Mike is on the button about perception.
As someone who manufactures/designs this sort of product, I probably have a better grounding to comment than most. What i will tell you is that EVERYONE wants beading. I might be selling products to a non specialist brand or it could be to a niche detailing brand, but they always want strong beading with their wax/sealants.
In reality, beading leads to water spots. In a perfect world, I would like a sealant which is totally the opposite and sheets water (note that means that water sticks to the surface and is NOT the same as when detailers talk about sheeting - this is actually just the same as beading, but it does so slightly differently). This would mean that any minerals within the water will be spread uniformly over the vehicle. It also means that the paint is easier to clean. Cleaning 101 will tell you that the key goal is to wet out your soiling. If you have strongly water repellent paint, it is darned difficult to wet! Hydrophobic surfaces are extremely difficult to clean without abrasion or specialised wetting agents. In fact, if you look at a lot of people with shampoo and mitts, you will see that their bubbly shampoo solution breaks up on their sealant, it fails to wet properly (this is a fault of the shampoo and the brand failing to recognise this clear indicator of a short coming). Hydrophobic surfaces will, however, be more inclined to stay clean in the first place. It is swings and round abouts - hydrophobic is hard to get dirty but hard to get clean when it is, hydrophillic is more inclined to get dirty (but uniformly so you might not realise) but decidedly easier to fix when it does.
Unfortunately, as Megs somewhat demonstrated, even the niche markets are unaware or unwilling to accept these realities. As a product designer, I wouldn't waste my time on such a project, even though I know that the performance would be good.
Another thing that should be considered is what actually constitutes protection? The peak of demonstrations of protection are when some idiot throws a lighter or a set of keys and says "wow, it didn't scratch". This is the sort of lovely demo which tells you nothing beyond the level of scientific knowledge or the demonstrator! So what is protection really?
Another question, those products which start beading and get less so but claim still to be protecting - how are they protecting? Why has the beading gone and how does it not mean that their product has now degraded? Are they being honest that it is still there at all!?
As someone who manufactures/designs this sort of product, I probably have a better grounding to comment than most. What i will tell you is that EVERYONE wants beading. I might be selling products to a non specialist brand or it could be to a niche detailing brand, but they always want strong beading with their wax/sealants.
In reality, beading leads to water spots. In a perfect world, I would like a sealant which is totally the opposite and sheets water (note that means that water sticks to the surface and is NOT the same as when detailers talk about sheeting - this is actually just the same as beading, but it does so slightly differently). This would mean that any minerals within the water will be spread uniformly over the vehicle. It also means that the paint is easier to clean. Cleaning 101 will tell you that the key goal is to wet out your soiling. If you have strongly water repellent paint, it is darned difficult to wet! Hydrophobic surfaces are extremely difficult to clean without abrasion or specialised wetting agents. In fact, if you look at a lot of people with shampoo and mitts, you will see that their bubbly shampoo solution breaks up on their sealant, it fails to wet properly (this is a fault of the shampoo and the brand failing to recognise this clear indicator of a short coming). Hydrophobic surfaces will, however, be more inclined to stay clean in the first place. It is swings and round abouts - hydrophobic is hard to get dirty but hard to get clean when it is, hydrophillic is more inclined to get dirty (but uniformly so you might not realise) but decidedly easier to fix when it does.
Unfortunately, as Megs somewhat demonstrated, even the niche markets are unaware or unwilling to accept these realities. As a product designer, I wouldn't waste my time on such a project, even though I know that the performance would be good.
Another thing that should be considered is what actually constitutes protection? The peak of demonstrations of protection are when some idiot throws a lighter or a set of keys and says "wow, it didn't scratch". This is the sort of lovely demo which tells you nothing beyond the level of scientific knowledge or the demonstrator! So what is protection really?
Another question, those products which start beading and get less so but claim still to be protecting - how are they protecting? Why has the beading gone and how does it not mean that their product has now degraded? Are they being honest that it is still there at all!?
