I just read this article on using a clay bar for detailing.

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I'm considering giving this a try, but it seems like quite a bit of work for something that is barely noticeable. If a paint job is protected by wax... the wax and debris wear off and you rewax...

It seems that the extra debris that gets poked into the surface of the wax will erode and return, erode and return along with the layers of wax that come and go.

How long does it really take to use a clay bar on a car? And is it really noticeable? I wish this was done on half of a car and not on the other half, that would be the kicker for me, lol

 

I bought some Maguire's clay when I got the Fit. I'm not sure why I expected the clay to work miracles on a 94,000 mile paint pitted car, but I tried it for the first time in my life. I found that the clay did remove a lot of surface dirt. However, rubbing wet clay on a car seemed goofy in the end. Folding and kneading it like it is a piece of dough just wasn't for me. If I bought a classic car from the Barrett Jackson auction, I'd use the clay. Now back to the real world.............. On any car I will ever purchase, there ain't no way I'll spend the money on clay again. While I try to keep my cars "forever," I certainly won't be keeping any car I buy for 20+ years. I keep my cars as clean as possible throughout their life span, but in the end, it is still just a machine to get me from point A to B.

 

I can respect that. Cars are utilities, and I'll be honest, I'm trying to keep the paint nice on my car, because I like the color and that will keep me from wanting another new car too soon.

 

If after you have washed and wiped down your car and it looks clean, but when you run your hand over the paint and you can feel grit and other debris, you can clay your car to remove them. After claying, you will notice a difference, a nice smooth surface, without any feeling of grit... How long it takes is how much detail you want to put into your work and how good or bad the surface is. Is it noticeable? yes it is... When you run your hand on and freshly clayed, waxed and polished surface done correctly, over just a washed surface you can feel it

My advice, just try it on a small part of the car, then, if you like it, do the rest

 

I generally spot clay my cars for stubborn stains that car wash soap and microfiber sponge can't get out

If it's really bad then I use my Porter Cable orbital polisher, orange pad cutting pad, and Chemical Guys cut 1.0 polisher and that normally takes any stain or swirl completely out of the paint

 

If you start claying your brand new car the paint will look great for far longer than if you don't.

It's easy to do really. First forget all those expensive clay bar lubricants. Just wash your car as normal and while it's still wet use the soap you use to wash your car as a lube.

With the car fresh washed and still wet use your sponge to wet part of it from your wash bucket (you should have something like a pie plate rest in the bottom of the bucket to prevent the sponge from going all the way to the bottom so it doesn't pick up dirt you just washed off) spread the suds in the area you want to clay then simply clay the wet spot.

Then move on to the next spot and a final rinse. Takes me maybe 10 minutes to do it.

It's just like washing the car then rubbing your hand over it one more time.

After the first time of doing the whole car I just do the horizontal surfaces like the roof, and hood when I wax then the whole car once a year.

Don't forget to do your headlight covers and windows I do those every time I wash the car and my headlight covers look like new with no hazing or yellowing even being 8 years old.

 

After the first winter my Taffy White was covered with rail rust spots. Claying did the trick. I now clay once a year followed by wax. It does not take that long and instead of wash soap I do use the detailer that came with clay( Mothers)

Never though of doing headlights and glass. I will try it as my windshield is getting that 4 year old pitted look.

 

Ok, so it doesn't have to be as involved as I was assuming. Yeah, just the hood of my car was un-smooth when I bought it. I've already put a coat of wax on it, though, and its a little more smooth, but not much. Definitely looks better, at least. I'm not sure claying after the wax is going to do much, though.

 

My headlights looked all hazy and nasty and before I polished them with Meg's PlastX, I used a claybar and it removed about 60% of the haze. Then the polish got them to sparkle!

