Upon Phil at DetailersDomain recommendation I picked up a new wheel cleaner they carry Sonax Wheel Cleaner. He posted up some experience that looked promising as I have a WRX with track pads. So needless to say, brake dust gets extreme even at 3-4 days of driving.
Personal review:
If you do not want the background, just skip to bolded performance section.
Background on myself: I have been doing detailing in some form/fashion for a 5 years now as a side job and a hobby.
From that experience, I have tried a myriad of product for all applications on a car (wheels, paint polishing, washing, fallout cleaning, decontamination, etc).
My go to product as of late for wheels is Chemical Guys Diablo Wheel cleaner. I used it because it is extremely economical for how well it works, dilutes to 3:1-6:1, safe for all finishes, and it seems small but also smell is nice (after using a few wheel and tire cleaners you will be down some nose hairs). In my opinion, it is about on par with p21s Wheel Gel, but much cheaper as you can dilute 3:1. In use on my car it does a bang up job, with a few areas needs a tad of scrubbing but overall really easy to use.
In the videos I watched on Sonax one thing that troubled me was how watery in consistency it appeared. This is a problem for me being in FL and the heat/humidity. With more watery products they seem to evaporate very quickly on surfaces here (already getting in the mid 70's here). This can stain some surfaces, but also causes you not to get the full potential of the products cleaners.
So to performance:
Overall: Sonax is one of the few detailing products that I have been really impressed from the get go. It just simply works very well. Again, the brake pad that I use on my car throws some pretty tough and corrosive dust and it handled it extremely well.
Consistency: One thing I was also thankful to see was the consistency is more on the gel side than the videos portray. So evaporation for me was not an issue.
Cleaning power: As opposed to my typical go to wheel cleaner (Chemical Guys Diablo Wheel Cleaner), there were no areas where I has to spend extra time to go over everything just came off very easy.
Smell: It was not as pleasant as Chemical Guys, but not so offensive that it cannot be tolerated.
Sprayer: The sprayer works very well to give you good coverage, and it does not take a lot of effort to dispense the product.
Pricing: For those that are price concerned the product is on the higher end of pricing for wheel cleaners, but it merits its price more than other in this space that I have tried. For cars that see track time, high dusting pads, or intricate wheel designs this would be my go to. However, if you are not dealing with a tough situation then something like CG Diablo or Megs APC+ will still be my go to because of pricing, and no need to break out the heavy guns.
I hope this helps people out that are on the fence or wanted some feedback before trying.
Let me know if you have any questions.
Also, I will try to get some pictures next time.
Personal review:
If you do not want the background, just skip to bolded performance section.
Background on myself: I have been doing detailing in some form/fashion for a 5 years now as a side job and a hobby.
From that experience, I have tried a myriad of product for all applications on a car (wheels, paint polishing, washing, fallout cleaning, decontamination, etc).
My go to product as of late for wheels is Chemical Guys Diablo Wheel cleaner. I used it because it is extremely economical for how well it works, dilutes to 3:1-6:1, safe for all finishes, and it seems small but also smell is nice (after using a few wheel and tire cleaners you will be down some nose hairs). In my opinion, it is about on par with p21s Wheel Gel, but much cheaper as you can dilute 3:1. In use on my car it does a bang up job, with a few areas needs a tad of scrubbing but overall really easy to use.
In the videos I watched on Sonax one thing that troubled me was how watery in consistency it appeared. This is a problem for me being in FL and the heat/humidity. With more watery products they seem to evaporate very quickly on surfaces here (already getting in the mid 70's here). This can stain some surfaces, but also causes you not to get the full potential of the products cleaners.
So to performance:
Overall: Sonax is one of the few detailing products that I have been really impressed from the get go. It just simply works very well. Again, the brake pad that I use on my car throws some pretty tough and corrosive dust and it handled it extremely well.
Consistency: One thing I was also thankful to see was the consistency is more on the gel side than the videos portray. So evaporation for me was not an issue.
Cleaning power: As opposed to my typical go to wheel cleaner (Chemical Guys Diablo Wheel Cleaner), there were no areas where I has to spend extra time to go over everything just came off very easy.
Smell: It was not as pleasant as Chemical Guys, but not so offensive that it cannot be tolerated.
Sprayer: The sprayer works very well to give you good coverage, and it does not take a lot of effort to dispense the product.
Pricing: For those that are price concerned the product is on the higher end of pricing for wheel cleaners, but it merits its price more than other in this space that I have tried. For cars that see track time, high dusting pads, or intricate wheel designs this would be my go to. However, if you are not dealing with a tough situation then something like CG Diablo or Megs APC+ will still be my go to because of pricing, and no need to break out the heavy guns.
I hope this helps people out that are on the fence or wanted some feedback before trying.
Let me know if you have any questions.
Also, I will try to get some pictures next time.
