Cladding

[vt_maverick]

It worked easy and looks great...the hood insert is amazing. It causght my eye since it actually had a picture of cladding on the bottle.

It was dark when I finished so pics tomorrow...

That's the same stuff I tried a week ago... just got rain for the first time today and it's already running!!! I'm hoping that it's due to there being some amount of B2B left on the cladding from previous applications.

Update from previous post... I applied another coat of this stuff over the weekend and had different results that are encouraging. When I did the first coat a few weekends ago, the cloths I used were completely black after applying it. At the time I thought it must be a byproduct of the Meguiar's product (similar to what happens when you rub a cloth over a fresh coat of tire black), but when reapplying it Sunday night it didn't turn the cloths black at all. Now my suspicion is that the black substance was actually Back to Black residue coming off the cladding.

The Meguiar's product is very similar to their Cleaner Wax in consistency (thick just like liquid wax) as well as function, as Cleaner Wax removes crap in your paint that washing doesn't. Back to Black on the other hand is a thin, runny substance that looks oily after application. So now I wonder whether the running was due to the last remnants of B2B preventing the Meguiar's stuff from fully adhering to the surface. Can't wait for the next rainfall to see if the running stops or at least slows. I know I had terrible problems with B2B running at first, but after reapplying it every few weeks for several months the streaking was much less pronounced. Let's hope it's the same with this stuff.

Oh and one more thing - the label is right, you can definitely use a car duster on it without streaking the coating or rubbing dust/pollen into it. Anyone who's tried using a car duster on B2B treated cladding should know that's a huge improvement.

Well after a few days of rain I'm officially calling the Meguiar's product a failure, in fact I would say WRT rain resistance that it's significantly worse than Back to Black. It runs badly in the rain, and after 3 raining days in a row, it was completely gone from the cladding. The last coat was super thick and apparently it made no difference. If you live in a place with 300+ days of sunshine (hello Arizona folks) it's really a great product; it leaves a dark satiny finish without the greasy feel of Back to Black, and it stands up to sun very well. But for the rest of us (especially those in the PNW) I think it's a no-go.

On the plus side, since everything had washed off the cladding I decided to do a full coat of 303 to test it out. Good news is that it's supposed to rain for the next 2-3 days, so should be a pretty direct comparison to the Meguiar's. So far it looks great, at least as dark as Back to Black or Meguiar's. No oily finish like B2B, but I haven't run a California Car Duster over it yet. Another review to follow later this week...