Ceramic Coatings Explained: Longevity, Maintenance, and Hard Truths. Episode #940
Pints and Polishing Auto Detailing Podcast
Ceramic Coatings Explained: Longevity, Maintenance, and Hard Truths. Episode #940
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Term
ceramic coating
A ceramic coating is a special liquid that you put on a car's paint to protect it. It helps keep the car looking shiny and new by preventing dirt and scratches.
Term
fine print
Fine print is the small text in contracts that explains the details of an agreement. It's important to read it because it often has important rules or conditions that you need to know about.
Car
Porsche Cayenne
The Porsche Cayenne is a high-end SUV that offers a mix of luxury and sporty driving. It's designed for people who want a comfortable ride with good performance.
Term
lifetime protection
Lifetime protection means that a service or product is promised to last for the entire life of the car. However, this can sometimes be misleading if the manufacturer doesn't support it.
Term
oxidation
Oxidation is what happens when something reacts with oxygen, like how metal can rust. For car paint, it means the color can fade and the surface can get damaged over time.
Brand
Toyota
Toyota is a car company that makes many popular vehicles. In this case, they're talking about a Toyota car that has been damaged by fire.
Term
clear coat
Clear coat is a special layer of paint that protects the color of a car. It helps keep the car looking good and prevents damage from the sun and scratches.
Term
paint systems
Paint systems are the different layers of paint that are put on a car to make it look nice and protect it. Car companies spend a lot of money to make sure these paints last a long time.
Term
PPF
PPF is a protective film that you can put on your car's paint to keep it safe from scratches and chips. It's like a shield for your car's surface.
Car
Tesla Semi
The Tesla Semi is a big electric truck made by Tesla, meant for carrying heavy loads over long distances. It's important because it helps reduce pollution and can save money on fuel compared to traditional trucks. People talk about it because it shows how trucks might change in the future to be more environmentally friendly.
Term
coatings
Coatings are special liquids you put on your car to help protect the paint and make it shiny. They can keep dirt off and help the car look good, but they might not be as strong as PPF.
Term
scratch resistant
Scratch resistant means that something can take a hit or a scrape without getting damaged easily. For car products, this is important because it helps keep the car looking nice.
Term
scratch resistance
Scratch resistance is how well something can avoid getting scratched up. For cars, it's important because it helps keep the paint looking nice and new.
Term
rock chips
Rock chips are tiny dents or scratches on your car's paint that happen when small rocks hit it while you're driving. They can make your car look bad and can cause bigger problems if not fixed.
Term
adhesive layers
Adhesive layers are the sticky parts that help things stick to each other. For car films, these layers make sure the film stays on the car's paint and protects it well.
Term
self-healing properties
Self-healing properties mean that if the film gets a small scratch, it can fix itself over time, usually when it gets warm. This helps keep the car looking good without needing to replace the film.
Term
hardness
Hardness tells us how tough a material is against scratches and dents. A higher number means it's harder and can resist damage better, which is important for things like paint protection films.
Car
Nissan Titan
The Nissan Titan is a big truck that can carry heavy loads and is great for both work and fun activities. It's known for being strong and having a lot of space inside.
Term
hydrophobics
Hydrophobics means that something doesn't like water and pushes it away. For cars, this helps keep them cleaner because water and dirt can slide off easily.
Term
wild claims
Wild claims are big promises that sound too good to be true. For example, saying you never have to wash your car again after using a special coating is a wild claim because it's hard to believe.
Term
acid bath
An acid bath is a cleaning method that uses strong liquids to help remove really tough dirt or stains from a car's surface. It's used when regular washing doesn't work.
Term
pH scale
The pH scale is a way to measure how acidic or basic something is. It helps people choose the right cleaning products for cars, depending on what they need to clean.
Term
touchless wash
A touchless wash cleans your car without any brushes or cloths touching it. It uses water and soap sprayed at high pressure to remove dirt and grime.
Term
chemical burn
A chemical burn happens when strong cleaning products damage the surfaces of your car, like the paint or plastic parts. It can make them look bad or even cause them to break down.
Term
Touch Free Wash
A Touch Free Wash is a car wash that cleans your car without any brushes or cloths touching it. It uses powerful water jets to remove dirt and grime, which helps prevent scratches on the car's surface.
Term
vinyl wrap
Vinyl wrap is like a big sticker that you put on a car to change its color or design. It's not permanent, so you can take it off if you want to go back to the original look.
LIVE
Welcome to the pints and polishing podcast, the most influential and listen to podcast in auto detailing. Welcome to the community.
I just 2026. Most of our listeners, presumably all I would think have put on a ceramic coating if they haven't installed. These are the least heard of one. Yeah. I mean, it's 2026. Right. So let's do top three.
According to chat GBT, top three. No, I'm joking. But top three wild claims about ceramic coatings. Mildren, please don't send us an email.
When we talk about it, though, Nick, the fun things I was trying to say before is like we do the the old back to the not Jay Leno, but Jay Letterman top 10. Right.
Now there's just we're just going to go in and just assault these. But let's go over them and talk through them. Right. The number three, which I'm calling is, well, lifetime permanent, like that you can put something on a car, it will stay there forever.
Can it be done? Is there possible that you can put anything on a car and it lasts forever.
