Panel wipe and sealant

[RippyD]

You do understand that naked paint will bead water very well, right? The presence of a wax or sealant is not needed for water to bead. All you need is a perfectly clean surface.

I will check WaxMode's chanel. Thanks for the tip.

I'm not checking beading, only sheeting. I haven't seen clean paint they way a sealant or coating will. The downside is that I'm likely saying these have failed too early. A lack of sheeting may not be a good measure of when a sealant stops working. But it's the one I can measure visually.

 

[Calendyr]

This is exactly the reason I'm doing this testing - there's a ton of opinion on this topic without any real evidence either way.

The Dupli-Color product you're using is 95% acetone, so I'd put it in the same category as the alcohol based cleaners. I'd guess the other 5% is water. This may be a 4th category of panel wipe main ingredients since it's a ketone rather than an alcohol (I don't recall the key differences between the two). It's miscible in water, unlike petroleum based solvents. I'll try acetone as well and see how it does.

Hoping to get testing done today. Missed Saturday, was too cold yesterday, snowing this morning. Will see how this afternoon looks.

Very interesting. i will have to check the price for both Acetone and G&WR. Might be much cheaper to mix Acetone with ONR and use that as a prep.

 

[ski2]

Wouldn't Acetone potentially damage trim/plastics???

 

[Calendyr]

Yes. Acetone can melt plastic. So you should not use it on trims or plastic parts.

 

[PaulMys]

Yes. Acetone can melt plastic. So you should not use it on trims or plastic parts.

Exactly. It wont melt all forms of plastic, but I would never want to find out which forms on my own vehicle.

 

[Mike@ShineStruck]

I coating prep o think would actually dissolve a sealant based paste wax(Autoglym HD or similar) would be Gtechnic panel prep

 

[RippyD]

Did some testing today. My camera lost some pics so not as well documented as I wanted.

I tried 3 other panel wipe products today. Recall that the front of the hood was N-914 at prep dilution (8:1). The other 3 are Gyeon Prep, Naptha, and Acetone.

The product to panel wipe matrix looks like this:

Before using any products I waterless washed and hit it with the hose. You can see the Aquawax is slowing downs some relative to the others. We had heavy rain over the last couple of days.

Here's how it looked after using the panel wipes. I decided to waterless wash after using the panel wipe products in in case any of the solvent-based ones left any residue behind. You can see that the Aquawax has slowed down considerably as of the others were acetone and naptha were used. These did clear, after a few more seconds, but are obviously slower. The PNS sections with alcohol and soap based wipes are doing well.

Dried, did a second panel wipe, waterless washed, and hit it with the hose. You can see the alcohol wiped areas are slowing down.

Third (dried, panel wipe, waterless):

Fourth (dried, panel wipe, waterless). You can see that the alcohol wiped areas are starting to slow down.

For the 5th one I decided I needed a control panel with no product to compare to, so I polished the PNS/Alcohol section (UP, prep polish, Gyeon prep). I also panel wipde the front section of the hood again to see if another pass with N-914 had any impact.

The alcohol, naptha, and acetone sections are shedding water no faster than the polished section. The N-914 areas with PNS and FK 1000 are still doing fine. The acetone and naptha sections slowed down considerably after 1 cleaning. The alcohol started slowing after 2, although PNS held up better than FK 1000 to alcohol wiping.

Panel wipe does appear to impact sealants pretty significantly. I would rate acetone as the fastest, then naptha, then alcohol. N-914 seems to have limited impact on a more durable sealant.

 

[DetailZeus]

[...] I decided to waterless wash after using the panel wipe products in in case any of the solvent-based ones left any residue behind. [...]

Panel wipe does appear to impact sealants pretty significantly. I would rate acetone as the fastest, then naptha, then alcohol. N-914 seems to have limited impact on a more durable sealant.

Personally I would expect a waterless wash to leave behind more residue than a solvent wipe. However thank you for doing this test, very informative!

 

[RippyD]

Personally I would expect a waterless wash to leave behind more residue than a solvent wipe. However thank you for doing this test, very informative!

