Looking For A Complete Detail List (Auto Store & Commercial Quality)

[BTD07]

Hey guys,
I am new here.
I recently traded in my 2015 B5 Charger for a 2017 Ram 1500 Laramie in Ivory Pearl.

I thought I would get into detailing more serious than I have in the past (which was not much compared to a lot of you), and I am a little lost on a good set up.

Lets say I want to wash, clay, mild polish (by hand, no orbital), wax/seal along with trim and wheel/tire cleaner and dressing. Interior too.

So I come to you guys with two requests:

1: What is your go to list for detailing in terms of products you cannot buy at an auto parts store/more commercial or professional products?

2:What is your list that you would settle for if you had to buy all products above at an auto parts store?

Thanks guys, I look forward to the replies!

 

[bhonshell37]

Hey guys,
I am new here.
I recently traded in my 2015 B5 Charger for a 2017 Ram 1500 Laramie in Ivory Pearl.

I thought I would get into detailing more serious than I have in the past (which was not much compared to a lot of you), and I am a little lost on a good set up.

Lets say I want to wash, clay, mild polish (by hand, no orbital), wax/seal along with trim and wheel/tire cleaner and dressing. Interior too.

So I come to you guys with two requests:

1: What is your go to list for detailing in terms of products you cannot buy at an auto parts store/more commercial or professional products?

2:What is your list that you would settle for if you had to buy all products above at an auto parts store?

Thanks guys, I look forward to the replies!

There are two top detailing forums. AUTOGEEK AND AUTOPIA. Each have a website as well. In my opinion, Griots Garage and Meguiars are excellent products one can purchase at Wal-Mart and auto parts stores. For microfiber, check THERAGCOMPANY and Autofiber, Microfiber Madness. On YouTube, Obsessed Garage, Waxmode, Adams and Accord79, Esoteric detailing

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[BTD07]

There are two top detailing forums. AUTOGEEK AND AUTOPIA. Each have a website as well. In my opinion, Griots Garage and Meguiars are excellent products one can purchase at Wal-Mart and auto parts stores. For microfiber, check THERAGCOMPANY and Autofiber, Microfiber Madness. On YouTube, Obsessed Garage, Waxmode, Adams and Accord79, Esoteric detailing

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Hey thanks for the info! I have peered at Autopia, but similar to here there are only some threads with specific products/uses, and not a list of all especially comparing store bought vs professional. Perhaps there is and I didnt do enough research? Instead of having to cross reference the entire threads, I thought someone might have a good list for themselves that they have compiled. Call me lazy haha. But I appreciate the reply and will look into it all!

 

[bhonshell37]

Hey thanks for the info! I have peered at Autopia, but similar to here there are only some threads with specific products/uses, and not a list of all especially comparing store bought vs professional. Perhaps there is and I didnt do enough research? Instead of having to cross reference the entire threads, I thought someone might have a good list for themselves that they have compiled. Call me lazy haha. But I appreciate the reply and will look into it all!

How much are you willing to spend? What I recommend is Meguiars gold class liquid wax. GRIOTS GARAGE spray wax. Meguiars Ultimate fast finish. Optimum Polymer Technologies or OPT sold by THERAGCOMPANY and the two sites I mentioned above. Amazon had a pretty good selection of detailing products. For a clay alternative, Nanoskin and Griots Garage. The two brands have clay pads, mits and towels. If one of these is dropped, simply rinse and keep decontaminating. Harbor freight carries a few Meguiars Mirror glaze line in tan bottles. M105 and M205 are good products but can be dusty when used on a foam or microfiber pad and daul action polisher.



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[chrisbh17]

How much are you willing to spend? What I recommend is Meguiars gold class liquid wax. GRIOTS GARAGE spray wax. Meguiars Ultimate fast finish. Optimum Polymer Technologies or OPT sold by THERAGCOMPANY and the two sites I mentioned above. Amazon had a pretty good selection of detailing products. For a clay alternative, Nanoskin and Griots Garage. The two brands have clay pads, mits and towels. If one of these is dropped, simply rinse and keep decontaminating. Harbor freight carries a few Meguiars Mirror glaze line in tan bottles. M105 and M205 are good products but can be dusty when used on a foam or microfiber pad and daul action polisher.



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Excellent advice.

There are a few products that are decent and available, like Griots and Meguiars listed above. M105 and M205 are good polishes, but dusty and oily....you'll need to make sure to remove the dust and oil before going to a last step, otherwise it wont bond well. Ive never tried it, but you should be able to use a 20% off HF coupon to buy them, it would be a gret deal for the 32 oz size of each.

