Polish two days ago but no wax

[ivan2009]

Polished on Saturday but didn't wax , what is the best thing to do on Monday?

Hi,

New to the forum, always leased cars and returned,always took it to the car wash so never bothered washing / detailing myself.
Got my brand new car this March, due to bad advice from a colleague I was told to wash and then get the MER MASUP5 Ultimate Shine Polish and JUST polish and no need to wax because the car is new.
I have washed and polished (unnecessarily) the car around 5 times already (never waxed since new), Yesterday I started looking into the whole process and I feel bad for listening the advise without checking ..it seems that I should definitely wax and that the polish was propably unnecessary (at least without claying first).

I washed and manually polished the car 2 days ago(Saturday) what shall I do today (Monday) ?

1)Hand wash again and apply wax?
2)Just use a microfiber towel to dust and apply wax straight away (probably the worst option)
3)Let it get dirty again and then do the whole proccess (Wash, claying, polish? , wax)
4)Something else?

How worried shall I be for polished a brand new car unesecerily five times, without waxing?
I understand that polishing takes of a layer of clear coat, and wax protects the paint.

Moving forward between waxs ( 2-3 times a year) it would be a case of just washing the car and adding a qd product as I understand it?

Thanks

[tcope1]

Re: Polish two days ago but no wax

Just wash again and apply wax. Polish removes almost no clearcoat.

[snozan]

Re: Polish two days ago but no wax

To be honest, the best sealant is allready there: Clearcoat. If you polish your car good enough, nothing else is needed

[tcope1]

Re: Polish two days ago but no wax

To be honest, the best sealant is allready there: Clearcoat. If you polish your car good enough, nothing else is needed

I'm sorry but that is 100% incorrect. Clearcoat is nothing more than...... clear paint. It's subject to oxidation from UV light and breakdown from chemicals in the air and rain. It _needs_ to be protected with some type of sealant. The sealant will help separate the containments from the clearcoat.

https://www.carsdirect.com/car-maintenance/clear-coat-car-paint-understanding-the-pros-and-cons

There is a ton if information that basically mirrors the information in the link above. It's also why there are hundreds of thousands of sealants on the market.

[Nick Winn]

Re: Polish two days ago but no wax

How worried shall I be for polished a brand new car unesecerily five times, without waxing?
I understand that polishing takes of a layer of clear coat, and wax protects the paint.

The word "Polish" or the act of "polishing" is used very loosely within the industry. Meguiar's offers two types of polishes. Pure Polishes and Cleaner/Polishes. Our Pure Polishes are solely oils & conditioners designed to provided added gloss, especially for a dark color. We typically define the Polish step as "The act of creating a brilliant high gloss" or " an optional pre-waxing step for providing additional high gloss." We also offer cleaner/polishes. Cleaner/Polishes contain mild abrasives which work to remove light defects like swirl marks & fine scratches, while also providing oils/conditioners for added gloss. While I am not familiar with the particular polish you have used, if it is what we would consider a cleaner/polish, with mild abrasives, and it was applied properly, using this 5 times since March would be no issue. Most cleaner/polishes are very mild, and are only removing an extremely microscopic amount of paint, almost not even measurable. To put things in perspective, even some of our most aggressive compounds applied via dual action polisher machine are removing an extremely microscopic amount of paint, almost not even measurable. Mild Cleaner/Polishes applied by hand is much less aggressive than compounds by machine.

Polished on Saturday but didn't wax , what is the best thing to do on Monday?

I washed and manually polished the car 2 days ago(Saturday) what shall I do today (Monday) ?

1)Hand wash again and apply wax?
2)Just use a microfiber towel to dust and apply wax straight away (probably the worst option)
3)Let it get dirty again and then do the whole proccess (Wash, claying, polish? , wax)
4)Something else?

Moving forward between waxs ( 2-3 times a year) it would be a case of just washing the car and adding a qd product as I understand it?

Thanks

At this point it sounds as though you are ready to apply a good coat of your favorite wax.

If the vehicle only has light dust, one option would be to use a detail spray, like our A3316 Quik Detailer Mist & Wipe. When used with good technique & microfiber towels, you can safely remove the light dust, leaving the paint finish completely clean, and ready to apply a coat of wax. We do not recommend using just a dry microfiber towel to "dust" the car. This would have a high risk of inflicting scratches into the paint.

If the vehicle has a level of contaminants beyond light dust, doing a traditional two bucket wash method would be a great option to get the car clean. Then simply apply your favorite coat of wax for protection.

Hope this helps!

Nick

[snozan]

Re: Polish two days ago but no wax

I'm sorry but that is 100% incorrect. Clearcoat is nothing more than...... clear paint. It's subject to oxidation from UV light and breakdown from chemicals in the air and rain. It _needs_ to be protected with some type of sealant. The sealant will help separate the containments from the clearcoat.

https://www.carsdirect.com/car-maintenance/clear-coat-car-paint-understanding-the-pros-and-cons

There is a ton if information that basically mirrors the information in the link above. It's also why there are hundreds of thousands of sealants on the market.

I guess the air and so on is much more clean here then....