I think I may have found a local detailer that sounds like he knows what he is doing. He uses clay, followed by a 3 step buffing process to clean the surface, then he uses a glaze to finish. I thought glaze was more of a polishing product used to give paint a mirror finish after cleansing the paint not a wax, but he says it is a protective coat. I have used a 3M hand glaze in the past after paint cleanse and before wax. Can glaze be a final product?

 

I don't know exactly what it is.... but I used to use it in the body shop after we buffed out fresh paint to fill in any swirl marks. That was our final step, you can't wax over fresh paint.

 

Typically, a "glaze" has oils and shine enhancers, and may have a tiny bit of abrasive to remove extremely minor defects, but it has no protective qualities.

At least, that's the case for the big companies like 3M and Meguiar's. There are a lot of products out there called "glazes" that would be more-appropriately referred to as "synthetic sealants", and they *would* provide a protective finish, so unless you know exactly what he's using, it's hard to say.

 

As has been mentioned a glaze is a product that's used to add gloss to your finish and masks defects. To the best of my knowledge Meguiar's doesn't make any glazes that are sealants (edited: oops reread Scotts post and he doesn't say Meguiar's has glazes that are sealants).. In their professional body shop safe line they have #7 Show Car Glaze which is a pure polish and they have #80 Speed Glaze which is a polish similar to Swirl. Course it gets confusing because the products sit under the umbrella name of Mirror Glaze...maybe that's where the confusion is since that line includes waxes and polishes.....

1. Body shops use a glaze because it's an easy way to make a lousy finish look good to a customer.
2. Detailers use a glaze because it's an easy way to make the paint look good without actually having to finish it properly.

Ok, so let me comment on the last two.

When a car is painted at a body shop, the paint is dry within hours after painting but has imperfections. So usually the next day, the paint is wetsanded making the paint dull and matte looking but very smooth. Next it's polished with a wool polishing pad which makes the paint shiny again, but leaves all kinds of really bad polishing holograms and defects in the paint.

Because the paint is still fresh, heating the paint through foam pad polishing could have detrimental effects..wool pads remove lots of paint without heating it up...foam pads finish beautifully but heat up the paint at the same time so you have to polish slower..which is contrary to how body shops work (speed is key)..as well as requires certain techniques that most low paid body shop painters aren't trained for.

Why not throw on a wax or some Amigo to mask the defects?? The paint needs to cure for 30 days and sealing it could cause issues. Glazes don't protect or seal, so they are ideal for making the paint look good without spending the time to finish it off. Although Amigo has glaze like properties, its polymers still offer a level of protection that could cause problems during the curing process...so waxes are a no no on freshly painted cars...glazes are fine.

So how does all this impact your question???

A detailer that finishes with a glaze most likely means he's either a detailer that works by hand (he conceals defects instead of removing them) or a production detailer who knows how to make a car shine with a buffer, but doesn't spend the time to remove the defects caused by his buffer..so he finishes with a glaze to mask his shortcomings. The car looks fine until you wash it, the glaze comes off, and you're left with horrid looking paint. Over Thanksgiving I had a customer from Florida fly me out to fix his car after one such detailer wrecked his paint..despite his 25 years of experience of detailing....

Is this too much information???

Richard

 

And here I thought glaze was something that made certain donuts look shiny

Mark

 

dunno about the previous glaze assessments, but on my R56 I use (and have used, on my R53) Klasse All-in-one (AIO) polymer twice a year (before summer and winter), and Sonus acrylic glaze a few times in between the waxing. Results? the AIO cant be beat for cleaning up the paint w/o haveing to claybar, gives perfect mirror finish that repels water and bird poop nicely, is durable, cleans up water stains, and helps keep those high mtce black bonnet stripes looking fantastic.

best of all, however, both are insanely easy to use, and make Chili Red/Black stand out. Have won a couple car show awards with this combo.