I think there's arguments of cars that never move. I mean, I put waxes in car collections that there's no possible way for the wax to get damaged. Right. It never sees sunlight, never goes outside, never drives on the road for a car that sees the elements. No, it's not possible.
And I think, again, when you dive deeper into how are people giving away lifetime claims, what we see in the fine print is basically coming in yearly and putting another ceramic coating on and then quote unquote achieving lifetime. Right. So
one of the things that's happened with sort of the warranty part of the business is the thing that you and I know very well is it's become very fine print oriented and how many people read even the installer read the fine print. And so when you read the fine print on lifetime coatings, you'll start to find a big hole in all of it, saying,
Well, it's not actually lifetime. We need you to come in every year and we're going to actually put another coating on the car every year and then we can achieve a lifetime coating.
It's like if we ever hear forever or hear, hey, you can get this permanent. What is it? What is forever? Right. Like, what does that even mean? And what is the, what's the, as you mentioned, warranty? Right. So what's the fine print? Well, what's the guidelines that I've got to do that's going to create this eternal, right, this forever thing?
You know, recently had to go into just like you appliances. They loved it, right? I had to get a dishwasher had to pump went out, it wouldn't, it wouldn't. Right. So you're either scooping out dirty water that sits there or
get it replaced, right? So you get it replaced. And while you're there, they go, Hey, we got this warranty because we're like, well, wait a second. Why do I need that? Like, talk me through because it's been a while since I've bought some appliances. He said right off the bat, I mean, you, you'll never get above five to seven years.
Oh, yeah, immediately through that number. Good salespeople in the appliance world are getting very honest. And that five to seven years is across the board here in Vegas and Tulsa in New York. They're, they're pretty much telling you planned obsolescence. You better put this on your checkerboard to get every five to seven years. I mean, it's, it's, it is getting that point. And for a guy like me, for a guy like you, I actually appreciate the honesty.
I know a lot of people get angry about that honesty. But I think you're also disconnecting yourself from reality when people are trying to tell you like, Hey, this is the way it's being designed. I'm not the designer. I'm not the manufacturer. I'm just a guy or gal selling this to you. And I'm telling you, stop thinking. I mean, that's what happened with our refrigerator. I mean, when we talked to the woman that we ended up going with, she looked at it and goes, You guys have had a good run. I'm like, a good run.
Like it doesn't feel like a good run. It feels like it was awful. Right. But to her credit, she's like, I'm just telling you, that's a good run in today's world.
You know, and I was talking to the guy and I go, Oh, is it the old just don't make him like they used to?
Yeah, sure. Sure.
And that's sort of what it was like, I go, but really like, I mean, because some of those you used to say, for instance, like a freezer. I mean, you bought a freezer in the 50s.
It was a thing last forever is what people would say, right?
Like, look, I have a family member. I mean, I shared this before.
Last year, they renovated their kitchen. They had been in the house for 25 years. They had the refrigerator that came with the house.
And it never broke down and never needed fixed in the whole 25 years until they just got a new fridge.
I mean, to say things were built different. Sometimes it's, you know, dad get off my lawn guy. And sometimes it's just a fact of what's going on.
And the same thing we can see in our business, everybody listening to this is like coatings, you know, everybody's trying to extend something or telling you they have special things.
And we put out a video last week about the truth about ceramic coatings. And one of the comments from from West on the video is exactly right.
Most people sitting in our chairs as manufacturers say this will last up to three years.
Our claim is this is going to last three years or beyond.
And that's a very big difference in wording, because we don't say up to three years. This is going to last you three years.
Okay, on tray or things like that. So when you get into 10 year eight year lifetime, you got to redefine print.
I mean, you got to really redefine print as an installer and you got to ask yourself is that something you want to put your name on. And if you're a consumer, you got to ask if this makes sense.
Does it make sense that you got a Porsche Cayenne, you just drove it off the dealer a lot.
Porsche doesn't say the paint systems lifetime, they're not going to make that claim.
But Timmy's coding company is going to provide lifetime protection for the paint system that's not even guaranteed for lifetime of the car.
That seems a little bit strange.
So to get to common sense, we need to do the Nick Walters, you know, hey, just say it out loud.
Yes.
Right. If you just will take a moment and just say it, because you just start to think is clear code.
Life doesn't know clear code itself. As you've talked about, immediately starts oxidizing as soon as it leaves the factory.
Oh, as soon as it's laid down. I mean, as soon as it hits air, it's it's going to start some type of oxidation process.
You look out my window right now, there's a Toyota outside in front, that the hood, the roof, and the trunk lid are completely burnt.
That'll buff out would be the joke many of us would say, right? I'm looking at it right now.
Toyota can't produce a lifetime clear coat that fights against the sun here in Las Vegas.
What is what is the fine print of a lifetime coding?
Right. Well, so if clear coat is going to degrade, so then something you put on the clear code by nature will automatically start to degrade by disqualification of being some some.
And this is where some people go, well, no, that's why you have to mechanically, you know, remove the oxidation.
And I've seen where people say, hey, you know, mechanically do this and you'll leave these marks and then you can put down the lifetime and it goes in because you have the mechanically it fills plus and it does its other thing and we go, OK.
