Toyota Lusterizing Sealant

[mcox]

Good morning. I'm not sure this is an appropriate place for my question however it sorta kinda falls into the paint protection area I'm thinking. Mods, feel free to move if necessary. On to the question.

Picked up the wife's new Camry yesterday and came across a bottle of what Toyota is calling lusterizing sealant and of course if its not used per instruction then there could be warrenty issues. I know, I'm almost ready to order gallons of it. Does any one have any idea what it might be? I am assuming that its a polish/wax?? I will say that I haven't started the Meg version of the paint protection plan yet but as soon as I put the shoes on its to the driveway I go. I'm hoping one of our esteemed members has some knowledge to pass on. Thanks guys and gals.

[Mike Phillips]

Re: Toyota Lusterizing Sealant

We moved your post to it's own thread instead of having it tagged onto an older thread.

I don't have any experience with this Toyota product so I can't and don't have an opinion on it. But here's some common sense...

There is no such thing as a Miracle Wax, every year, multiple new products are introduced to the market showcasing themselves as the best thing since sliced bread but at the core of all these products is one of two things, and sometimes a third...

1) They are some kind of dealer applied paint sealant that you have to pay hundreds of dollars for and in reality they are an insurance policy, not wax or paint sealant that is any better than anything you can buy yourself and apply yourself.

2) They are some kind of consumer applied wax or paint sealant that you have to pay high dollar for and they are not any better than anything you can buy at a lower price and of course apply yourself. Again this assumes all things are equal, that is if you're buying a was or paint sealant to be used on a brand new car then you would compare this to buying an wax or paint sealant from a local store and use it on a brand new car.

3) There is a multi-level marketing program behind the product and thus the price has to be high to pay out to all the different levels built into the marketing and distribution structure and an equal amount of hype to promote the high price of the product.

(We recently had a person join and try to shill a product as though they were a happy customer only to find out they are a distributor of the product with an eBay store selling the product.)

The key to maintaining a paint job over a long period of time if the car is not a garage queen is to to actively maintain the paint, that is wash it, clay and clean the paint when it needs it, polish if you want to and then maintain a protective coating of either a quality car wax or paint sealant that you can purchase at any auto parts store.

There is no magical product that after one application it will prevent swirls and scratches and last for any extended period of time on a daily driver without the appearance and protection diminishing over time in correlation to how the paint on the vehicle is treated and the environment it is exposed to.

Keep in mind, that a brand new car or truck should look GREAT right off the assembly line, adding a coat of wax to something that already looks great doesn't mean the product you used is also great.

Too many people forget this and then buy and apply some expensive boutique wax product and after applying it think they've discovered the new holy grail, what they forget is the paint looked great before they applied anything.

Theoretically, if you took the least costly wax on the market, and as long as this product didn't actually dull paint after application, then you could apply it to a new car and you would see no difference and that's because the paint on a new car is supposed to look great already... it's brand new!

We would love for you to get this new treatment from Toyota and then share with us what it cost you and how it works and holds up over time. And if it does work great and hold up over time, let us know if you think that if you would have done all the same things to the truck using a quality store bought brand if you don't think you would have gotten the same results.

Thanks!

[eyezack87]

Re: Toyota Lusterizing Sealant

Like Mike says, its just a glorified sealant. If you are not willing to wax your car every few weeks when you wash your car, you should invest in Zaino or Collonite 476/845. Those are supposed to be the longest lasting sealants/waxes on the market today

[J. A. Michaels]

Re: Toyota Lusterizing Sealant

My personal opinion is for what the dealers usually charge up front to apply the sealant, add the cost of the quarterly "booster" and the time element. You are way better off doing it yourself and you would probably save a lot of money in the long run. No warranty issues and it would be done to your standards.

[mcox]

Mr

Guys,

Thank you for your input. To clarify my original post a bit, the car came with what Toyota calls the “Vehicle Shield Package” which includes 1) lusterizing sealant, 2) sound shield- I know, extra insulation, and 3) sealant cleaner. The distributor suggested retail was listed as $349.00. I must say that we paid the Toyota employee price for the vehicle so one could argue that it did not cost us anything.

As I mentioned in my other post, I did do a Megs paint protection process on it after my post. We are moving back to Michigan in a couple of days and the Camry is being shipped so I wanted something on it that I trust. I do have some pre and post Megs pix so when I find them I’ll post them. I do plan on hitting it again with either GC or some more 2.0 on Sunday. They pick it up on Monday. I will, once back in that winter wonderland, clean half the hood and apply their product and see how it holds up. I, of course, will update the thread as appropriate once I’m done.

My process was clay, clean, polish (#7), then top coated with NXT 2.0. I must note that prior to starting the Megs version I dropped a mf towel on the hood and it never moved. Of course I had washed the car before doing that. The surface also felt rough as in not glass like. I could understand the feeling of the surface a lot more if the car hadn’t been built just 2 short months ago but…. Maybe I’m biased but although it looked good sitting at the dealership I do notice a difference post Megs. I guess that is that highly trained sense I developed since I joined the forum. Well maybe not. I will keep everyone updated. Again thanks a lot for the knowledge.

[mcox]

Update

To update everyone, once we returned to MI. I went in to local Toyota dealer and asked exactly what it is in the bottle. I was told it was basically a sealant. Nothing special about it. Applied it to half the trunk and went over the other half with NXT 2.0 about 15 days ago. The results, well let me say that I'm glad I did not pay for the bottle. Less than spectacular. Absolutely less eye popping than the 2.0. Unfortunately the camera was destroyed in the move and haven't replaced it yet, so unable to snap pix at this time. I suppose the next question will be how long it lasts? As I observe will again update thread.