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To wax or not to wax.

3K views 8 replies 6 participants last post by  MyFirstJeep 
#1 · (Edited)
I have never waxed my old ZJ in 10 years that I owned it (purchased it 2 years old in 2000). Car spent all this time parked on the street. The only care it received was car wash twice a season. I drive about 5,000 miles/year. FWIW I am in Brooklyn so there is a lot of salt on the road during the winter.

On the day my ZJ met its untimely demise (it had about 85,000 miles on it) it looked pretty good if you ask me:



I will soon get new WK2. I wonder what regiment of exterior care I should follow.

I don't really care what car looks like on day-to-day basis. All I care about is long-term paint and body protection.

I will not be doing detailing myself and will not spend hours waiting for it to be waxed every other weekend.

Is there something that can be done say twice a year that would make a real difference in long-term paint protection?

Separate question about underbody protection: I checked underbody during the last oil change and some parts were pretty rusty (driveshaft for instance). No holes or any serious problems. Is this unavoidable on car 12 years old or something can be done from the beginning to alleviate that?
 
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#2 ·
if your not doing it yourself....see our vendor NX1(qbnkid) and he will take care of you.

And....that pic looks good down that side....but I can see the swirls etc on the hood.....LOL
 
#3 ·
Separate question about underbody protection: I checked underbody during the last oil change and some parts were pretty rusty (driveshaft for instance). No holes or any serious problems. Is this unavoidable on car 12 years old or something can be done from the beginning to alleviate that?
undercoating. not the one they offer you at the dealership, theirs is all a sham. but there are people that can be found that do it with something really similar to spray-in truck bed liner. very very durable stuff, and will also help cut down on road noise. I wouldn't know where to go about finding someone that does it, but they swear by this on a Subaru forum I'm on.
 
#5 ·
Judging the state of a vehicles paint from a pic can be misleading. With the sun shining from the other side of the Jeep and at that distance, the paint would need to be in terrible shape for it to show. So long as the Jeep is clean, it will look good in a shot like that. Now take a pic of the other side, with the sun shining directly on the paint and close enough to show maybe just a single door panel and any paint damage will be pretty obvious. As Scott mentioned, you can see the swirls in the hood, even though the sun is shinning directly onto the paint.

My guess is that the ZJ's paint was in far worse shape then you may have realized. That may be, no heck it is, expected on a 12 yr old daily driver that saw little car for the paint. If you really want to protect the paint on the new WK2, you need to be sure to wash it properly so as to introduce as few scratches as possible and take steps to protect it from the other things that can damage paint. That means at least a bi-annual detail consisting on a wash, dry, clay (when needed), light polish (if needed) and sealant. You could also go with waxing instead of sealant, but that would need to be done more frequently. The idea is to protect the paint while also providing a sacrificial layer to take the damage caused by things like brake dust, acid rain, industrial fall out, bugs, birds, etc. You'll be lucky to get 3 or 4 months of protection from a sealant and 3 or 4 weeks from a good wax. Using both, with a new application of wax about once a mouth, may allow the sealant to stretch out to 6 months.
 
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#7 ·
Depending on the sealant used, rain will either bead or run off rather quickly. If the rain starts to flow off in "sheets" or sits on the paint as one big wet covering, the sealant is pretty much gone. Also, freshly applied sealant will feel as slick as pig snot, as it wears off, that slickness will disappear as well. Finally, with a solid coat of sealant, bugs will generally wipe right off with little more than a spray of quick detailer and a microfiber towel. A the sealant wears, bugs will be harder and harder to remove off the front end.
 
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