Car pro Essence. Anybody used it ?

[Nickyc]

Hi folks, hope you are all keeping well ?

Has anyone used the above ? If so what are your thoughts. I sort of wanted to use it because I didn't want to go crazy on my clear coat, but liked the fact that it has semi permanent fillers and finishes rally well. I wasn't planning on ceramic coating it on top but maybe a different type of sealant.

Your views would be most welcome.

Thanks

Nick

 

[123Quattro]

It is a very very good product, I use it frequently (professionally) and do highly recommend it. You will need to get some heat into it to get it to "bite" into the paint, it wipes off easily and no dust. Leave it to cure for a few hours or ideally a full day before topping it or getting it wet. It has excellent filling capability, surprising cut if you use a medium pad and the hydrophobics are also quite good, though I'd suggest you top it with elixir as a drying aid to keep it at its best.

 

[Nickyc]

Thanks Quattro, you see my car has wash marring on it only. Nothing more than that, so to help preserve as much clear coat as I can, I wanted something like this, but wasn't sure if it was the right product or even if it was capable of removing any marring ? If it is the right product, I was thinking reload to top it after washes, would that work ?

 

[123Quattro]

Essence does have some light cutting ability, but if you car has marring and swirls you might need something more aggressive if you want to remove rather than mask them. My advice would be to do a test section with a medium cut pad on a DA or rotary and see if you are happy with the result.

Could be you need something a bit more aggressive before finishing with essence, but only testing will tell for sure.

Reload is a fine product, but I think even CarPro is moving away from it in favour of Elixir which applies much easier and lasts almost as long, and also hydro2 which is an amazing spray on, rinse off product that lasts even longer than reload and has more gloss to it. If you don't already have reload I'd explore either of these other options. Reload can be a bit streaky to work with on dark paints or in direct sunlight and doesn't last that long. It was really designed to protect curing ceramic coats that might be prone to water spots in the first few weeks, and to "bring back" the hydrophobic on ageing coatings, which it docent actually do - it's just a ceramic based sealant. It will work great over Essence or even bare paint, but I personally feel there are better options these days.

 

[Nickyc]

Talk to me Quattro, I have not bought any products yet for the protection stage, so what would you recommend I try on Nardo ? I only brought up Essence because I just saw a youtube vid. Polishes I have are Koch Chemie H9.01, F6.01 and Menz Super finish 3500 (because they ran out of M3.02)

 

[123Quattro]

That's a good selection of superb products on your shelf already. My advice is use the finest polish and pad you own that removes the defects. All of those are very capable. This usually means testing a few sections on the bonnet and see how it comes out. Once you have your paint as defect free as you are willing to spend the time and effort on, only then coat/seal or wax it to keep it looking good and protected from the elements and the birds.

What do you have for pads?

I'm a ceramic fan boy, but that's certainly not a solution for everyone, especially if you get the odd ding or scrape that needs polished out, or are on a budget. CarPro Cquartz Lite or Geyon CanCoat are good options that is cheap, very safe and easy to apply and lasts the better part of a year. Baring that a good spray sealant like hydro2 (or reload), sonax BSD, or even the meguiars or turtle wax ceramic hybrid line are very good options that add mad hydrophobias, protection and gloss. Wax I don't really have an opinion on. It seems a bit old fashioned these days.

 

[Nickyc]

Thanks for the reply Quattro, Pads at the moment are Flex ones for the PXE 80, but got a corded Flex XCE coming that has a couple of pads with it, but I will obviously need a few more, any tips on them ? With the LSP, I've never used a ceramic before, and just didnt want to mess anything up, not to say I dont want to use one - Its the fear factor for me, BSD I have and also wowos crystal sealant and probably thousands of others. I find BSD a bit too grabby for me, I like a nice slick finish. I definitely wont be using a wax, thats why I originally mentioned Essence and what to top it with as that interested me a lot, or an easy to use ceramic coating that even I cant mess up.

 

[NevMan]

Gyeon CanCoat is a great place to start trying ceramic, very very easy to apply, and serious slickness and beading/run off. Obv. Much better if car is polished and panel wiped down 1st.

I use it as top up to Gyeon Q2 Pure, which is also pretty easy to apply, is thicker than many so one coat is plenty.

Here is a short video after I coated the M40i with Pure: