samx18

After a month of research and 2 weeks of negotiation, today I finally got the RDX I wanted for the price I wanted. Phew!
The dealer offered me a XZILON pat protection package for a whooping $880! I have no experience with this, so opted out for asking for some time to research and decide.

I am almost certain this package is not worth it, any experience or feedback on this package?

What kind of package or detailing service if any should I consider first after getting the Acura out of the showroom?
last but no way the least I wanted to thank a Acurazine community, learnt a lot form here!

ceb

Waste of money. Find a good detailer and have them do OptiCoat. That should be 3 or 4 hundred and is much better than the dealer applied crap.

The basis for good results is preparation. Dealerships are incapable of doing a proper prep.

Comfy

I second this opinion. This is just a sales tactic by the dealership to increase their profit margins. You did great by not wasting your hard earned two weeks worth of negotiations in price. The point is dealers are not detailers. They put $35 worth of stuff on your car and call it $800 protection package. New car buyers are very gullible at that time.
Anyway congratulations on your new car. Post some pics please.

samx18

Thanks I'll find more on the OptiCoat service nearby.

For sure!

Rocket_man

It's not the product that costs $800 it is the labor. A car the size of the RDX will cost about that much to Opti-Coat Pro from a professional detailer.

You can buy this product from an eBay reseller for $20 and do it yourself.

Search eBay.

I'm not saying it is a good product or not, but if you want it and have the ability to polish your car you can apply it yourself far cheaper. It is more like a sealant than a coating like Opti-Coat.

BTW that 5-year warranty has holes in it big enough to drive your RDX through. You could probably never collect on it if you had a paint claim.

There are a lot of good products to seal or coat your paint. I just used up my last Opti-Coat 2.0 on my wifes new car this weekend and they no longer sell that to consumers. But there are other products like CQuartz that are very similar to Opti-coat. I will say it is best to do this while the car is new. It was so nice to polish a new car... smooth as a baby's butt with little effort.

ceb

OC2.0 is about $60 in materials the last time I bought it and my detailer charged $1500 to clean, polish, OptiCoat and clearbra my TSX and my wife's Civic - albeit both new.

The success with any sealant or coating, like RocketMan implied in the preparation. Dealerships assign their lowest paid laborers the job of prepping a car, using dirty rags and dirty water. The car looks decent because they pour on glaze that covers the swirls and holograms but that wears off in a couple of weeks.

Look at your new car closely and you can see bits of glue residue around the trim and (if the car is white or silver - still there but not as visible on darker cars) bits or rail dust that look like tiny flecks of rust.

The dealer will sell a car and "prep" it while you are doing the paperwork. Since many cars are delivered after dark, the dealer will have a "delivery area" with bright light intended to show off the shine produced by the 50 cents worth of glaze they just poured on.

The protection packages dealers flog are the same - except that they buy a warranty from the company (that you can never collect on) and the whole thing (prep, application, product and warranty) costs them about $25. The rest of the $775 is pure profit.

You want to do something good for your car, then take it home and, while still new, buy a bottle of Scotchguard from Home Depot and spray your carpets. Then, buy a bottle of LeatherMasters online to clean and protect your leather periodically.

If you are interested, then buy a good (PorterCable or the like) random orbital polisher ($200), two buckets, grit guards, clay bars and microfiber towels and cleaning chemicals (Iron-X for the rail dust, your favorite car soap, polish, wax) and OptiCoat/CQuartz (all of that will be another $200) and spend a weekend cleaning, polishing and coating your car. You'll end up with a much nicer looking car.

BUT - you'll need to spend another weekend reading up on how to polish, use a clay bar, types of products and so forth before you tackle your car.

That $400-$500 you spend on equipment and supplies should last you a good many years and keep you in clean cars all year long.

FredS

Forget it and just buy a $15 bottle of Zaino Z2 and apply every 4 months. You will be very pleased and richer.

Rocket_man

Unfortunately you can't buy OC2.0 any longer. They have a new product that doesn't last as long and is twice the cost and so I'm looking at CQuartz for my future use.

This is the top of my wife's Mini with the black roof after minimal polishing. I could have gone further but I didn't want to over do a new car.

ceb

Looking very good. That debunks the theory that OC doesn't give a good shine.