Can we and have we achieved in technology this level of bonding forever at a molecular level that never needs reapplication?
No, it's not. Again, you can say this pretty clearly. Mercedes, Porsche, Ford, Toyota, billions upon billions of dollars spent at this point on paint systems, if not trillions, if you add it all up over decades and decades and decades.
If they're not guaranteeing paint systems for a lifetime, I think it's pretty safe to say there's nothing out there that's going to last lifetime because they would just do it.
It would be a sales point for them. Your car is never going to oxidize. Your car is never going to get burned. We got I mean, it would just be a leg up in the marketplace.
And again, I think all of us have to look at this just from a common sense perspective.
And also, we need to realize that the more we talk about things that sound outlandish, the more people that are going to get burnt in the marketplace and drive them away from using these products in the future.
It's happens in the PPF world. It happens in the tint world. It happens in the detailing world with coatings. There's just no reason we do have good technology. Let's say that there's great technology to help people protect their paint system.
You don't really have to oversell it.
In a common sense way, and I think everything plays itself out in a good way.
Number two, wild claims about ceramic coatings. And you were, well, you must have been sniffing right there because you mentioned PPF.
Right. Number two, wild claim. After we've said that a coating will last forever. We've also developed inside of quote unquote, our industry. We developed this wild claim. Well, ceramic coatings can actually now replace PPF. It will prevent a rock chip that, you know, got thrown off of a semi truck trailer up ahead of us at 90 miles an hour.
And it will prevent that from damaging the clear coat. And you know what, it will also self heal like PPF, right? So there are some wild claims that you can completely never have to put PPF on and that it will self heal like PPF. That's, that's pretty wild.
Well, PPF doesn't self heal forever. Number one, there's a lot of misnomers about self healing PPF. Let's put that out in the open. You know, basically it's a top coat thing. Once that top coat, you know, starts to wear a little bit, it's not going to self heal. That's been proven a million times over.
We don't have to take my word for it. It shouldn't be a sales point at all. In my opinion, it's just a marketing thing. And look, we don't make PPF. So I'm not taking a shot at anybody here, any competitors of ours. I've said this direct to companies, direct to the reps, direct to the vice presidents.
Everyone knows it's kind of nonsense after a certain period of time. Does it, does it work the day you install it and it's right out of the box? Sure. Try that six months in, eight months in, a year in, you'll see that that goes away.
The idea that that that coatings are taking away or, you know, achieving what PPF can achieve. I think it's just also one of these things unnecessary. You know, first of all,
there aren't a lot of customers buying coatings that are asking me in particular, and I'd say you when you get calls, is this going to start stop a rock chip. So somebody's introducing this
to the customer rather than the customer saying, I want a coating that stops rock chips. So whether that's a coding company, a group of installers, whoever it may be, a YouTube channel, a Tik Tok, it doesn't matter why we're introducing this. It's not really anything any customers ever brought up to me.
You know, maybe they've watched a video online and asked me, Hey, this kind of sounds weird. Is this how it works? Maybe once in a blue moon, I might get that.
But I don't get that as this is why I'm putting a coating on my car. I don't even think the customer's thinking that way. It's just an unnecessary thing to have even a little bit of a conversation about
coatings are great at what they do. PPF is great at what it does. All of it has a limitation of some kind. And I don't think there's any reason to oversell any of this.
You know, we we think in the past of always gone, you know, why why why is it needs to be claimed that, you know, nine H means it is scratch resistant, right? Like, why does, you know, we would go in to go the pencil versus regular and you can go into all these
different things when we have these discussions.
I still want to know why. But as you mentioned, it's probably because some people just needed to get something out into it.
But I'm still also going to go why like why why did we have to go to such wild claims to be able to sell something right like it always made sense to me that that it became easier maintenance right
like you're gonna have nine age because well it prevents things coming and it helps but it never was a cure all like PPF to me I know isn't a cure all but it was much more I could I could I could hang my hat I guess on like hey no PPF that would be your answer if if you're
looking for right scratch resistance or like
shopping cart going into your bumper at the right Cody's not going to prevent that PPF will, you know, give you a give you a chance give you a chance right like we mentioned the rock flying off of you know here we got gravel trucks going around
all the time here saying you got the after the snow how much stuff is now on the roads that you're just driving you just hear the like it's like
listen my my old beamer right that I bought the front low part of that bumpers covered say what's hammered with little dots. Yep. I never just did just in my mind when I'm the installer I'm somebody putting I've never thought that this liquid that I'm putting on
this nine age which I always would brag about or you know we put this I did I never crossed the line over into imagination and go it's magically going to now do these things.
And it because it doesn't happen right so there's a lot of reasons.
That PPF stops rock chips that are just not achievable with something in a liquid in a bottle. Right. There's, you know, thick adhesive layers. There's multi layers of the film.
There's just the thickness of all of it and the pliability of all of it. But again, it's not even perfect. I mean, I've had people that drove their sports cars really hard and the PPF gave them a fighting chance but it didn't it didn't stop every rock chip.
It just didn't. And by the way, did a great job. I'm not it doesn't make it a bad product. There's just limitations to all of this. And for whatever reason,
it's very easy to tell yourself that I want to get rid of the limitations. That's great if the technology gets rid of them.
