Two questions

1. My dealer gave me a free bottle of some stuff called "First Place Finish" car protectant (NOT "finish first", different company). The dealer puts this stuff on every car, and it appears to be doing a good job (water still beads after four months and lots of car washes). I tried going to the company's website,

http://www.firstplacefinish.com/firs...ish/index.html

to find out what this stuff actually was, but no luck. Went to the dealer for oil change this weekend. I asked the service chief if the stuff was polymer based or whatnot. The guy looked at me funny and said the stuff was "teflon", and that is all he knew about it. I'd like to slap on some Gold Class polymer on my TSX (Its a balmy 50 degs in Pittsburgh, so I was able to give "Choice" a good bath today), but I don't know how it will interact with this first place finish "stuff".

2. I bought a Del Sol California Water Blade. Never used one, and the directions were a bit vague (i.e., which edge am I not supposed to use?). Its shaped like an upside down "T". Am I supposed to put it flat against the surface, or a bit of an angle. The blade makes a squeaky sound which freaked me out, but the package assures me that it wont scratch the car. Also, It didn't take off as much water as I thought. What is the technique to use one of these, cause I don't think I am doing it right!

Thanks for the help!!!

 

My is to get rid of the water blade, or use it for something else.

They don't really work all that well, you'll still have to go over pretty many spots of your car with a towel. And the odds are you WILL mark up your car, especially if you have one of the blades with a hard plastic handle. You'll thank me the first time your going down your car and you hit a dry spot and that thing goes flying out of your hand.

Use the old "nozzle-less hose" technique, followed by a touchup with a MF towel. That method is faster, works better and is a lot safer for your paint than the blade.

If you really want to dry your car good, finish it off with the old leaf blower...

 

I've been using my waterblade and don't have a single scratch from it. The trick is to make sure that the car is clean before you blade it. It won't dry the car for you but you can remove 90% of the water very quickly and touch up with a chamoix before any water spots set in. Mine also makes a squeaky noise sometimes. I hold it at approx 45 degree angle and just squeege the water off. I wipe it on a towel after every pass.

 

OK, thanks for the tip. I usually do a pretty decent job of washing, but I do go through alot of towels drying, so maybe I'll use the water blade to get the big blobs of water off, then get the little guys with the towels.

I did go ahead and use the Meguairs (sp?), and boy, what a shine!!! I did 24 hours, then put a second coat on for 12. I was going to do a third, but ran out of time (The "meaningless" Steelers game was more interesting than I thought it would be!)

 

I tend to think of myself as the waterblade snob.....

1st. Not all water blades are the same...I use the "original" California Water blade.
mfg. California Car duster makes the blade. It should have a purple handle.

They made some of the originals early on for Target with the Black handle--these too are ok... and Walmart got some with a blue handle..also OK.

But...later on Target and other chain stores got a new black handle model with the blade wider then the handle (dry blade)....take this one back. It is the worst water blade ever. The plastic is way hard and inferior.

From now on I only recommend getting the orignal blade from the website of Cal Car duster. Else, you just can't be sure you are getting the right one. The original had a very soft and nice blade I love mine, never made a scratch yet.

This is the one I use...
The rest on the site suck @$$, yes I have used them all and I wrote them a letter stating the suck @$$, but using better, more grown up words, and a spell checker.

 

Waterblades are a waste of money. I used the "original" cali water blade, now it sits in a drawer in my garage. All you need to do to dry your car is after your done washing, jump in your car, drive around the block at around 60-70mph. When you get back, wipe off whats left with an MF towel (I use Z6 as well). Done.

It works the best because it gets the water out of all the cracks. Cant do that with the WB or towels. I used to use compressed air to get that water out. Doing this cuts the drying time in half.

 

I would think you could pick up some debris on the way that could scratch your car up when you dry it.

 

If you live on dirt roads, yea I guess. Its only for about a minute, your not going on a road trip. And I dont have any scratches anywhere.

 

You really owe it to yourself to try the nozzle-less hose technique recommended by snowmanTSX. I have the waterblade and the hose technique works better and is less likely to damage the paint because you are not dragging anything across your finish.

Just take the spray gun off the hose, run the water at about 1/3 to 1/2 and let the water run over the car. I'd say about 80% of the water sheets right off. It's very easy to wipe the rest dry w/ 1 single towel.

After I do that, I follow up with joerockt's air dry at 70 mph technique to get the water out of the cracks.