Next Generation Technology Brochure

H

hirosh

New member
Today in the mail, I got this "Next Generation Technology" brochure from Meguiar's talking about their latest products, including the NXT line, ColorX, Quick Suds Car Wash Strips, etc etc. For the nxt Tech Wax, one thing it says is "Swirls and fine scratches disappear right before your eyes. Now you can enjoy a flawless finish that will amaze your friends." Plus they include a "Before/After" picture where the Before side has a lot of light swirls, while the After side shows that all of the light swirls are removed with just some deeper ones remaining. (I wish I had a scanner to show this picture.)



My question is: how did they do that (like what procedure, pads, rotary or PC)?



I am just wondering because from what I read here, I though nxt was a LSP. Yet here it seems like it's a cleaner wax type of product. Does it have some fillers or something?



And please don't tell me this is Meguiar's over-hyping nxt's ability because I love what nxt has done for my Mustangs. In fact I like using a majority of Meguiar's products, not only because I can get them locally, but because of the nice results I get with them. :xyxthumbs



Thanks in advance.



Reid
 
hirosh said:
And please don't tell me this is Meguiar's over-hyping nxt's ability because I love what nxt has done for my Mustangs. In fact I like using a majority of Meguiar's products, not only because I can get them locally, but because of the nice results I get with them. :xyxthumbs



Thanks in advance.



Reid
Click to expand...



Just because a manufacturer hypes it's products does not mean it isn't a good product. I get good results from NXT also but there is no way it serves as an adequate replacement for proper prep products. I'm not surprised at all by the literature in that brochure. Regardless of whether or not the claims are valid, a ton of people will buy NXT because of the great job Meguiar's has done in promoting their new product. It HARDLY matters whether or not the swirls disappear like magic the way Meguiar's claims they will.



My brother-in-law has been using Turtle-Wax's Finish 2001 for a long time now because he's convinced it lasts a year (says so right on the bottle!!). In all his years of using this product, he's never checked to see if it really does last a year. In fact, over the weekend we detailed two of his cars. When I told him that the wax I was using (Mothers Reflections) should last about 2 months, he seemed disappointed. He then asked if it was OK if he waxed over the Reflections product tomorrow with Finish 2001. Why did he want to do this? Because he wanted to use a product that would protect his car for a year. He's completely sold on the idea that Finish 2001 will last a year. Why? Cuz it says so on the bottle!! My brother-in-law typifies the average consumer of OTC car care products. This allows Meguiar's to take a few liberties in its marketing slant when it comes to their retail products. Notice how these crazy claims are toned down when it comes to their professional line.
 
Intermezzo said:
Because he wanted to use a product that would protect his car for a year. He's completely sold on the idea that Finish 2001 will last a year. Why? Cuz it says so on the bottle!! My brother-in-law typifies the average consumer of OTC car care products. This allows Meguiar's to take a few liberties in its marketing slant when it comes to their retail products.
Click to expand...



Oh yeah, well my paint is going to live a much longer and healthier life because of the Zymol I use, it allows my paint to breath the freshest and healthiest air possible. Its like a respirator for my paint.



It says so on the marketing. :D
 
Well, I have you ALL beat.



This car salesman told my friend and me that his new cars' paint would never need to be waxed.

He specifically blurted that the clear coat on the new car was, "Almost as good as paint!".



Wow. :confused:
 
Heh heh, thanks for the interesting tid-bits. I do know about how companies like to hype their products.... but anyways, let me go back to what I originally asked, how did they do this:



nxt.jpg




Sorry, I used my digital camera to take the picture.



The reason why I ask is because I have a couple friends that I would love to clean their cars, yet they don't have time to let me. I was thinking if I could use NXT to do what the picture above did, then I could cut down on the steps and on time. Then again, maybe I'll just wait until I get the pads for my PC and experiment it on someone's car.
 
I would think that they accomplished this by using a PC.

In your situation if you are getting a PC anyway, I would wait until you get it until detailing your friends car. I think the only process that you don't want to skip out on is clay bar then go to town with the PC. :up
 
hirosh said:
how did they do this:



nxt.jpg
Click to expand...



Hi hirosh,



It took me a day to locate my original photos from this photo shoot, sorry for the delay. I took all the photo's for this demonstration using my own camera, an older Sony FD97 Mavica, 2.1 mega pixels. The photo's below are the RAW photo, as in I did nothing to retouch in any the results as I never do with any of my photo's.



I also was the one to prepare the finish for the before shot, as well as the after shots.



The car in question is a Honda Acura, 1990's something or rather. It belongs to my friend Tom, a Meguiar's employee, here at the office. I borrow his car from time to time to test products on because the hood on this car is fairly flat, (no raised body lines), and low to the ground, (compared to many cars), which makes it easy to look down on for visual testing purposes. While it' looks black when looked at from 15' away, close inspection under the right lighting conditions show it to be a sort of olive/brown metallic. The dark clear coated metallic color makes for good visual testing of waxes, although not as good as black.



A couple of things about the hood just so you know. Tom keeps all his cars up with frequent maintenance using Meguiar’s products. In order to produce the cobweb swirls you see in the photos, I washed his car at least three times using a strong detergent soap. (Whoops... sorry Tom!), and I washed it kind of how you say... coarsely, in order to swirl it out. This by the way worked very well. When I was done drying it off the next thing I did was pull the car out into the sun to make sure it looked bad.