My thinking was that anything left by the solvents would be oil based so the the soap would remove it and the water would remove the soap. My concern was any oil-based product left appearing to repel water. Not sure that makes sense, and I expect the naptha and acetone evaporate pretty completely anyway.

EDIT: Weather permitting I'll do another pass with the panel wipes today and then do a waterless wash on 50% of each of them to see if there's a visible difference.

 

[PiPUK]

I can't help but think about the possibility of "clogging"; are you sure the N-914 is removing the Aquawax, or is it simply bonding to it and "clogging" the beading/sheeting performance?

Remember we went through this a few years ago with Swanicyouth and PiPUK (what ever happened to him?) with Dawn and APC washing which seemed to remove sealants, only to do an IPA wipe which removed surfactant residues and restored the beading. Which opened up a whole can of worms about sealant bonding to "bare" surfaces if we weren't really getting bare surfaces to begin with.

I am still around, but not often!

It actually is great to see that this all stuck with you guys! One of the reasons I stopped posting so much was that these attempts to educate, on the UK forum scene, resulted in outright unpleasantness. Suffice it to say, many UK detailers are still stuck with the idea that dawn (or our equivalent - fairy) strips everything and leads to appreciable corrosion. Ho hum.

Anyhow, having done a bit of googling on N-914, I would say that there must be a risk of the same occurring. I cannot find a safety data sheet but the spiel clearly says it contains surfactants. They say that these are not substantive but that is relative. By their very nature, surfactants have two 'ends', one of these likes water and the other oils (which is how they work). Fundamentally a wax is rather like an oil, albeit longer chain and different properties. Surfactants will try to stick to them and the other end will be dangling up in the air - the water loving bit (!) - which will encourage water to stick and thus no beading. Sealants are typically just clever silicone based polymers which could easily be descibed as having oily characteristics and thus a surfactant can easily stick. This is the case for any surfactant. There are certain classes of surfactants which are specifically substantive and these give much more pronounced modifications and are based, mostly, on their electrical charge being opposite (and thus attracted) to the surface itself.

Summary - if you have a wax or sealant, a surfactant products will inevitably leave a degree of surfactant residue, unless you wash it off (and hence the previous tests where we did IPA wipes). In the absence of a thorough rinse, as per the use here, a surfactant residue is inevitable.

So I wouldn't both using this product for any sort of scientific testing, the results can immediately be questioned.

As discussed by others, you need a totally volatile product. IPA and alcohols are only going to do light oils. Mineral spirits or hydrocarbon panel wipes are the way and you should avoid water based panel wipes - these have a place but they aren't here.

Our experience is that we make automotive products (yes, we are one of the companies who actually formulates and manufacture). We would test hundreds of sealants and waxes during developments and thus need to strip them. Years of experience has led us to conclude that chemical methods don't work reliably. Lower quality products can sometimes be removed, old and tired applications can sometimes be removed but a fresh application of a good sealant is typically not coming off without multiple applications or extended contact time. In the UK we would have a lot of tar on our roads so tar removers are a norm. In contrast to the products you guys often get, these will often be white spirits and xylene based - really strong stuff. Certainly when against our sealants (and I mean traditional type, not nano/silica etc), you cannot be confident of removal. As such, when we are testing, we rely on an abrasive polish and a DA machine.

 

[fightnews]

The thing about polishing oils though is that they make the paint look better. The polishing oils in ultimate polish are the same as what's in miguiars show car glaze #7. I think that's the main reason why I would not remove them if using a sealant

 

[PiPUK]

The thing about polishing oils though is that they make the paint look better. The polishing oils in ultimate polish are the same as what's in miguiars show car glaze #7. I think that's the main reason why I would not remove them if using a sealant

The oils are filling. The trouble is that it is now tough to identify how sensitive a sealant is to the surface. Many products which are insensitive to a bit of contamination insist on total cleanliness. This then can lead to people being insufficiently careful when they should be.