I street park my car so traffic comes by and kicks up dirt onto my door panels. We all know that the Honda Fit paint is a joke and it'll scratch if you sneeze next to it so I'm very weary of hard scrubbing when I wash my Fit. I can just imagine a piece of sand getting stuck in my mitt and putting a horrible scratch on my ride. Last time I wanted to polish my car, I first cleaned it and it was covered in little black spots. Even with the claybar these were hard to get off; I think some of it was minuscule bits of tree sap and bits of tar/road debris. The claybar got rid of all that and even some black spots around my fenders/wheel wells I was convinced where stone chips were removed by the claybar. If you find that you have little black spots you think are stone chips on your skirt kit under the doors, I urge you to try claybaring them, it might get rid of them (unless they truly are stone chips, of course)!

When I wash my Fit, I give it a real light once over and I don't insist on any stuck on bugs, bird poo, or road debris, I just make a mental note and claybar those areas. Aside from some light parking scratched that I touched up, my Fit looks great even given that its a 2007! I also used the claybar to polish my Honda HFP tailpipe, really made it sparkle!

Basically, unless my car was covered in stuck on contaminants (like it was the last time I wanted to wax my car), I only use claybar on little spots mainly on my front bumper (bugs) and around my wheel wells/fenders. If your car is already visibly clean and well maintained, there's no reason to go through the painstaking task of claying the whole car. Just hang on to that kit and use it for little spots, it's really fantastic

P.S. claybar is also great for prepping areas for paint touch ups

 

If you clay after you wax, you are basically undoing your wax coat. One of the purposes of claying is to actually remove the wax from your car. If your hood is rough, I would do this:

-give the car a once over with light scrubbing
-use claybar system on the hood
-use some form of light polish. Even better, if you have an orbital polisher you can get the best results.
-finish with a sealant (wax)

If you do that, your car should look fantastic and stay that way for at least a month and at least 5-7 washes.

 

Exactly, it removes the fallout you really cannot see. Then you can wax over your now pure paint.

 

And it makes it baby's butt smooth too! It's amazing what kind of crap comes off that isn't removed by soap and water.

 

Ah, how jealous fancy folks are who's butts aren't talked about nearly as much as those of babies.

 

Some pretty cool insight here from some posters.

That being said, I don't have a Fit, but my car is LONG overdue for its first claybar. I have an Evo that I bought new in February 2007, and I'll probably do it when I put the stock trunk back on. (I put on a carbon fiber trunk last fall, but I don't want to claybar without it so I can do the entire car at once, though the stock trunk is at my family's place, and I'll need to re-install the wing.)

I'm at work right now and can't exactly pull up YouTube, but there's a video (maybe by Meguire's or someone), and they took a BRAND NEW vehicle off the lot, and while those cars are generally pretty clean, you could still "hear" the contaminants on the hood when the guy would rub his hand over it. He claybar'd it, and then the hood was smooth and didn't make a noise when he rubbed it, but then he rubbed his hands over the other half (which didn't get the claybar treatment), and you could hear the roughness again. So there's a difference.

 

I'll consider doing this before the next waxing, but its so hot outside right now, and humid, I might very well skip it, lol My car is no longer rough feeling, though,so maybe just the wash and wax did the trick.

 

You shouldn't clay very often. I average about twice a year.

 

Twice a year I do the following:

Thorough wash including door jams under hood and tailgate.
Clay bar the entire car (this really helps clean up the front bumper and mirror covers that see the majority of bugs)
Step 1 Paint Cleaner the entire car one panel at a time
Step 2 Paint Polish the entire car one panel at a time
Step 3 Wax entire car

This process usually takes me about 6-8 hours which includes cleaning the inside, normal vacuum and shampoo carpets if any residual stuff ie. road salt from the winter or otherwise is in the carpets and a quick detailer spray down of the plastic parts.

It usually lasts a good month or so looking freshly washed if I go to the touchless car wash immediately following a rainstorm. White is really hard to keep clean but it cleans up really nice because it hides a lot of the inevitable swirls that happen to the clear coat.

 

Why do you think that? It doesn't remove any of the paint so what harm could there be?

 

It's still an abrasive polish, and slowly removes the clear coat. It will take a lot to take the clear coat off, but if it's done 26-52 times a year, rather than twice, the damage will be more noticeable. .

 

Nope it's not an abrasive polish. It works by adhesion to the sticky part not by abrasion and does NOT remove any paint.