It did.



(Sorry Tom, I hope you don't read this!)



Anyway, I obtained the result I was looking for, a finish that looked neglected. While the finish did look neglected, it really wasn't, that is, it didn't need to be clayed, and the swirls were light from hand car washing, not deep like those instilled with a wool pad on a rotary buffer.



Here is an original before from the photo shoot that day.



2acurabefore.jpg




Here is the original after photo used for the ad.



2acuraafterNXT1.jpg




Notice on the after side, there are still signs of cobweb swirls. If you move the light over the waxed side you could still see cobweb swirls throughout the finish.



The above after photo was done by hand, (my hand). I applied the Tech wax twice, the first time I worked the product in really well. The second coat I applied gently. Both coats were allowed to dry for approximately 15 minutes. There was approximately 30 minutes of curing time between the first and second coat. I also experimented on the rear deck lid before the photo shoot so that I would know what the results were going to look like ahead of time.



That said, those are the actual results produced by hand using NXT Tech Wax.



I did something very similar to this last Saturday for the Harley Davidson Ford F150 Truck Club.



Harley Davidson Detailing 101 Clinic at Meguiar's



The after side pictured below was all done by hand. In this case, the swirls were much deeper and the finish more neglected. We did clay it first, and I did apply ScratchX by hand first to the drivers side. After removing the ScratchX I applied one coat of NXT Tech Wax, removed the tape, had the owner pull the truck out into the sun and let the club members inspect it.



Mike Phillips said:
For the demonstration, three Meguiar's paint cleaners were used to show the results from each one. Meguiar's philosophy of,



Always use the least aggressive product to get the job done"



was put into action as we tried,



Deep Crystal Paint Cleaner

Clear Coat Body Scrub Paint Cleaner

ScratchX



After applying each one to a portion of the hood, the truck was pulled out into the sun for inspection by the club members,



2HD_InspectingResults-med.jpg




After determining the ScratchX followed by NXT Tech Wax left behind the best looking finish, the truck was pulled back into the garage whereupon we applied the ScratchX by hand to one half of the hood followed by Tech Wax.



Then, after removing the Tech Wax from the demonstration side, we pulled the car back into the full sun to inspect again...



2HD_InspectingResults2-med.jpg




Here are the results...



2HDResultsbyHand.jpg
Click to expand...



You will always get your best results by first doing the proper prep work and this usually means breaking the process down into separate and dedicated cleaning, polishing and protecting steps. But for fine swirls and scratches on paint finishes in good to excellent condition, Tech Wax will eliminate the swirls and restore a clear, high gloss finish with enriched color and vibrancy.



Mike
 
Thanks for the explanation, Mike! :xyxthumbs



That really cleared up everything because for a moment I thought Meguiar's was implying Tech Wax was a one stepper when I heard it was a LSP. But now I understand better. Unless the finish has FINE swirls and scratches, the proper prep work should always be done before using Tech Wax.



BTW, nice job on the truck! :up



And is this what you mean by "a clear, high gloss finish with enriched color and vibrancy"?



altima-nxt.jpg




altima-nxt-02.jpg




I wish I had taken better pictures, maybe I'll try again later.



This was after I had used my PC on my mom's Altima, #80 Speed Glaze followed by NXT Tech Wax. I was really blown away when I just saw how the metallic sparkled! :D



Thanks once again, Mike!
 
Hi hirosh,



NXT is a LSP.



I coined the acronym LSP because I talk, and type often about multiple step processes. Because of this, I'm always referring to the last step product before you make your final wipe with a polishing cloth and then stand back and admire the results. (In other words, you quit touching the car, thus the last step product!)



I have 2-3 very high dollar cars in the future to detail and for each one of them I will be using 2 coats of NXT Tech Wax as the LSP.



I often read of people applying a topper to NXT, which is ok with me, people can do whatever they want. What I tell them is if they're going to apply a topper, then to only apply the topper to one section first, say a 10 inch area.



Then, inspect that area in both bright artificial lights, and if available, pull it out into the sun and put the sun right down on the hood and move in such a way that you can see the sun on the topper section and then on the NXT section.



So far, after applying at least two coats of NXT, I have never seen a reason to use a topper.



Mike
 
Hirosh-I've also been very impressed with the #80/NXT combo. Used it on a few combos at the Autopia/Meguiars meet and recently on this BMW 750iL:



10992000_750iL_front.jpg




10992000_750iL_rear.jpg




#80 with a Meguiars polishing pad, speed on 6, NXT with CMA finishing pad and speed on 4.
 
Mike, it's a funny thing you mentioned about comparing Tech Wax and Tech Wax + topper. I tried something similar to my Mach1 recently, although it was Tech Wax on one half of the car, and #26 on the other half. I couldn't tell the difference!!!! :o But I plan to keep on trying Tech Wax by itself and see how I like it. Hopefully with a PC and the proper prep work, I can see good results with Tech Wax. But thanks for the suggestion, I'll be sure to try that when I get the urge for a topper. :D



Scott - really nice job! :bow

i'll be sure to try that combo out on my Mach! Thanks!
 
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