I was wondering if anyone has had experience with a product I saw on TV that looked like clay. It was supposed to remove deep down dirt from the finish. I have what look like dried water spots on my maroon F-150 but they don't come off when I wax. If I am not mistaken that is what they were using the clay product for.

Any info or sources of these products would be great, I have looked by my local sources are limited to K-mart & Wal-mart.

Thanks,

Thomasj

 

Your talking about either the Mothers or Megueirs clay bar. This is a small piece of modeling type of clay that you run over the surface of your vehicle in conjuntion with a spray mist cleaner, usually provided in the box.

If your asking if this works... Oh yeah it does! It removes almost all of the contaminants in your paint, and it will have a deep shine. You can clean the surface all you want, then run the clay bar over it, and you'll see how much was left behind.

My advice is buy it, and use it. Just follow up with a good wax. Make sure you give yourself enough time to do your truck. My Screw took 4 hours with the clay bar alone! Good luck!

 

Claying takes a long time but the results are great. If you want the true deep down clean though you should probably do an ABC bath. This will eat out paint contaminates such as raildust. Claying will sometimes only pull the part of the contaminate that sits above the surface off. The deep down part it'll leave and that part can still cause damage to your finish. An ABC type bath is the only way to get rid of everything.

If you feel the surface of your paint, even after washing, it will feel kinda grainy. You will be able to feel stuff stuck in the surface of the paint. The Clay will remove all of that and make your paint feel smooth like glass.

There are many different brands of Clay bar. Mothers seems to be the most popular. There are other, stronger, claybars though. I think any specialy automotive paint shop will sell different grades of claybars.

To lubricate the claybar you can use a quick detailer. Like someone said before, the mothers claybar comes with a bottle of instant detailer. I find that Mothers Instant detailer is perfectly fine to use with a claybar but as a true quick detailer the mothers instant detailer just doesn't cut it. It streaks way too easily so just use it with your claybar. Some claybars you can use water with carwash in it to lubricate the paint but some claybars will fall apart with water. Don't use water and soap with the Mothers claybar.

I suggest that you wash your vehicle, then claybar, and then wash your vehicle again. That second wash will make sure you get everything off your paint.

You said that you had watermarks. You don't have to claybar to remove these water marks. Any good polish should pull the watermarks right off. Try something like 3M's Swirl mark remover. It is a very mild polish and will help take out watermarks, swirl marks, and other surface imperfections. To prevent future watermarks keep your truck waxed. I find that if my truck is waxed and I do get watermarks they are easily removed with a quick detailer.

 

I have used both the Meguire's and the Mother's clay bars. Both worked great. The clay will remove particles and stuff from the surface of the paint, but will not remove the water spots if they are anything more than the light hazey ones. I have the same one's on my Lightning. The only way I'll be able to get them out is to buff it with a high speed buffer or to wet sand the hood.

The clay bars do make the paint very smooth. I do both of our vehicle a couple times a year.

 

Pep Boys sells another brand called "Clay Magic". They are great at getting out any contaminants out of the paint. Especially the infamous "rail dust". Did my L a few months ago and really made a huge difference.

 

Ford Motor Co issued a Technical Service Bulletin regarding the raildust, acid rain, industrial fallout, water spots etc,

TSB #99-10-12

You can read and print it out, the last page has a the pictographs that will make all the text more understandable.

The tech bulletin can be found at www.autoint.com

Click on OEM/TSB Section on the left side, it will take you to not only the TSB, but additionally, the same Tech Tips that are on Ford's Dealer Only website.

These address various other paint/trim etc conditions.

Might clear up some bad information that those TV Informercial's give out on late night TV.

Ketch

 

Many years ago I used to detail cars. I get all my detailing supplies for the same guy. I get a gallon of Wax for around $22 and a gallon of tire dressing for $25 and so on. It's much cheaper than going to kmart or a parts store. I got a clay bar and I use Paint Gloss with it. The paint gloss is the stuff the guys spray in the show rooms to keep the cars looking nice. It works great. I used it on my SHO that I trading in towards my F150. It works great. It will leave the paint with a smoother finsh than buffing will. I will do it to my truck once the weather gets nice. There is a web address on one of the bottles. I haven't looked at it yet. www.pssales.com Hope this helps.