Just got back actually!
I thought of posting a picture taken with the iPhone, but... I thought it wouldn't really do justice to the results.

The weather wasn't fantastic, with rain at random, but I decided to get up real early (ok, not so early, 6:30, but still!) on Sunday and got to work !

First of all, the Prima products are awesome. Much more awesome than I thought they would be. No regrets taking the plunge !

Swirl is very mild and predictable so for a beginner like me it was very much welcome.
Amigo... well, I could go on and on, but I'll tell you this : my boss was curious to try it -by hand- on his old MG, and it did such a wonderful job at darkening the BRG paint and hide fine swirls that he now wants to order the whole shebang from DP (through me )
Epic : was a bliss to apply and wipe off. And by the way, the Wolfgang Polishin' Pal with a black pad was perfect to apply it by hand.
Hydro : Holy Crap, Batman, that thing is liquid gold! now I understand why kenchan went insane

But enough blah blah, I know you guys just want pictures, right ?

So, let me first refresh your memories. Here is the same car treated with 2 coats of Z5pro and 2 coats of Z2pro :


Up until last Sunday, I thought "how different or better could this look?"

well...

After doing the left side of the car with Swirl :

When I saw that, I realised how the preparation is actually 95% of the overall "look".
I worked on the car until around 20:00, with Amigo, then Epic.
Next day was rainy through and through, so yesterday morning I washed the car lightly and applied Hydro while drying. Then I got this :




I love the Astro Black paint : is it black ? is it blue ? is it gray ?



and a final complete view :


Now I've read a BUNCH of threads about the different looks you get with Zaino and Prima... but now I have a visual proof ! Epic/Hydro are less shiny and more "deep", for a lack of better description.

In any case, the result is awesome and I had a lot of fun and learned quite a bit in the process

 

kurisu- otsukaresama! looks great!

hey, i could've told you before that zaino was all about shiny and epic about deep.

Zaino is imho very similar finish to Griot's PaintSealant.
Epic is very similar to some of the characteristics of carnauba wax, but has a deeper richer gloss.

so my preference is to use paintsealant to get the nice
protection/durability with super shine while very easy
to use, no stupid numbers to memorize, then control that
shine with Hydro. well, that's on my dd's.

 

Nice work!!

Thanks for posting the pics. If there's a color that will really test your skills and the power of your products, it's black. I'm glad to hear you enjoyed your Prima goodies.

Great to hear that Amigo was also a "friend" to your boss' BRG MG too!

-Heather

 

heather- how about you release a j-market version Amigo called "KONJYOU"

根性

it'll sell in an instant.

 

I'm guessing that means "friend" in Japanese?? As soon as we establish a Prima retailer in Japan then it'll be first on the list!

-Heather

 

Pick me, I'll go

Mark

 

..... ummmm... sure.



nono, for tomodachi (friend), you'll probably want to use shinyuu. 親友 much deeper than just a friend. Amigo is not just a friend. it's your best friend.

not to be mistaken with shoyuu (soysauce).

 

lotsie goes where Amigo goes? are you the new blimey?

man, i can't wait to put some Amigo on my MCS and G later on this month.

 

Tks kenchan
About Zaino vs Prima, what I meant was that until I saw the difference on my own same car, I could not understand/visualise what people were describing.

Thanks Heather !
Yup, the products are great, a pleasure to use. From Swirl to Hydro and Nero, they work as advertised, and the results are very pleasing
You will hear from me again shortly as I guess my boss will want to get his own bottles of Amigo and Hydro !

you mean "guts" as in "Amigo's got a lot of guts" ? unless my vocabulary is getting rusty

I think "Amigo" sounds ok in Japanese, but if you want to make a "j-market" version, I would keep it simple and name it "Tomo" in hiragana (とも).

Heather, just curious : am I the only one having ordered your products from Japan ? (that would very much surprise me) ? If you know of a few Japanese customers, short of a reseller, we could perhaps group our purchases and that way we could get some big pallet of Banana Gloss shipped by sea ?!

 

Hmm... maybe we should just stick to the name Amigo even in Japan. I fear we'll call it guts or soy sauce or something other than friend or even best friend!


Believe it or not, you and one other customer (who is in the military and stationed there) are the only ones who have had us ship to Japan to date.

We mostly ship outside of the U.S. to Australia, the UK, Germany, Spain, and, of course, Canada.

We have a possible new Prima retailer in Taiwan though... we're still working out the details but it may happen soon. I would assume shipping from Taiwan to Japan would be less expensive than the US to Japan so that could help!

-Heather

 

it was a joke... your japanese is not rusty, just not native enough to rust yet.

tomo sounds good, but too close to 'como' in spanish?

so, did you see a lot of folks detailing their cars during GoldenWeek? i hear they were offering some cheap rates on toll ways or somethings so you got to park your car on the roads (congestion) instead of at home.

 

Sure it would, also, I go to Taipei on business fairly often, so ! (I wonder if I could run into OctaneGuy there one day...)
But Nick was so helpful and patient, I liked dealing with you guys

Have you looked into the possibility of tapping the network of MiniMania in Japan for selling your products ? MINI aftermarket is huge here and with the image your products have (i.e. "exclusive", but fun and easy to use), seriously I think it should be something to dig. Not sure if you guys and minimania are on good terms, but just a thought!

冗談だった！あっ。。。分からなかったもん。。。恥ずかしい　

For Golden Week, if you peaked at my flickr stream, you probably know I went to Karuizawa Since there is an "outlet mall" there, and I know people just go there for shopping, I left on Friday evening, and came back on Tuesday noon and avoided the crowd, but that means I paid full toll fees.
The new toll fees (1000 yen, wherever you go) are only for the week-end, and only if you pay via ETC (which I have).

The new fees are in effect since April 1st, and were an idea of the car makers, to boost the awfully sluggish car sales. In a way it worked, because now there are people who for instance go from Tokyo to Nagoya by car JUST because it's 1000 yen, NOT because they want to go... kinda stupid if you ask me...

So, not a lot of people detailing their cars except me and my boss (though he certainly isn't ready to pull out the RO just yet) and one guy I saw just washing his black Mazda RX7 (hot car !).

Ok, I'm going to go get my car back from the workshop now. stupid whistling sound at idle... water pump changed... 3rd problem in 3 months of ownership...