But the technology is not getting rid of the limitations. It's just those are the limitations of the technology. And like I've told people before,
go get dealer installed PPF and then get PPF at a shop like mine. I guarantee you the PPF we put on is going to stop rock chips better than the dealer PPF.
It's the same product to everybody. No mills are different. Quality is different.
Everything is different because what's the dealer want they want to deal from their installer.
And so they're putting a lower quality PPF on more susceptible to allow rock chips through. So even in that world,
I can show you limitations of what's being installed. And it's the same quote unquote product, right? It's a PPF
product, but
I can put on a better PPF product at my shop than they're willing to do at the dealership.
Yeah, all right. So finishing off with the scratch resistant part and the self healing and all that,
we got to think that, you know, to be able to self heal, it's got to be kind of elastic like
Elasticizable, right? It's got to be softer. It's softer. You got to be soft, but
nine H
hardness.
Yeah, soft.
Say it out loud. Yeah, so how so everybody that doesn't know
self healing properties are
achieved by a softer top coat.
That's what allows it to be malleable.
Okay, it is not rocket science. That is exactly how it works. It doesn't make it bad.
It does mean that there are different properties that you got to ask yourself when those go away,
which your self healing will go away, some of it rather quickly, like within a month,
some of it may get to three months, some of it may get to six months.
Have I seen a bunch of great behavior at the year mark of a daily driver? No.
And I see it all the time, right? Where somebody, I mean,
again, making a consumer angry over something that they never even needed to be told.
You never needed to tell them about self healing. They just wanted to stop rock chips.
Why'd you need to tell them? Because your rep told you and the, you know, manufacturer told you,
but you never just said, Hey man, this is going to help you stop some rock chips.
Hey, the install is good. We did it professionally. Thanks for your money.
If anything happens, give us a call.
Three months later, they're like, Hey, I can see scratches on my hood.
You did that wire brush test at your shop and I'm not supposed to be able to see them.
And then all of a sudden you're in an argument over something the customer was never even asking for.
I don't see the benefit of that. And I'm glad you brought it up.
Say these things out loud. If somebody's getting PPF to stop rock chips,
in what universe did they bring up self healing to you? They never did.
All right. Number one, wild claim about ceramic coatings.
Well, I actually, at one point in time, I remember taking a photo and seeing after rain,
seeing that little bit of dirt right on the top of my white Nissan Titan.
And seeing because right at the very first ceramic coatings, you just got so mesmerized by
the hydrophobics and everything. We can all go back to those very first times and put in
seeing the results and like we can go like a kid in a candy store, right? Like a kid super excited
about their shit, right? Whatever it is, just excitement of going, wow. And I remember walking
up to my Titan and going, wow, look at that little bit of dirt. Like, hey, it pulled off because the
hydrophobics, it pulled off the dirt. And wow, I could see why some people would say
that you never have to wash your car again. Well, wait, what? That is one of the wildest claims
about ceramic coatings. You don't have to wash your car. Like Anna maybe will even tell you not to
wash your car, but they don't really give you the explanation of how you're supposed to
take care of this product that's going to last forever and do all these amazing things that then
you never even have to clean it. Guess what? The rain, our great and wonderful world,
has provided us clean water that falls out of the sky and cleans our car for us.
Yeah, I mean, the washing thing was, I think, a bigger problem years ago. I think it was like
when the entry point people got real crazy with claims, they were setting cars on fire,
things like that. I think now, I don't hear a lot of people saying that, I'm sure it's happening,
but I think the one thing we are, I guess, struggling with is what does it mean to really
maintain? What does it mean to actually clean a car with a coating that there are
different types of car washes people are using, but again, we're pretty steadfast in,
there's a proper way to wash your car. Whether you have a coating or you don't have a coating,
we understand people are going to use car washes and we understand people aren't going to do it by
hand all the time, but we've never really kind of wavered from, there is a right way. I mean,
there is a way that's going to give you greater benefits long term. I mean, I've even said it
as simple as, if you just look at it, you only have to do it 12 times a year, you're going to
be ahead of the pack. If you just washed it in your driveway 12 times a year, I think you'd be
ahead of 99% of people doing it monthly, properly once, but we have to understand that I think
people are getting very loose with an understanding of the car wash part of it. I think we're getting
to a point where people are, well, my clients are going to go through a car wash and we're
advocates of that's going to happen. Okay, there's no reason to argue with a customer.
So let's pause there. Why are we there is important because it's not just a blanket statement.
We understand consumer habits. Sure. A, you have customers for a long period of time.
And B, I used to own a wash. I went from mobile detailer to car wash owner.
Sure. I love the habit of people washing their car. Like, it, I would always be the same as
we teach now. Like, well, if you get a good quality car wash dot dot dot, right, you don't have the
problems. Let's go over the problems that most people would say, and let's go over the different
types of car washes, right? So let's start with this, because I'm having a lot of these conversations.
And I want to make sure that we say something out right now.
A touch and a touchless are both car washes.
For some reason, there is a very high percentage of people right now that say
a car wash. And when they say it, they're using it as a term with something with a brush in it.
And then they think the touchless is not a car wash.
All right. So if we're driving down the street, we're going to see a sign that says car wash.
