Problem with MK37 HydroBlue

[geoguy]

So I did my first major wash of the season on Tuesday using hyper wash. The truck has MK37 coating ver.2 on it that is a little over a year old. The horizontal surfaces are still beading good but the doors and back are flat. I guess understandable with the Michigan winters and all the salt on the roads. After washing the truck I treated the entire vehicle with HydroBlue Including the wheels. After the high-pressure rinse everything was beading and looking great. Wednesday it rained and snowed so truck got slightly dirty. Went to the self-serve car wash today to just do a quick rinse off using the high-pressure soap and high-pressure rinse, and the wheels and doors are flat again like I never sprayed on the HydroBlue. The back just has a little bit of beading. Horizontal surfaces still look good.

What would’ve caused the Hydro Blue not to bead anymore after 3 days? Is the car wash high-pressure soap that strong that it would strip the HydroBlue? Does Hydro blue have a shelf life? I’ve had the bottle for eight or nine months.

 

[DMiglio]

I’m not gonna be of much help sorry, but I use this product pretty often and haven’t experienced this before. I know Nick from McKee’s frequents the forums and will be more than willing to help you out! McKee’s stands by their products and has awesome customer service!

My guess though might be some form of contamination or heavy road film left on the panels from winter(salt, brine, oils etc), possibly hindering the HB from bonding? I live in Chicago area so have dealt with this situation on my vehicles as well. Sometimes it takes that real “spring cleaning” of the paint to be able to get products to bond correctly or perform as we’d expect.

 

[geoguy]

I’m thinking that is well, but i’m not sure what else to do to really clean the panels. I had pressure washed the crap out of it first, pre-soaked the lower panels with bug squash (closest thing I have to a pre Soak), pressure washed again, soaked panels with D114 (at 1:128), washed with hyperwash, HydroBlue, then used D114 again as a drying aid. What else could I do? Use Reset?

 

[SWETM]

Try a tar remover on the paints surfaces that are flat. Can take a couple of application since you have maybe locked in some contaminants. Try to not apply any protection for a couple of weeks and give it a go again with the tar remover if it didn't work the first time.

Do you know if the PW soap has anything leaving behind?

You could just try the tar remover first on dry paint so it's not getting diluted. Let it dwell and don't let it dry on the paint. Then PW clean with the water pressure from the PW from the bottom and work your way up so it hit every bit of the paint as you would use a wash mitt or brush. Apply the bug remover on the whole car and do the same thing with the water pressure from the PW to clean with. Then wash with HW and dry the car and then test the water behavior. I do this every wash that is not often I can do during the winter months. I only use spray on rinse off products for protection. And it holds good but sometimes needs to be topped up. In your case if you get an acceptable beading and sheeting from the vertical panels you have problems with. Like it was before or just a notch less. You could try to top it up. Don't top it if it's still flat though as you should be able to at least get it to bead some and you something from the coating behavior.

 

[DMiglio]

I echo swetm’s statements. If you can try searching his name in the forum, he’s got a few posts detailing his winter washing procedure and iirc most of it is touchless. Even his touchless washes seemed to turn his cars around pretty effectively.

I’d stay away from the soaps at those self serve washes, I really don’t think they rinse well and must leave something behind. The last time I tried it, the soap killed my beading and sheeting, really made it hard to dry the car even. I’d try a combo of fallout removers(tar/iron) or even a couple ounces of APC in your wash bucket, or both. You’ll definitely want to rinse the car heavily after this.

I do like your use of Hyperwash and D114 as they are both very good cleaners(this road grime is an exception) and leave nothing behind so idk if I’d look to change though. Best of luck and keep us up to date!

 

[waterman]

Hello,

If your coating is a year old it might be a good idea to do use iron remover. You may have some contamination that washing wont get out. This shouldn’t effect the coating. Remember hydro blue isn’t as effective if the paint is contaminated, that may be the reason for it only beading for a few days. Send Nick a email and he will respond.

Lou

 

[geoguy]

Thanks guys for the advice! I did notice this time at the car wash they really cranked up the soap concentration coming out of the wand.

Next time I have a chance I’ll hit it again with the tar/iron/bug process and see how it fairs.

Does anyone know if tarminator is safe for coatings?

 

[SWETM]

I echo swetm’s statements. If you can try searching his name in the forum, he’s got a few posts detailing his winter washing procedure and iirc most of it is touchless. Even his touchless washes seemed to turn his cars around pretty effectively.

I’d stay away from the soaps at those self serve washes, I really don’t think they rinse well and must leave something behind. The last time I tried it, the soap killed my beading and sheeting, really made it hard to dry the car even. I’d try a combo of fallout removers(tar/iron) or even a couple ounces of APC in your wash bucket, or both. You’ll definitely want to rinse the car heavily after this.

I do like your use of Hyperwash and D114 as they are both very good cleaners(this road grime is an exception) and leave nothing behind so idk if I’d look to change though. Best of luck and keep us up to date!

Yeah sometimes a touchless wash is effective. But when it's to dirty the last dirt need to be a little aggitated with the wash mitt and car soap solution. It's no way around that sadly LOL. And also the prewash steps gets you to aggitate less. Only 2-3 wipes over the area with a mf wash mitt or pad is often what only needs to be done. And that is on some really dirty paint what I started with.

I can say that the wash bay that I can be in. They wash semi-trucks in and have a stronger alkaline based degreaser there that I have tested. The problem is that first it leaves something behind protection wise. But that don't help cause I tested on a car treated with Sonax Spray and Seal. After the degreaser and the followed with the tar remover I had some beading back. But have a lot of sot on the paint so thought to spray on the degreaser again. And even with a very effective PW I had a flat water on the horisontall panels and slow sheeting. The wash with Reset took the beading back though. So some products is leaving a lot of surfactans behind like a dish soap does. And that's why I now bring my own TFR prewash degreaser with me. When rinse that off it actually gets the beading back with only cleaning it off with the PW water pressure.

Here is before on a Carpro Hydro2 lite LSP that has not been washed since a month back.

Here is only the TFR prewash spray on rinse off results without touching the paint. Not sold on AGO and think it's not available in the US either.

The tar and road film build up during a month here on a freshly applyied Hydro2 lite. Since only a month since last wash I applyied the tar remover without any rinse before so you can see loose dirt too.

I applyied the parts where I had the tar remover dwelled finished with the TFR directly over it and on the whole car. Cleaned with the water pressure from the PW from the bottom and work my way up. This is after the rinse cleaning and still not touched the paint. As you can see the Hydro2 lite is not as on the hood. But also a little degraded even after the Reset wash but better than this picture though.

I looked at the SDS on the Tarminator and saw many chemicals that I don't know if they are coating safe. Some hydrocarbon can be very harsh on some coatings. So if not anyone else says it's good to use on coatings. I would go with a tar remover from a company that has coatings in their products. Just to be safe. The petroleum distillates is what is in the tar removers I uses.