Optimum makes excellent products....Im a fan of their semi-permanent coatings, but have tried a bunch of others as well (leather cleaner, all purpose cleaner, Hyperpolish, etc). Never been disappointed.

I started with the old school Porter Cable random orbital. Upgraded to the HF model (in this case, probably the only time an HF piece would be an upgrade )

Get your pads online, exclusively. Lake Country makes excellent pads and they are relatively inexpensive.

I just did my new RAM a few weeks ago, this is the process I went with:

Optimum HyperPolish with a white Lake Country polishing pad. HyperPolish is a spray-on polish, first time Ive ever used it and I was quite impressed. Never dusted, could get some cut along with no cut just to finish it all at once.

Once that was done I went back with an IPA (Isopropyl Alcohol) wipedown to make sure all of the polish remnants were gone.

After that I coated the truck with Optimum Gloss Coat.

If you didnt want to go with a semi-permanent coating and were more interested in protection than looks, go to a boat supply store and look for Collinite FleetWax. Its not the easiest product to work with (if you wait too long it becomes really hard to buff off), but it will protect for a long while.

 

[BTD07]

How much are you willing to spend? What I recommend is Meguiars gold class liquid wax. GRIOTS GARAGE spray wax. Meguiars Ultimate fast finish. Optimum Polymer Technologies or OPT sold by THERAGCOMPANY and the two sites I mentioned above. Amazon had a pretty good selection of detailing products. For a clay alternative, Nanoskin and Griots Garage. The two brands have clay pads, mits and towels. If one of these is dropped, simply rinse and keep decontaminating. Harbor freight carries a few Meguiars Mirror glaze line in tan bottles. M105 and M205 are good products but can be dusty when used on a foam or microfiber pad and daul action polisher.



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That is a good question. I would like to spend maybe $100 to start, if I went the auto parts store route, but if I went professional, who knows! I just dont have more than half a day to detail, with a family and such, so it would need to be efficient products. I really like the list you just said, it doesnt seem to be too pricey but good products. I am at the point where I would rather use nothing extra than buying bad products.

 

[bhonshell37]

100 dollars can get you a decent detailing kit. A kit may be your best option to research. Another product I like is HD SPEED. This is an all in one polish that is made for give some cutting ability and leaves a light layer of protection

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[Pull Ya]

IMHO---If you're budget is around $100 for supplies and your time is limited to 1/2 day I would recommend that you take your truck to a professional detailer and let them do the job. A full detail from start to finish can take a couple days especially if you include a ceramic coating. Without a coating--one full day for wash, clay, polish, seal and wax. A lot of the "better" polishes and sealants need time to bond to the surface before you can top them--I wait overnight before I wax over sealant. Once you have a "good" foundation your maintenance time is significantly reduced.
Jay

 

[BTD07]

IMHO---If you're budget is around $100 for supplies and your time is limited to 1/2 day I would recommend that you take your truck to a professional detailer and let them do the job. A full detail from start to finish can take a couple days especially if you include a ceramic coating. Without a coating--one full day for wash, clay, polish, seal and wax. A lot of the "better" polishes and sealants need time to bond to the surface before you can top them--I wait overnight before I wax over sealant. Once you have a "good" foundation your maintenance time is significantly reduced.
Jay

You're right, I just would want to do it myself. I guess if you take the word detail out, what are the products for a really good car wash? Haha

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[BTD07]

100 dollars can get you a decent detailing kit. A kit may be your best option to research. Another product I like is HD SPEED. This is an all in one polish that is made for give some cutting ability and leaves a light layer of protection

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What detailing kit for 100 could you recommend? If you know

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[bhonshell37]

What detailing kit for 100 could you recommend? If you know

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This is a loaded question. I will check Autopia and Autogeek and Detailed Image.

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[BTD07]

This is a loaded question. I will check Autopia and Autogeek and Detailed Image.

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Well thanks! I'll do some research too

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[bhonshell37]

SONAX Detail On-The-Go, Kit,https://www.autogeek.net/3d-detailers-choice-starter.html,3D Bucket Car Care Bundle. Here are a couple kits from AUTOGEEK under 100 dollars

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[Pull Ya]

With all the knowledge on this forum about detailing I think we can make some good recommendations regarding what product will give you the best bang for the buck and still do a good job and give your truck the protection you are looking for. My main concern still remains the time you are able to devote to this project. As I have said before, I just don't believe that a 1/2 day will be adequate to give your truck the kind of protection you are looking for.
Jay

 

[shadowhawk]

to get a decent finish to your paint, you really need a machine to do the work. Hand applying anything and working it in won't help level paint.