We got basically three different types of car washes, right? Like,
we got the ones that we would call kind of old school with the lanes that you got the different.
And this is where we do see those brushes where people are out there scrubbing.
They don't have to use the brush. It's called a self-service car wash.
You can do it yourself. In a bay. At these places inside of there, there's also usually
what they call a rollover, right? It's a bay that you'll see a line where people are waiting.
They'll go and pay, they'll go in. At that place that's rollover, they're going to be either
a touchless or they're going to say brushless. These are some of the lingo terms inside of car
washing because there's another sign that you might see that says car wash. You're going to see
this big row and it's going to have all these like vacuum hoses and these like curved lines.
And you see these bays where people are in there getting to town. And then this long tunnel,
we're going to see a bunch of cars going through it inside of those.
Maybe you can find a touchless. It's going to be difficult. Most of those are,
they would also say a brushless, but they would say soft cloth. Now the reason there's the brushless
that they don't want to be, and that's the old school that they're trying to not be associated
with from back in the 80s and the 90s or rebranding. Well, yeah, it is brand because it is because
of abrasion, right? Like inside of there, they're trying to educate their customers that, hey,
we're using and the wash we built, we used a company in California that had patented a style of,
they called it lamb's wool. And it was they were mimicking a very soft cloth. And so our machines
went very slow. I get it, detailers. And Nick's even Nick's even got a smirk now. I get it. But in
that world, there's differentiation because the old school brushes, the nylon things, those real
bristle weave ones, that's really what truly after car up, right? Like now they move to these nylon,
if they don't work that, they move to these like nylon foam things that come and slap around. And
if you got enough lubrication on the surface, they do a pretty good job. But as I talked about,
remember on those wheels, or on the back of SUVs, you can see those like little finger things. That's
how you know somebody went through one of those style of washes. Yeah, so but it's important that
every single one of these types of washes has a positive and a list of negative traits.
Yeah. Yeah. Okay. The the thing that you can't get involved in is telling yourself that somehow
these are all not connected, because they are connected. They are. And I think I got a lot
of listeners I know you mentioned Wesley, he goes to the self serves. There's a there's plenty of
people that will go to a self serve wash. And I completely am okay with it too. You can go and
not use the brush, right? Use it for the power washer part. Now some of these washes will let
you bring your own stuff in. But a lot of them will say no bucket washing or they don't want you
to right they money on chemicals. Yeah, I mean, they're the ones paying the payment for the dirt
and they you know, it's their equipment. Let's trust me the the dollar you spend on the water
isn't gonna is gonna make their pain to say this. That's the minority.
It is but that is I mean, there is a place that some people do go and there's a way to use it
intelligently. So yeah, let's let's let's say that that is the way exception to the rule.
The major rule here is somebody's going through some type of tunnel.
Mm hmm. That has some day. Yeah. Yeah, that has some type of let's just make it simple.
A touchless or a brushed is a tunnel that is 90 plus percent of the marketplace as we sit here
in 2026 in most major cities. They are going to have a brush. No matter what's in there,
like you said, some are better than others. But let's not get down that road. There's a brush
or there's a brushless which is a touchless wash.
We've had a boom of them here, right? Like people have started to invest in cities,
you know, 20 30 50 million. And they're the easiest ones when we talk about ceramic coatings
are the easiest ones to pick off. They're the low hanging fruit. Because whether or not we're
going to buy into quote unquote brushless or foam, it is friction. And it's friction that's
happening at a rapid rate. And we will always say that abrasion is going to be the very first thing
that starts to destroy a ceramic coating. So we don't even have to really spend a lot of time
on that tunnel wash. I think the big one when people detailers would say, don't go there. It's
okay if you go to those ones at the gas station, or at the self serve, where it is touchless.
Yeah, we're starting to see this big. And again, I don't want to say that that's the wrong thing
to say if the customer is going to do nothing. There's an argument that a touchless is better
than nothing, right? Yep. So but let's talk about this. One of the things we have to realize
about touchless is you are relying solely on the operators of the car wash
to hire the vendors and then the vendors doing the right thing at the car wash. That's that's a
lot. We've already got a lot of moving parts here. And let's let's look at that moving part
because we can understand a lot of us will go to some of those those places we can look around a
is that high quality of like, you know, does it look awesome? Is that paneling clean?
Is the signage all clean? That can give you some early signs on is this operator is he heavily
involved with making sure it's staying up because the vendor really what happens with the vendor
as somebody who went in to sell soap to those guys, they really do want which we can all just
kind of understand. Hey, listen, I want the lowest price for the biggest bang. Yep. And so when you
do that, you're talking about heavy concentrates. Yep. Just like with all of you, we've talked
about the misuse of concentrates at a detailer level. Now go to something that should be
1000 to one. Concentrate. So like a ton. I understand. But let's not go too far. Okay,
let's look at far. I've got an actual forum though. Okay, yeah, think about this. Like,
most of them are generally at about 20 to one for a presale. That's the same as a foam cannon.
