At home DIY ceramic coating...save some cash!

[usnmustanger]

Ceramic would be geared toward the guy who doesn't care to spend much time detailing and simply wants to hit his truck with a power washer once in a while and be done.

Yup, this is me. I do want my truck to look good, and to protect the paint for resale value, but mostly, I want to spend most of my free time doing fun things with my truck, and just hosing it off in the car wash when I'm done.
(Yeah, I know some of you masochists out there actually consider washing/waxing/detailing "fun", but not this guy...)

 

[mattio]

Yeah, I know some of you masochists out there actually consider washing/waxing/detailing "fun", but not this guy...

haha yea this is me. Sometimes when its 100 degrees and 98% humidity I think to myself, "you enjoying yourself?" lol its a love/hate thing

 

[ValveofHouston]

I’ll be giving ceramic a shot next week. Did plenty of online research to find the best products. I know I’ll hate myself half way through but should be fun. I already had a polisher so this will be much cheaper than dropping 1k + to have someone do it… if I do it right. Fingers crossed.

 

[ESPcoatings]

I'm doing the ceramic thing soon too. Hope Adam's is a good choice. Any opinions beforehand out there?

 

[Gdog]

Been using Adams for years. Great quality stuff

 

[ESPcoatings]

Been using Adams for years. Great quality stuff

Thanks!

Been using Adams for years. Great quality stuff

I've yet to find anything from them I didn't like but ceramic coating makes me a little nervous. A ton of work if it goes right, too much work to fix if not. Haha.

 

[Irregular F150]

Well ive got a horror yet kinda funny story for yall. Not trying to scare anyone from this stuff. Lol

Ive been a detailer for over 15 yrs now and at the dealer i work at one of the salesmen had me coat his last vehicle… well this time he wanted to do it himself so i gave him some instructions etc. i even told him i wasn’t busy and could do it. So he comes in the next day and says “umm idk what happened but something is wrong”. So I check it out and it looked like someone took a paint brush and tried to clear coat it. I guess he went a bit heavier one the product then needed.

He has a jeep wrangler and only did the front half before stopping. That alone took nearly 8-10 hrs to fix over a few days when i had time. It consisted of a lot of heavy and careful buffing.

So when you are new to this just take your time and don’t over do the amount of coating, you can always go back over it.

 

[ESPcoatings]

Well ive got a horror yet kinda funny story for yall. Not trying to scare anyone from this stuff. Lol

Ive been a detailer for over 15 yrs now and at the dealer i work at one of the salesmen had me coat his last vehicle… well this time he wanted to do it himself so i gave him some instructions etc. i even told him i wasn’t busy and could do it. So he comes in the next day and says “umm idk what happened but something is wrong”. So I check it out and it looked like someone took a paint brush and tried to clear coat it. I guess he went a bit heavier one the product then needed.

He has a jeep wrangler and only did the front half before stopping. That alone took nearly 8-10 hrs to fix over a few days when i had time. It consisted of a lot of heavy and careful buffing.

So when you are new to this just take your time and don’t over do the amount of coating, you can always go back over it.

Question on large panels like the bed sides... is it OK to do small sections at a time and overlap or is it bad to let one section of a panel dry/set up before you do the rest? Or am I just overthinking something that won't really be an issue? (Now I'm thinking I should also practice on my Jeep first.. ha)

 

[pat247]

I embraced a new tech wash/wax system when I bought my Raptor in early 2014, it's nano polimer wax technology just prior to ceramic coatings. Getting older I needed something less strenuous than the traditional wax on/wax off method. The only product that I have used for eight years now is Meguiar's wash & wax, wash first with 5 gal bucket using a liberal amount of product, rinse, use waterless wash & wax like spray detailer to dry the truck. This product achieved my goal of being easy to use and exceeded my expectations on paint protection plus it shines.

I looked into switching to ceramic but after reading the lable, the part about well ventilated or it could kill you scared me off.

I'll stick with these two for now.

 

[Irregular F150]

Question on large panels like the bed sides... is it OK to do small sections at a time and overlap or is it bad to let one section of a panel dry/set up before you do the rest? Or am I just overthinking something that won't really be an issue? (Now I'm thinking I should also practice on my Jeep first.. ha)

Lol. Practice on something you’re not as worried about messing up isnt a bad idea. We just do a small section / let dry a bit / wipe / move on and overlap a bit etc..