When did they quit selling OC2.0? I guess they had too many complaints from people not reading the (very simple) instructions, just slathering it on and then complaining about drying time and runs.

Comfy

Or may be the Opticoat 2.0 was too good that the competition complained and made them remove the product from market. Too bad.

Rocket_man

I think it had something to do with the 'lifetime' claim of the product and lawyers. But the new product, called Optimum Gloss-Coat is $60 for 10cc. That is half the volume of OP2.0 and more than half the price. 20cc is $99. It is only marketed as good for 2 years. So who is going to buy this? Other products are just as good and cheaper. So I'm looking elsewhere for my next coating product.

Optimum Paint Coating

YeuEmMaiMai

I just wax my car and I have shown pictures of that already. I wax 3X a year

once before winter
once after winter
once in the middle of the summer

samx18

Thanks everyone for your responses. After reading through this are a few other threads.. this is what I am planning to this weekend.(first wash after purchase)
1. Wash and clean the care with optimum no rinse
2. Apply Optimum Opti-Seal
3. Finish off with Meguiar's G17516 Ultimate Quik Wax

hope I am not doing something totally wrong?

CoachRick

I'm a bit more 'concerned' about our dark Caspian Blue Volvo C70 than I am the white '13 RDX. I did a quick NuFinish number on the RDX last week and I have to say it looks darned good. With only 9 months left on the lease, I doubt I'll do much more than that. Might regret it IF we decide to buy at lease-end, but that NuFinish sure seems to be a product that was ahead of its time. I remember having it around many, many years ago.

samx18

Thanks, but what about the process I described above? Is it safe enough to go ahead with that for the first wash or should I get it cleaned and waxed by a detailer first?

CoachRick

Unless you are going to wait for the super finish for a few months, I don't think waxing would be of benefit. I'd put money toward a claybar treatment; but I'm not a super-detailer .

ceb

I'm not a huge fan of nu finish but it is OK while it lasts

ceb

You need to clean the car properly before you add a sealant that seals all the crap in. You'll want to remove rail dust and glue residue and all of the other crap that is on a new car.

samx18

Yes, I am hoping the Optimum no rinse wash to take care of this

Rocket_man

As you wash the car run your bare hand over the wet paint. You'll be able to feel anything left that needs to be removed even if you can't see it.

CoachRick

Well, it hasn't even gotten wet since I applied it; so I haven't given it much of a test. The finish looks and feels great and it was even easier to apply than I remember from years ago. Perhaps they have tweaked the formulation to make it easier to buff off AND to remove from black trim(I was pretty careful; but I'm not getting on my knees to work on the trim ). We'll see if I take the time to re-apply in a few weeks like they recommend. Should have considerable rain Tues and Wed, so we shall see if I'm still pleased with the results.

ceb

ONR will not remove rail dust, glue residue or bits of bird dropping that are on your paint.

Get a cheap (the thinner the better) sandwich bag. Stick your hand in it and run hour hand over your dry paint. Any imperfection you feel need to be removed prior to sealing.

Get a bottle of IronX to remove rail dust and a bottle of 3M Adhesive remover (from any autoparts store) to get rid of the glue residue. Be careful with the adhesive remover as it can damage plastics.

k7baixo

I seem to recall a small uproar with Consumer Reports ranked it fairly high for car waxes. Hard to beat for $7-9 and it's almost idiot-proof.

ceb

All of this stuff is only as good as the prep.

wildeklave

Do any of these products actually protect paint fro chipping after 6-10 years? I have a 9 year old vehicle with 150k miles on it that gets parked outside. I noticed some minor paint chips after last winter. I bring it to the car wash 10-15 times a year but just think lots of miles and weather has the paint beat up. When I buy a new vehicle will any of these products make a difference after 100k miles and 7+ years?

ceb

No wax, sealant or other liquid or paste can protect from impact damage.

A clearbra (either the solid or the spray-on type) will protect the paint from minor paint chipping from stray salt or gravel but if the impact is hard enough it'll go right through the clearbra too.

k7baixo

Yep.

CoachRick

Sounds like a job for PlastiKote

samx18

Here are some pics after the first with the Optimum No rise

Comfy

That looks great. Did you use anything else other than optimum no rinse...?

samx18

Yes, forgot to mention. Meguiar's G17516 Ultimate Quik Wax while wiping off the ONR. Also Invisible glass for the windows and the windshield.