But a foam cannon, we put two ounces or one ounce of a neutral pH. If we're doing cleanse, we're
like, Well, we really big. So this is like put caustic soda and old school degrees are
full strength. Yeah, I mean, it's it's look, this is dangerous stuff. So the number one thing we
all know we can see is what we call chemical burn, where it just becomes obvious something's wrong,
you see lines, you see, you know, where it doesn't matter how well it was rinsed, it just fried some
plastic fried a hood fried a trunk and whatever. Yeah. So
there's also something else we need to talk about, especially if you're if you're a person that has
your car coded or you're somebody coding cars. There's also things you can't see with the naked eye.
Which is this person has gone, they came to your shop, or you or you're mobile and you
have a coding on or you're somebody with a coding on. And you go why I went to this touch free wash
over here. 25 times in the last six months and my coding is failing. Let me make something clear.
Any good coding, including ours. What would chemically strip that coding off would cause
so much damage, you'd be able to see it. So it's not stripping the coding off. It's leaving scum behind.
And now we get into my my car's not beating like it should. The part that's getting left out by
most detailers or shops talking to these people is okay, you went to that touch free wash.
Yes, maybe you get out at the end and dry it off with a towel so you don't see the little droplets.
But you may be maybe.
But I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt on that. But what you're never going to feel because
you don't have the experience and you're never going to see because you can't see it with the naked
eye, is that there's a ton of high alkaline cleaner left on the surface. Yep. It's not damaging
anything, meaning visually layer. It's just a layer. We always called it soap scum. So we always
call I mean, because if you go back to paint car soap, you could put I mean, you could lay some
scum down and what happens, right? So you've got to use this high alkaline plus the high
concentration. Plus, and you haven't even mentioned heat. If it happens to be a hot day,
you just got a lot of chemistry that's having to do a lot of work really fast. And then it also
has to be rinsed off and they'll put this drying aid, which is basically just think of it like an
oil to help the water break apart and go but but if it hasn't breaking off all the the bonding of
everything, you can understand how there's just a little bit of the surfactant or a little bit of
stuff, because we were at such a high concentration. Wow, let's remember needs to be a lot of water.
Yep, that water coming out, they really want to do high pressure low volume. Yep, you need both
actually, and water is more expensive many times. So those rent cycles sometimes get a little shortened.
So not everything gets rinsed off, then the mineral stick everything's and that you just get
that compound effect. Right. So but a but a high end touchless wash would have multiple layers
of high alkaline. Then they would spray low alkaline to break the high alkaline apart.
When does anybody ever really do that in any of these washes? They don't because like you said,
they use high alkaline because that gets most dirt, debris, oils, things like that off.
That's what they're going to spend their money on. They're not going to do the second step guys,
because that's where the customers are going to complain, right? That's window films. Yep,
that you didn't get my bugs off 100%. So they're fighting, literally not wanting to spend on one
more chemical. That's it. That's all we're talking about here. So then what happens,
your customer comes back and they say the water behavior of my coatings gone in six months.
It's not gone. It is being covered up and smothered by a film from going front to a touch free wash.
Can I get what is it coding clog for 100 Alex? Yeah, I mean, it's it's not clogged, right? It's
that's the term we use inside the business, right? It's a good thing to say to a customer,
right? Yeah, because it is clogging me. Yeah, it's just being covered up, right? So
you got this scum. So then you bring it in and use cleanse or maybe even go stronger and use TRX
and a foam cannon and nothing's breaking apart, because you're fighting fire with fire and not
fire with water. Okay, so the water in this instance is an acidic bath. That's and and again,
we use the word minerals because of water spotting, but this is actually breaking apart.
There's actually a you're trying to create a reaction to get the chemical to break loose.
Okay, so that's why if you do a high alkaline wash, like some people are doing 13 on the pH
scale at a detail shop. If you're not neutralizing that down, you're doing the same thing as a
touch free wash. There's a reason why cleanse sits at on the pH scale where it does. We can make a
13 pH. But to do it responsibly and get the best finish, you'd have to neutralize it out with an
acid wash. Okay, that's it's a very simple chemical understanding here. You got to realize the touch
free wash Marty just told you is trying to buy the cheapest chemicals. Do you think they're trying
to add more chemicals to their wash? No, they just want the high alkaline cleaner. They want to churn
and burn. They want to flush it off with water. That's not how it always works. Because like Marty
said, the water is usually not high pressure enough, not enough volume, not enough this, not enough that
the stuff could have stuck on there quickly because it was, you know, 85 degrees outside the
panels were 100 plus degrees. It kind of fried a little bit when it walked in there because they
didn't do a proper rinse down in the tunnel. So before you call somebody, any chemical
manufacturer and say the coating doesn't work. As soon as you hear touchless, you have to assume
an acid bath is in order. Because if you don't use cleanse use TRX, if that's not breaking
everything loose, you got to go to the other side of the pH scale. And you got to acid bath this
stuff off there. And and that's your best hope to get this thing back to working again.
All right, I'm a detailer. And I've got a customer that got a ceramic coating couple years ago.
They've come in, we haven't regularly maintained the car, you know, it's whether whether the
customer hasn't ever respond to coming back in or maybe we're not really a shop that that cares to
quote unquote have maintenance for our customers where we see them on a regular basis, right? Like
this is just a circumstance, right? We're going to go through a situation here.
