balefire

I've seen a few posts on upkeep for berlina, so I though I'd chime in. Once upon a time, I had the time to 3/5 step wash, clay, cleaner, polish, and wax my car once a month... Now that I work my butt off and am married, I have spent the last few years trying to find the quickest method and yet keep my berlina black looking wet. Here's my current solution:

Once a month:
1) Mr. Clean Auto Wash & Dry system & Wash mitt
2) Eat dinner with the wife as the car dries.
3) Meguiar Cleaner Wax or Colorx using an orbital buffer

Weekly:
1) Mr. Clean Auto Wash & Dry system & Wash mitt
2) Meguiar Quik Wax while car wet using an orbital buffer

It isn't perfect, but its pretty close, and its about as quick a job as possible while still keeping my car a deep wet berlina black.

Reasons:

Mr. Clean Auto Dry
-I hate frantically drying my car to avoid water spots that are easily seen on black.
-Mr Clean Auto Dry isn't perfect, but helps a lot
-Cleaner Wax / Colorx / Quik Wax removes the few remaining water spots

Meguiar Cleaner Wax / ColorX
-I don't have time to cleaner / polish / wax. This combines them.
-Carnauba looks better than synthetics in my experience on berlina black.
-I'll take the trade off in durability for wetness / shine.

Quik Wax
-good for maintenance
-don't have to wait for car to dry

Some people add NXT Tech Wax (synthetic) on top of Cleaner Wax for the durability issue. I would rather spend that time next week with another round of Quik Wax or Cleaner Wax.

Hope this helps the lazy ones (or busy ones) with berlina!

wanabe

balefire-
good post... there are lotsa folks who are not perfectionists, but still want a nice shine!

do you ever get time to do a little more to the car?
post up some pics!!

MikeyC

You used to clay, clean, polish, and wax every month? There must not be a lot of clear coat left on your car.

s2ksimon

not entirely lazy as if i'm going to be doing heavy compund work, i employ its use to wash any dark colour finished in the sun to avoid water spots.

connorsgp

I've got about 3 coats of
McGuires Gold Class under about 10 coats of NXT...everynight my 14 yr old neighbor does the car with McGuires quik detailer..including wheels and tires for that I let him sit in the car and play CD's while he works.....

darkknight1999

yeah ok... Why would that matter if he's always claying the car, he should be. Its better than leaving the dirt on the car and then rubbing that dirt into your paint otherwise know as spider-webbing the paint. You remove maybe, and that's a hugh maybe 1-2 Microns of clear maybe, and that's if your using a super aggressive clay and your pushing really hard, (course if your car has clearcoat it has 45-60 microns of clearcoat) If you damage you clearcoat with clay your working it the wrong way.
Either way your much better off to clay the car than to just buff over all the dirt and fallout and rub it into your paint.

Bass

see that certification is paying off for you huh John

the orig poster should be BANNED from the wash wax section until he / she understands a black car should be pampered to least 30 hours detailing .. Mr. Clean products

darkknight1999

umm... yeah I think...

MikeyC

Uhhhh . . . my post was a joke. Also, I'm well aware that clay at worst only removes the most minor amount of clear coat.

darkknight1999

... sorry..., it seemed more serious to me the way it was written. My bad...