 

[RippyD]

Years of experience has led us to conclude that chemical methods don't work reliably. Lower quality products can sometimes be removed, old and tired applications can sometimes be removed but a fresh application of a good sealant is typically not coming off without multiple applications or extended contact time. <snip> As such, when we are testing, we rely on an abrasive polish and a DA machine.

Thanks for the reply. I am seeing water sheeting impacted by panel wipes, but I have no way to know how much sealant remains. Appreciate the advice and sharing your professional experience with us.

Summary for me: A panel wipe is likely to impact sealant performance but is not the best way (or even an effective way) to remove them.

The oils are filling. The trouble is that it is now tough to identify how sensitive a sealant is to the surface. Many products which are insensitive to a bit of contamination insist on total cleanliness. This then can lead to people being insufficiently careful when they should be.

Another helpful reply. My takeaway from this is: most of us have no way to know when polishing oils will cause a problem with your sealant, so always remove them.

And unless I'm mistaken what PiPUK is telling us is completely consistent with Mike's position on this stuff.

 

[Themikerobe]

I am still around, but not often!

It actually is great to see that this all stuck with you guys! One of the reasons I stopped posting so much was that these attempts to educate, on the UK forum scene, resulted in outright unpleasantness. Suffice it to say, many UK detailers are still stuck with the idea that dawn (or our equivalent - fairy) strips everything and leads to appreciable corrosion. Ho hum.

Anyhow, having done a bit of googling on N-914, I would say that there must be a risk of the same occurring. I cannot find a safety data sheet but the spiel clearly says it contains surfactants. They say that these are not substantive but that is relative. By their very nature, surfactants have two 'ends', one of these likes water and the other oils (which is how they work). Fundamentally a wax is rather like an oil, albeit longer chain and different properties. Surfactants will try to stick to them and the other end will be dangling up in the air - the water loving bit (!) - which will encourage water to stick and thus no beading. Sealants are typically just clever silicone based polymers which could easily be descibed as having oily characteristics and thus a surfactant can easily stick. This is the case for any surfactant. There are certain classes of surfactants which are specifically substantive and these give much more pronounced modifications and are based, mostly, on their electrical charge being opposite (and thus attracted) to the surface itself.

Summary - if you have a wax or sealant, a surfactant products will inevitably leave a degree of surfactant residue, unless you wash it off (and hence the previous tests where we did IPA wipes). In the absence of a thorough rinse, as per the use here, a surfactant residue is inevitable.

So I wouldn't both using this product for any sort of scientific testing, the results can immediately be questioned.

As discussed by others, you need a totally volatile product. IPA and alcohols are only going to do light oils. Mineral spirits or hydrocarbon panel wipes are the way and you should avoid water based panel wipes - these have a place but they aren't here.

Our experience is that we make automotive products (yes, we are one of the companies who actually formulates and manufacture). We would test hundreds of sealants and waxes during developments and thus need to strip them. Years of experience has led us to conclude that chemical methods don't work reliably. Lower quality products can sometimes be removed, old and tired applications can sometimes be removed but a fresh application of a good sealant is typically not coming off without multiple applications or extended contact time. In the UK we would have a lot of tar on our roads so tar removers are a norm. In contrast to the products you guys often get, these will often be white spirits and xylene based - really strong stuff. Certainly when against our sealants (and I mean traditional type, not nano/silica etc), you cannot be confident of removal. As such, when we are testing, we rely on an abrasive polish and a DA machine.

Fascinating! Thanks for the informing and conclusive knowledge!

Sent from my FRD-L14 using Autogeekonline mobile app

 

[Tempest45]

PiPUK, thanks for posting such great information!

I'm not a chemist but have studied lubricants quite a bit. What you are saying about the behavior of surfactants makes perfect sense.

 

[RippyD]

One more test: I wanted to try and determine panel wipe products were leaving anything behind. It makes sense to me that alcohol and Acetone would live little behind, depending on the % concentration of the alcohol. I say this only because in my chemistry classes (many years ago) it was considering sufficient to use acetone to dry glassware. 99% alcohol could be used, but acetone was preferred. I have to believe it wasn't leaving much behind to cause issues with future experiments.