Because we can give all this information that I really wonder when you get into these situations
and somebody comes and says, Hi, hey, you coded my car. Well, I bet you it starts with a phone
call. Sure. Usually that phone call, you can tell there's real uncomfortable. Yep. You know,
it could be a hey, I don't mean to bother you or hey, I don't mean but I got this little prop
right that could be one way or they could just come after you like sure. Hey, you said that
fill in the blank. Okay, sir, ma'am, come on into the shop. You know, let me take a look at it.
You know, they get there. How have you maintained it? Well, what does that mean? Okay, well, sir, ma'am,
how have you washed the car? Like what have you been doing? Oh, well, I go through this place
right down over here, because you said it was okay. All right, all right. And there's where we get,
right? Like, what do we do after maybe we've actually been somebody that's listening, there's
recommended a certain place or you know, we've thought that, Hey, this seems to be that way,
because as you said, Hey, if if we don't have a maintenance form, we can at least send them there.
You know, if we get in a situation, I bet you, you know, our heart rate gets up and we start
doing okay, what's our process then, you know, walk us through how to handle the customer. Yeah,
so I think you need to start at the way you release cars. Right. People need to learn
there's certain things to be said and certain things not to be said.
Our recommendation is you hand wash it. We've told shops you should be carrying our products,
you hand them a bucket of products for a certain cost. And you go, this is what we tell people to
do. This is the best way to look after your car with a coating on it. I'm not going to do that.
Okay, great. Let me tell you the pluses and the minuses of going to that touch free wash that
you're telling me you're going to go through because I'm not going to tell you what to do with
your car. I gave you the recommendation. Some people feel that they should so you're basically
going to say hey, don't if if they choose other than the number one recommended, don't even put
yourself into the boat of being okay with other options. Yeah, just just how you just said that.
Yes, be okay that they're going to do something else. I don't know what you were trying to say
there. Yes, I was saying yeah, you say that you want to do it this way. I think some people
gone okay, if you're not going to do it this way, we're okay with you doing what you said. Okay,
should you should you not even I know you're okay with it right but you're not going to put
yourself in the camp so that they can come back later and go you told me I could go to that
touchless wash. Yeah, what I'm saying is once they tell you they're going to the touchless wash,
you're never signing off on it. What you're saying is okay, man, I'm not here to tell you what to
do with your car. That's that's the energy. But I'm going to tell you the pluses and minuses.
It's better than doing nothing. Mr Smith. Okay, it's better than doing nothing. But I want you
to understand what can happen at these touchless washes. You can get chemical burn, it can burn
your plastics, it can burn your wheels, it can burn the coating, you have to bring it back in,
I'll have to fix it, I'll have to polish that off. We'll have to hope it didn't do further damage.
Also, it can build up scum on your car, where your coating is not reacting properly, and you'd
have to also come in for a certain type of service to fix that issue. I'm not getting into an
argument. That's the whole point here. I'm also not standing there saying nothing.
There are pluses, there are minuses. I gave you the best. You just told me this, let me be an
education on that, not telling you not to do it. And then six months a year later, two years later,
to your point, they call me and they have that attitude. I can always say with every car we
release, we tell people how to wash their car, we have the products here that put you in the
best position to win. What did you do? Well, I go to Jimmy's Touch Free Wash down the street.
Remember that conversation we had about the Touch Free Washing? You're going to have to bring the
car in. I'm going to have to assess it. There's going to be some type of fee to get this coating
back to proper benefits, so to speak, and how it should work. That could be an acid bath.
That could be all the way to polishing and reapplying something like stack.
The thing is, though, when you release a car and you start signing off on things with no
governor of, hey, we want you to know how this kind of goes and not coming from a how dare you,
that's not what I'm doing. I'm just going, I want you to know how this works. And I don't think you
can go wrong there because you're always going to be operating from the high ground. I told you,
I educated you, you made a call. All good, man. It's your Porsche. You made the call.
But remember that conversation we had? Could even be part of most of us have some sign off for
sure. If if if you need to get to that level, hopefully you know, there's all kinds of CRMs
out there that you guys are using, right? Build a form in the CRM that gets emailed directly
after you install ceramic coating that has the pluses and minuses of everything.
Here's what we tell you to do and maintain. Here's all the hyper clean products available.
Next, here's what happens in a brush wash. Here's what happens in a touch free wash.
Here's the ramifications of that. You make that document one time, and it's sent to everybody,
you're covered. I'm not saying it's not a pain in the ass to make the first time and you'll have
to tweak it a little bit. But you'll be fine. Right? I'm not doing the argument thing. By the
way, this happens with PPF all the time. You know, me PPF jobs, people come in here. Edges will be
ripped up and I'll be like, Yeah, you went to that wash down the street, didn't you? Uh, uh, uh,
it's like, buddy, I can see that there was a brush on here that ripped up the edge.
I need people to understand this happens to everybody.
We think coatings are special or PPF is special or tend to nothing, nothing special.
You just have to know how to mitigate the things that come up the most in the thing that you're
installing. So if you're installing PPF, people going through a brush wash and having the edges
come up is a big concern. Just go ahead and mitigate your liability on that. Like you said,
with a form, with a speech you give, so you always are on the high ground going,
I kind of walked you through that. We're happy to fix it for you, but it's not going to be fixed
for free because we warned you not to do what you did, but it is your car. So we didn't want to
tell you not to do that. We just want to make sure you understand the pluses of minuses of it.
