bead up anymore... I was like wtf. It was because the wash that I used stripped the wax :( So use a GOOD car wash (I recommend Production Car Care of course, but Zymol is good too) that doesn't strip wax... it should state it on the container. And use a non-abrasive method for drying. This sounds dumb, but sometimes I use a leaf blower to blow dry the car... kindda like an automatic carwash (I know someone here mentioned they did that too, so I am not alone! :)). Or use the Absorber brand for a towel... works pretty good.

So, in summary, for all you out there wanting to have a lasting shine but not be overly fanatical like me and some of us, use a good car wash (non wax stripping), a good wax, then use the Duster to take dust off (if it's not been rained on... if it did get rained on, don't use the duster... you'll have to wash it).

I hope I was able to help out...

by the way, I would like to add that the paint on my 7 (it's a '93) and my Integra are both original... healthy detailing really preserves the paint...

I remember I was at a gas station once and there was this salesmen walking up to all the people pumping gas with a liquid wax in a spray bottle he claimed was used on the Nascar racecars.. he sprayed some on a part of my car and wiped it off, this sounds like the kind of product your looking for, although I didn't believe his little story, liquid waxes are nice. I think Eagle one has a wax spray you use while drying your car...

Aren't spray waxes pretty much the same thing as a detail spray? Again... it may work, but in no way will the results ever come close to actually waxing a vehicle by hand using a paste or liquid wax...