I waterless washed the hood (N-914 at 128:1). The tape lines are still clearly visible on the two right areas, not so much on the left. This tells me that sealant is still there. The Aquawax on the left is mostly gone based on the tape lines.

.

I then dried, reapplied tape, and panel wiped three sections in the same order as before (alcohol, naptha, and acetone). I then split the right test area in half and did a waterless wash (after the panel wipe).

The idea is that the right side of the vertical line was washed with soap after the panel wipe, the left side is just panel wipe. If the 3 panel wipes left anything behind, the soap would have removed it. Then I hit it with the hose.

So the areas with soap and shedding water much more slowly. Does this mean that the other 3 panel wipes left something behind that is repelling water, or that the soapy area is not repelling water? No way to know yet.

So then I washed the side with soap just using water and an MF towel. 4 sides of a folded towel and a lot of water.

They all look more similar now. This tells me that some soap was sticking to the paint, lowering water tension and preventing it from running off as quickly. The soap after a panel wipe is clearly leaving a little soap behind. The other panel wipes aren't do so in a way that can be seen with visually.

Does this mean you should only use non-soap products for a panel wipe? I don't think so. I don't know that any sealant would be impacted by a small amount of soap on the paint. However, I would recommend using a very light dilution soap to help remove a more concentrated one. If you use N-914 at 8:1, I would go over it with a 256:1 or more diluted mix to get some of the soap off the paint.

Just my opinion. Please feel free to correct or challenge my thinking on this.

Edit: You could ask what this means for the sealant tests I'm doing since I'm always washing first. The answer is that I don't know yet. I'm typically washing with N-914 at 256:1 and rinsing. I need to do more testing to see if this has been a problem.

 

[mwoywod]

One more test: I wanted to try and determine panel wipe products were leaving anything behind. It makes sense to me that alcohol and Acetone would live little behind, depending on the % concentration of the alcohol. I say this only because in my chemistry classes (many years ago) it was considering sufficient to use acetone to dry glassware. 99% alcohol could be used, but acetone was preferred. I have to believe it wasn't leaving much behind to cause issues with future experiments.

I waterless washed the hood (N-914 at 128:1). The tape lines are still clearly visible on the two right areas, not so much on the left. This tells me that sealant is still there. The Aquawax on the left is mostly gone based on the tape lines.

.

I then dried, reapplied tape, and panel wiped three sections in the same order as before (alcohol, naptha, and acetone). I then split the right test area in half and did a waterless wash (after the panel wipe).

The idea is that the right side of the vertical line was washed with soap after the panel wipe, the left side is just panel wipe. If the 3 panel wipes left anything behind, the soap would have removed it. Then I hit it with the hose.

So the areas with soap and shedding water much more slowly. Does this mean that the other 3 panel wipes left something behind that is repelling water, or that the soapy area is not repelling water? No way to know yet.

So then I washed the side with soap just using water and an MF towel. 4 sides of a folded towel and a lot of water.

They all look more similar now. This tells me that some soap was sticking to the paint, lowering water tension and preventing it from running off as quickly. The soap after a panel wipe is clearly leaving a little soap behind. The other panel wipes aren't do so in a way that can be seen with visually.

Does this mean you should only use non-soap products for a panel wipe? I don't think so. I don't know that any sealant would be impacted by a small amount of soap on the paint. However, I would recommend using a very light dilution soap to help remove a more concentrated one. If you use N-914 at 8:1, I would go over it with a 256:1 or more diluted mix to get some of the soap off the paint.

Just my opinion. Please feel free to correct or challenge my thinking on this.

Edit: You could ask what this means for the sealant tests I'm doing since I'm always washing first. The answer is that I don't know yet. I'm typically washing with N-914 at 256:1 and rinsing. I need to do more testing to see if this has been a problem.

RippyD, I'm really enjoying all of your testing. You are certainly asking all the right questions. Thanks for sharing man!