And if we do it as the pluses of minuses, it didn't come off as sometimes,
you know, we'll make people check something or hey, guarantee me you're not going to do
dot, dot, dot, dot. And it varies almost comes across very aggressive, like, oh, wait, if I do
this, then what happens? Like, yeah, that's what's going to happen. But you just gave it away, like,
and then they're like, wait a second. Sure. And there can be all that fun. And look, I've been
both. Anybody lying to you says they haven't mishandled one of these situations. We've all
mishandled stuff. The easiest part now is we have so long in the marketplace of PPF and so long
in the marketplace of people having coatings installed. Just learn from everyone else's screw
ups, mine, yours, anybody that's been doing this a long time. Here's what I'm saying. I'm not getting
in an argument in my shop about how somebody went to go through a car wash. I'm just going to make
sure they know I gave you the best. Here's what I'm going to tell you can happen from what the
choices you're making. If you need anything from us, let us know. We'll be happy to fix anything
that comes up and call it a day. And a lot of people vinyl wrap business, the PPF business
and the coding business have a liability because they offer no solution for maintenance.
They don't offer products to sell. And they don't offer to do it at the shop.
Or they don't do it as a mobile guy. Guess what? You're not really giving them any solutions.
And so
what happens with the fight, you know, like the fight actually happens because the customer
doesn't feel there's a solution to the issue. Sure. Whether or not the issue is their fault,
whether or not they believe what are like, if there's no real solution, that's when the fight
happens. The fight wants to fight starts. It's not good. You never leave a fight without a black
eye. And if you've been in business long enough, listen, you don't want to look like that guy
from what a couple weeks ago, where you and I were texting back and forth right the day after
right his eyes were like this and like what happens right enough blows and enough little hits.
You eventually get some puffy faces and you don't look so great. It doesn't matter your
Google reviews. Like it doesn't know. So it's almost how do you you mitigate it going in and
you mentioned something you mitigate it with here's some products to take care of it. I value
use the customer. I value the money you just spent. Yep, we all know that if somebody spends
a thousand dollars in 2026, they spend $500 they spend 1500 in 2026. That's a lot of money.
Look, part of it is you got to respect your customer. You know, we're having a lot of
conversations right now with PPF shops that are trying to rectify some mistakes.
Number one, getting out of the coding business. But number two, they're starting to talk to
talk about maintenance because when you get so big as some of these PPF shops,
they can create a lot of headache if they don't have solutions. And I'm here to tell you,
be in the solutions business. A solution. If you don't have the ability to have a
maintenance program at the moment is to come on as a distributor, get 50% off all your products,
make some money on them in your shop. The other thing is you can hold clinics once a month to
bring people like a cars and coffee of how to wash your car properly. You could do that 12 times a
year and bring people into your shop at a cars and coffee and offer them some value. Again,
I'm not trying to tell anybody what to do. I'm trying to say I'm getting way too many questions
about touchless washes. And I go, guys, it's not better or worse. There's pluses and minuses.
And if the coding starts to act weird, there is scum on that car. And most of the time,
it's high alkaline scum. Stop trying to fight high alkaline with high alkaline. You got to
break it off with an acid bath. And as hyper clean, we're trying to come up with solutions
that can move you and make it easier for you. But we want to make those solutions properly.
And so I'll say to everybody out there, we always talk about using proper chemicals. Here's another
point of it. That if you don't understand how to use chemicals to your benefit,
you're struggling. And I have a weird story right now on a very expensive car that a shop
messed up completely because of misunderstanding chemicals happens every day, guys, don't feel
bad about it. This is the episode. How do you fix one of those touchless wash build ups more
than likely? I'm not saying 100% of time, it's got to be pretty damn near 100% of time. You got
to get high alkaline stuck on cleaner off that car. So scum, we could we could basically now
define soap scum as the silent killer of ceramic code. No question. No question. Great episode.
We'll see everybody next week. See you guys.
About this episode
Ceramic coatings are often marketed with exaggerated claims, leading to confusion among consumers. The hosts dissect common misconceptions, such as the idea that coatings can provide lifetime protection or replace paint protection films (PPF). They emphasize the importance of understanding fine print in warranties and the realistic longevity of these products. Through engaging discussions and relatable anecdotes, they highlight the need for honesty in the detailing industry and encourage listeners to approach claims with a critical mindset.
Original notes
In this conversation, Marshall and Nick delve into the common misconceptions surrounding ceramic coatings, particularly the wild claims made about their longevity and effectiveness. They discuss the reality of lifetime warranties, the differences between ceramic coatings and paint protection film (PPF), and the importance of proper maintenance and washing techniques.
The conversation emphasizes the need for transparency with customers regarding product capabilities and the potential pitfalls of improper care. Ultimately, they advocate for a solutions-oriented approach in the detailing industry to enhance customer satisfaction and product performance.
Chapters
00:00 The Myth of Lifetime Ceramic Coatings
09:52 Ceramic Coatings vs. Paint Protection Film (PPF)
18:00 The Misconception of Maintenance and Washing
38:00 Handling Customer Expectations and Solutions
Pints and Polishing Auto Detailing Podcast
Nick Walters and Marshall Hill
0:00
50:51