Griots offers a Porter-Cable random orbital style buffer. You'll need pads. I just bought an 8-pack of hex cell pads. You'll need a decent leveling compound, and then a good finishing polish. I've used Meguiar's with good results. Waxes are like oil- everyone has his/her favorite. My neighbor is using BlackFire products and loves the finish on her Camaro.

 

[BTD07]

With all the knowledge on this forum about detailing I think we can make some good recommendations regarding what product will give you the best bang for the buck and still do a good job and give your truck the protection you are looking for. My main concern still remains the time you are able to devote to this project. As I have said before, I just don't believe that a 1/2 day will be adequate to give your truck the kind of protection you are looking for.
Jay

Well the situation is this.
My wife and I live in an apartment with a 3 month old, so I have to go somewhere to wash it and don't have a garage so I can't really spend time and leave it and come back to doing it. But I ask, is there no way to achieve a great wash without spending an entire day? Like I said earlier, take the word detail out of it. It can't be that it's either spend 12+ hours on it or don't wash it at all right?

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[chrisbh17]

With all the knowledge on this forum about detailing I think we can make some good recommendations regarding what product will give you the best bang for the buck and still do a good job and give your truck the protection you are looking for. My main concern still remains the time you are able to devote to this project. As I have said before, I just don't believe that a 1/2 day will be adequate to give your truck the kind of protection you are looking for.
Jay

This.

Unless you mean literally 12 hours, half a day wont really cut it. I spent over half a day on protecting the interior of our brand new car....exterior work can be much more tedious.

Thats not to say you cant do it in pieces. Wash/decon the whole truck, then polish and protect sections at a time. I did the cab and front end one day, then came back the next to do the bed and tailgate. I didnt physically run out of time, I just had other stuff to do in between. And beers.

If you are using a wax or sealant last step, it makes the whole section thing a bit easier. Using a coating is a little more of a pain to do in sections because the paint needs to be 100% clean for it to bond. Leaving a truck overnight would require re-cleaning the panels before coating....not a huge deal, but more time spent nonetheless.

 

[chrisbh17]

Well the situation is this.
My wife and I live in an apartment with a 3 month old, so I have to go somewhere to wash it and don't have a garage so I can't really spend time and leave it and come back to doing it. But I ask, is there no way to achieve a great wash without spending an entire day? Like I said earlier, take the word detail out of it. It can't be that it's either spend 12+ hours on it or don't wash it at all right?

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Need to define exactly what you want to get out of it.

If you just want to wash and protect, polishing for paint correction isn't absolutely necessary.

You would still want to wash and decontaminate the paint....so wash with plain Dawn dish soap, claybar or Nanoskin the contaminants off, wash with Dawn again, then apply a last step product.

To save time on the last step you could look at spray-on last step products like CarPro Hydro2 or Gtechniq C2. And instead of old school claybar, invest in a Nanoskin sponge/pad/towel to make decontaminating go (a lot) faster.

Just keep in mind it wouldn't be correcting any swirls or scratches in the paint. But at least it would be protected.

 

[Pull Ya]

^^^^ Good advice. It's important to realize that after you wash and clay bar your paint is kind of "naked". It will be important to put some sort of polish or wax on the surface to protect the paint. As was stated above it can even be a spray wax(Opti Car Spray Wax) or if you like you can put a coat of Wolfgang 3.0 Sealant on. Remember a wax lasts about 3-4 weeks and a sealant last up to 6-8 months. Either one will provide protection to your paint--the variable is the length time they last. Please understand we are not trying to make this complicated for you we are just trying to match the products and process into your particular situation.
Jay

 

[BTD07]

Need to define exactly what you want to get out of it.

If you just want to wash and protect, polishing for paint correction isn't absolutely necessary.

You would still want to wash and decontaminate the paint....so wash with plain Dawn dish soap, claybar or Nanoskin the contaminants off, wash with Dawn again, then apply a last step product.

To save time on the last step you could look at spray-on last step products like CarPro Hydro2 or Gtechniq C2. And instead of old school claybar, invest in a Nanoskin sponge/pad/towel to make decontaminating go (a lot) faster.

Just keep in mind it wouldn't be correcting any swirls or scratches in the paint. But at least it would be protected.

Okay so call me a newb but I remember reading it is bad to use dawn on your paint? I wanted to make a quick detailer for claying one time with dawn and everything online said not to. Are you saying to wash with dawn as the car soap or in between? This is interesting. I will also look into a better method of claying as you said.
It is a new 2017 and white, so I cant imagine it has bad swirls, but just getting caught up in the pictures here and autopia of how much polishing does, I wanted to try it. Seems to be a bigger job than I would need right now.