Tire protection

[gmitch23]

Is armor all really bad for tires? I've heard it dries out tires faster. Is that true for all tire shine products or is there a product the conditions and shines?

[ChevyNick]

I kind of wonder this too. It appears that my sidewalls between the treads on my BFG All Terrains are beginning to crack slightly.

I think you'll find that nearly everyone here stays away from Armor All haha. I've been using BlackMagic Tire Foam or whatever its called. I keep sayin I need to try Meguiars Hot Shine or whatever but just never tried it yet...

I've done some research in the past on this but I didn't really come up with a clear answer. It appears to me that these tire products don't necessarily damage your tires...

[CHzo6]

Re: Tire protection

What you use to clean your tires is much more harsh that anything you will put on to dress them. The old ArmorAll did have some chemicals that with lots and lots of use, would dry out vinyl and rubber. It has since been removed. I still don't use it, whereas Meguiar's makes much better products.

[gmitch23]

Re: Tire protection

Yea I haven't used armor all in years and recently tried it again. I don't know why but Meg's endurance doesn't seem to last more than a day on my tires. Maybe I'll go back to it and try again.

[CHzo6]

Re: Tire protection

How old are your tires? Old, dried out tires will absord a lot of product.

[gmitch23]

Re: Tire protection

How old are your tires? Old, dried out tires will absord a lot of product.

My tires were only a year old when I was using High Endurance. They are two years old now.

Also I must say, this thread isnt meant to bash Armor All. Its a general question about all tire shine products. I want to make sure and use the best product for my car. My wife had an 08 eclipse and her tires started cracking about 3 years later. Not that they were un usable but seemed kinda soon. Car only had 45k when we traded it in last month. The factory tires on my car done the same thing before I changed them at 50k. Maybe its because I live in Oklahoma and we get every extreme temp during each season.

I would really like to know that I'm not causing premature damage. Tires arent cheap.

[gmitch23]

Re: Tire protection

If it helps any, I prefer the "wet" look in choosing tire shine.

[mswerb]

Re: Tire protection

Auto makers don't put the best tires on cars when they are built. Any replacement tire you put on will be better than what came on your car originally.

[mis3]

Re: Tire protection

To determine the age of a tire, you have to check the manufacture date on the tire.

Some stores will sell you tires which are already 3-4 years old.

[gmitch23]

Re: Tire protection

Tire age wasnt a problem. I checked that long ago. So could it be that tire shine could cause premature cracking? I hope not, I love shiny tires

[PdxRealtor]

Re: Tire protection

I never had much luck with the endurance stuff. I still have half a bottle on my shelf. I try it every now and then when we get new tires or just because I forget how much it doesn't work like I like it.

For me the best stuff I've found for my tires and the look I like is the Meg's hot shine. The exception is when I had my 35 mud terrains the hot shine was a little thick to get in between the lugs. For that I'd get some stuff that seemed to give the same oily look but was a little thinner. Don't know the name I got it from my local tire shop.

[Michael Stoops]

Re: Tire protection

There isn't a tire shine product on the market from any reputable manufacturer that will cause cracking of the sidewalls. For any of us to include such an ingredient, one that actually causes damage, would be unbelievably stupid of the chemist who created the product in the first place, and for the whole development team to let it out to the public.

Tires are manufactured with an anti-ozonant built into the formula. As the tire rotates under load these anti-ozonants leech out to the surface to protect the rubber from the damaging effects of ozone. It's not so much UV that causes problems for tires, but ozone. If the tires are rarely used, like often happens with large RVs, these anti-ozonants can't leech to the surface and the sidewalls aren't protected from ozone, and they start to develop very small cracks. This is why in the RV industry they recommend changing tires after a certain period of time, regardless of mileage.

A potential downside to this leeching of anti-ozonants is that some of them cause what's known as "blooming", or more commonly referred to as "browning". This varies from manufacturer to manufacturer as they don't all use the same mix of anti-ozonants, or even the same quantity of them, in all their tires. Some brands of tire are more prone to this blooming than others. And all it takes to really bring out that nasty brown look is a little solvent to release the excess from the sidewall. (The term "solvent" is used very broadly here, just to be clear. If you dissolve sugar in water the water is considered the solvent, and we all drink water. So don't read too much into that one little word.) Any half way decent cleaner, whether a natural citrus oil degreaser, household cleaner, or even the propellant in an aerosol tire dressing will act as a "solvent" here, and release the brown material from the sidewall. So even if you never put a dressing on a specific tire but used a cleaner of some sort, you'd get that ugly brown stuff on the sidewall. Depending, of course, on the specific tire and how it was built. As an example, from personal experience, we used to have 4 cars at home and each of them had a different brand of tire. All 4 cars were treated the same way, washed with the same products, tires dressed with the same products, etc. Only one brand exhibited a high level of blooming, and it kind of drove me nuts because it was so bad. This was on a highly respected brand of tire, and one that we hear more comments about high levels of blooming with. From a quality standpoint, this isn't good, bad or otherwise. It just is.

Now, if your tires are starting to show some very fine cracking in the side wall and you then apply a tire dressing, you may actually make those fine cracks easier to see, but you aren't making them any worse than they already are.

As for Armor All specifically, the vast majority of their protectants are water based dressings with some sort of silicone in them. Big deal. The same can be said for our products like Natural Shine, Supreme Shine, M40, etc. Or for most of the other vinyl and rubber protectants on the market. AA products aren't going to hurt anything if you choose to use them on your car.

[gmitch23]

Re: Tire protection

Thank you Mike. That was a lot of information and that is what I was wanting to learn. You continue to impress. Now that I have those worries out of my head can you tell me, what is the best product that will give me the "wet" look. And is it necessary to use an applicator or what. (your opinion of course and its ok to have a bias)

[Michael Stoops]

Re: Tire protection

Personally, I'm a fan of our Endurance trigger spray tire dressing. It doesn't give a really wet look, however, but then again I, personally, am not a big fan of a wet looking tire. Hot Shine Trigger Spray will give a wetter, glossier look if that's what you're going for. But a lot of people make the mistake of overusing tire dressings in hopes of getting a really wet look. That might be fine when the car is displayed at a show, but too much product on the sidewall, or more specifically too much product trapped in the lettering, graphics, edge of treads, etc will result in sling as the tire reaches a speed where physics takes over and the stuff just can't hang on any more. Then you end up with the dreaded sling and product all over the side of the car. I always tell people that none of our tire dressings will sling, but all of them will sling. Contradictory? Crazy? It's all in how you apply them. A little bit goes a long way, so go easy and apply two thin coats rather than one heavy one. Let the product sit on the tire for a while and then give a final wipe with a dry terry cloth towel. That will remove excess product and it will also knock down some of the gloss. It's a trade off, though.

As for the initial application, even with an aerosol you're better off spraying the product onto an applicator and then wiping it onto the tire. This prevents overspray if there's any wind at all, especially with aerosol products that are delivered in a very fine mist. Trigger spray products can spray unevenly onto the tire, and people often try to even things out by spraying more product, which only compounds the problem. Whether you use a foam wax applicator, one of those concave tire sponges, or even a tire brush to apply product is up to you. Again, strictly from a personal perspective, I like using a tire brush to apply my tire dressing. It seems to do a very quick job of getting the product into the edges of lettering and graphics without overloading things.

[Murr1525]

Re: Tire protection

I've found on my tires the Hot Shine or All Season dressing look nice and wet at first, although go to more of a rich matte black a bit quickly. Then the rich matte black stays for a long time.