 

[Desertnate]

Our experience is that we make automotive products (yes, we are one of the companies who actually formulates and manufacture). We would test hundreds of sealants and waxes during developments and thus need to strip them. Years of experience has led us to conclude that chemical methods don't work reliably. Lower quality products can sometimes be removed, old and tired applications can sometimes be removed but a fresh application of a good sealant is typically not coming off without multiple applications or extended contact time. In the UK we would have a lot of tar on our roads so tar removers are a norm. In contrast to the products you guys often get, these will often be white spirits and xylene based - really strong stuff. Certainly when against our sealants (and I mean traditional type, not nano/silica etc), you cannot be confident of removal. As such, when we are testing, we rely on an abrasive polish and a DA machine.

I don't want to derail the conversation, but I'm curious. Does your company produce finished products, i.e. stuff going into bottles for sale, or are you lower on the supply chain and produce base components which are sold to other companies combine for the final products? Your insight has always a great read over the years, but I'm always interested in the background and perspective of the author and how that shapes what they write.

 

[RippyD]

Getting ready to apply more sealant to the Rover hood and decide to do another panel wipe test. Polished the hood with Mens 3800 and LC thinpro white pad. At least two passes everywhere. (Washed, clayed, then polished.)

Used Gyeon prep on the entire hood and waited a couple of hours. Then hosed off any dust and dried. (I didn't want to introduce any soap.) Then I used acetone on the left 1/3 of the hood. So right 2/3 Gyeon prep panel wipe, left 1/3 Acetone after Gyeon prep.

Water was flying off the left side. It was moving off the right side, but slowly. Very slowly in comparison. So did the acetone leave something behind that repels water, or did it remove something that lowers water surface tension? Not sure.

Pressure washed the whole hood.

Both sides slowed down a little bit, but the left side was still sheeting water much faster. Pressure washed again, and this time spent more time on the left 1/3. 2-3x more time. The right 2/3 slowed down a little more, the left 1/3 a lot. It was still faster. Pressure washed again and saw no change. Both are moving water slowly, but the left was at least 2x faster. Hard to tell from this pic, so you'll have to trust me.

So what does this mean? I'm hoping somebody smarter and more experienced will tell us. Here's my guess: the acetone certainly left something behind. I can't think of any other explanation for it sheeting water so quickly and then slowing down with a lot of pressure washing. I also think that Gyeon either left some soap behind or didn't get all the polishing oils off. My guess is oils, because sheeting slowed down after I pressure washed it. Confusing, right?

It's certainly possible that the acetone removed some oils and left something behind. My guess is that there's something left in the paint that will slowly evaporate over time or will take soap to remove. I probably should have given it 30 mins or so before pressure washing. It probably had 5-10 mins.

If anybody has other ideas please(!!) share them. Will try to get some soap testing done this evening or tomorrow to see how different concentrations impact water sheeting and how pressure washing helps (or doesn't).

 

[RippyD]

Summary: I didn't see any any difference in water sheeting due to soap residue using N-914 at concentrations ranging from 50:1 - 400:1. I did see a difference in how the area cleaned with acetone behaved after being washed with N-914. It looks like acetone leaving some residue that repels water.

I put tape down horizontally across the hood into 4 sections and waterless washed with N-914 at 50:1, 100:1, 200:1, and 400:1. 50:1 closest to the windshield, 400:1 at the front of the hood. I was trying to see if residual soap and any effect on sheeting. The answer is that I don't think so.

I flooded the hose with the hood after washing. The left side had slowed down. I then pressure washed the right 1/3 of the hood to see of there was any difference. There wasn't. No good pics of this.

Left side after washing.

If there was any difference in water behavior due to residual soap it should have been removed with pressure washing. I didn't see any. Given this I think washing with soap and rinsing will give a fairly accurate results for water sealant testing.

The left side slowing down, particularly the section toward the windshield, tells me that the acetone left something on the paint that the soap removed. The left side was behaving about the same as the rest of the hood after washing it. I then pressure washed it just to be sure and the results were the same. They only way I could see this happening is if the soap removed something that was repelling water.