Best way to clay a black car without causing marring?

idriveblackcars

idriveblackcars

In time out
Joined
May 10, 2016
Messages
745
Reaction score
0
Hello all, just wanted to get some feedback and advice. Going to give my daily its first hand wash and decontamination of the year. Car is black,paint is swirl free.

I don't want nor plan on any polishing this year, car simply doesn't need it. But I do want to give it some kind of clay treatment before I throw a sealant on her.

I own nanoskin pads as well as classic clay bars. Every time I clay my car it always causes slight marring which I never did mind because I would follow with a polishing. This year just don't feel like it.

I plan on using my fine grade nanoskin with a DA, unless you guys think I could buy a product even less abrasive that would cause zero marring? Thanks..

5dee19048b3495ee3883bcad63f9183b.jpg
 
I suggest maybe iron x and tar X or something alone those lines instead of clay, give it a good chemical decontamination unless there's over spray and what not. Try thst first and then see if your car even needs clay after.
 
In my opinion If you use the nanoskin pad you will see marring on a black car.
I think the only way to have even a small chance of not marring the paint is to go with a fine clay bar
like pinnacle. I have had a lot of black cars and using nanoskin has always marred the black paint.
I am not saying it dont mar other colors. you just dont see it like black
 
Thanks for the replies..I figured it would cause marring. Maybe I will try a light clay bar. Or a really good chemical bath. It doesn't need any polishing but has been through plenty snow and salt. I'm in New England.

It really could use clay.
 
Safest bet is to Iron-X before (or after, your preference) washing, then use an ultra-fine clay bar with plenty of lubricant. I always find that if the clay bar is cold I get marring, make sure the ambient temp is warm when you are doing this.

The only downside to ultra fine clay is it is much harder to remove the contaminants.
 
The only way to clay a black car is don't clay and wait until your ready to polish.
 
Rsurfer said:
The only way to clay a black car is don't clay and wait until your ready to polish.
Click to expand...

Yeah that's always been my experience with my own personal cars. No matter how hard I try not to I always end up with some marring.
 
Maybe instead of a clay treatment, how about a simple once over polish by hand.
I know you said no polishing, but a hand polish application can take the same amount of time as to clay by hand, and get as good and better results.
 
I agree with Rsurfer, but if you're dead set on claying it, I'd recommend using an iron remover first as others have suggested and proceed to clay/Nanoskin by hand. Also instead of regular lube, I would use some spray wax and very light pressure. May take a lil longer but I have done a few vehicles this way and had very minor to no marring.
 
fly07sti said:
I agree with Rsurfer, but if you're dead set on claying it, I'd recommend using an iron remover first as others have suggested and proceed to clay/Nanoskin by hand. Also instead of regular lube, I would use some spray wax and very light pressure. May take a lil longer but I have done a few vehicles this way and had very minor to no marring.
Click to expand...

Thanks I may take a route like this.
 
I just did a Suburu, which I was polishing but because of the soft paint and the fact it is new I wanted as little marring as possible. I used my Nanoskin mitt with Glide and didn't get any marring. The VW should have hard paint, I don't know if I would try the pad with a DA though. The main thing is to use Glide. I used to never use the Nanoskin or clay unless I was polishing until I started using Glide.
 
DaveT435 said:
I just did a Suburu, which I was polishing but because of the soft paint and the fact it is new I wanted as little marring as possible. I used my Nanoskin mitt with Glide and didn't get any marring. The VW should have hard paint, I don't know if I would try the pad with a DA though. The main thing is to use Glide. I used to never use the Nanoskin or clay unless I was polishing until I started using Glide.
Click to expand...

Thanks man, I still have a fulll bottle of undiluted glide I didn't use from last year. I may try the pad on my roof at speed 1 on my PC. See how that looks. Basically I'm trying to avoid spending more money. I still have a ton of stuff from last year I never used.
 
I clayed a new black Toyota Sienna the other day. If I was very careful using lots of lube and no pressure I did not get a noticeable marring. As I got further into it I think I got less cautious and did get some marring. Mostly where I worked it more like on the side mirrors because of bug guts. It only took 2-3 passes with my clay mitt to get it where I wanted on the rest of this new car so it wasn't too bad.

I think using the disk by machine would be overkill for your situation.

Doing by hand should definitely reduce the risk of marring. If you don't have a clay mitt, towel, or block, you can use the disks by hand but it might be hard to hold without one of their handy holders.

Nanoskin Hand Strap Applicator - 5 inch

But maybe you could improvise by just using your backing plate off of the machine, then hit the tighter areas with traditional clay.

Again, lots o lube and the least amount of pressure you can apply. Just glide it.

Oh, and clean the clay surface frequently.
 
I've never had a problem using nano sponges on my car. Any very light marring that may occur is easily removed with something like Essence or Menzerna 3500. IMO it's good to hit your car with a light polish like those in the spring to remove any road grime and to help freshen the shine.
 
pdqgp said:
I've never had a problem using nano sponges on my car. Any very light marring that may occur is easily removed with something like Essence or Menzerna 3500. IMO it's good to hit your car with a light polish like those in the spring to remove any road grime and to help freshen the shine.
Click to expand...

That's a great process once or twice a year.

Clay and a light polish, or AIO.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top