Another "weekend" off, another selection of products to work through.
Continuing the Armour Detail Supply theme of recent weeks, today I sampled their Tire Cleaner.
The ADS Tire Cleaner was already out of stock at Detailing Shed when I placed my order. Needing to order something from AutoBuff, I added the RTU version to make up the shipping. This product comes in either a 473ml (16oz) RTU, or via a gallon of concentrate for dilution at the following ratios..............
Reading that, it seems this is a very potent product.
Because of its high alkalinity and chemical make up, the RTU version of ADS Tire Cleaner comes in a different bottle to the rest of the line, being a solid black plastic rather than the domed transparent bottle. You will notice similar with other high alkaline products across the industry, think Carpro Multi-X and Lift, or Adam's Wheel & Tire Cleaner. First off, I like how this product foams up a little when sprayed. It then lathers nicely and had no issue stripping the dressing from the Ranger, the Jag's Dunlop's put up a fight, but that's normal for this tyre.
Both the gallon of concentrate and RTU version are decent value, especially when considering a gallon could conceivably make up to 19-litres (5 gallon) of product at the 4:1 ratio, or about 11-litres (3 gallon) at 2:1. The same gallon quantity of Shine Supply Wise Guy would only make 7.6-litres (2 gallon) at the suggested 1:1 ratio. For further comparison, I would need to buy 5 gallon jugs of P&S Undressed to match quantity potential of the ADS product, which would work out to be $214.75 AUD compared to $112.95 AUD.
Moving along, I used ADS Hero to clean the rest of the Jag. I can safely say this is my favorite rinse-less wash now. It doesn't have the mixing quirks of Absolute, smells just as good and is even slicker under the towel as it passes across the paint. After the wash, I dried the car with the help of ADS Adapt.
After attending to the glass, door jambs, engine bay and interior, I turned my attention to the tyres. These Dunlop Sport Maxx RT tyres seem to hang onto dressings, generally resisting tradition cleaning treatments. As such, I will occasionally break out the sledgehammer to reset them. This task can be done with mineral spirits, but Tarminator does the job better without drying out the rubber too much.
Speaking of Tarminator, its gotten harder to find this in Australia. Car Care Products advised me they would not be restocking it, and Detailing Shed have no intentions of bringing it into the store. It can be ordered from Amazon at considerable markup. Which leads me back to the AutoBuff order, they being the only Australian retailer selling Tarminator. AutoBuff actually offered me a discount on three bottles with cracked caps, which saved me some cash.
I'm not sure how or why Tarminator excels as a tyre deep cleaner, but it does and the results speak for themselves. Never spray Tarminator onto the tyre, always into a throw-away towel. Rub the sidewall with firm pressure, reapplying more to the towel as needed. Allow to flash and the end result is a completely stripped sidewall.
This is why you use a throw-away towel..........................
Now that the tyres were bare, it was time to undo all that work by reapplying more dressing. :laughing: Today, I had a hankering for NV Onyx, a product that has been a favorite of mine from the moment I tried it many years ago. Applied with a brush, it spreads with such ease, accompanied by a delicious caramel scent. Onyx can be glossy but is best leveled down with a towel for a satin look.
It was then onto the Ranger, it being lent to a family member to move furniture last week. This gave me a chance to try another soap in the que, 3D Ultimate Wash.
Ultimate Wash is pH neutral and shares a similar thick-ish consistency to their Pink Car Soap. Unlike Pink, this Ultimate Wash produces much thicker foam and a subdued orange/mandarin scent. I also found it has decent slickness and rinsed freely. However, this is not a WOW product, while nice in several areas, it hardly excels at any of them. Not bad, but not great. I also hate the pop-top caps 3D uses, too much resistance to release the product, then spits back at you when the cap is pushed closed.
As always, the finishing touch to any detail, dressing the tyres. This time, I used my new Obsessed Garage Tire Dressing Applicator Brush.
The OG Tire Dressing Applicator brush is a collaboration between OG and Detail Factory. This takes the bristles from the Curveball, slims them down and melds with a longer handle that has a rubberized grip with the OG logo. On first impression, this brush follows Detail Factory form in that its extremely well made, superbly ergonomic and features lovely soft bristles. However, I did have reservations as to if this brush would function well for tyre dressing purposes. And that sort of proved correct...................
The bristles are just too long, meaning they splay out too much when working the sidewall. On larger profile rubber like my Ranger, this isn't really a problem. But on low profile tyres, you would need to work slowly and carefully to not smudge dressing onto the wheel. The way around that would be to squeeze the bristles tight, which would then cover your fingers with dressing. I started using a brush over foam applicators for tyre dressing because its cleaner and negates the need to wear gloves. Well, this brush contradicts that. For cleaning wheels or interiors, this brush would excel, but for tyres its quite ill-suited. A puzzling conclusion to an OG product.
