Christian Westhorpe, the Glidecoat Application Specialist addresses common questions about the professional ceramic coating process as he applies Glidecoat Marine Grade Ceramic Coating to a 37′ Midnight Express.
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Video Transcript
Detailer: How much are you going to put on the sponge to start with?
Christian: I just put it right in the center. And that's...
Detailer: That's all you're doing. So you're not saturating the rest of the sponge.
Christian: No. Right in the middle.
Detailer: So that's maybe a dime...
Christian: And the one thing like, especially when you got one's that are probably 3 or 4 feet here. The biggest thing you don't want to do is get too big with your section. Especially when you're working in the sun. You can tell there is a little bit of drag the first time, you just have to work it.
I do the same just like you guys did, kind of lock it in there, square it off. You can tell once you go the first pass after it's a little smoother to apply, first bit has a little drag to it.
I always like to kind of hold it in a quarter here.
Detailer: So you're putting quite a bit of pressure on there...
Christian: Yeah. Cause it's more so you want to feel like you're buffing, not removing access.
Detailer: OK. Yeah...
Christian: Once you get that first initial wipe off, you can kind of work a little bigger than your section. Just to make sure that it's properly blended. You don't want to have to be like - straight line - straight line - and then you end up missing something.
Detailer: Ok. Yeah... and then just a clean dry....
Christian: This is a clean dry one here just to smooth. You can see as I'm wiping just like this, sometimes what happens when you get too saturated, you do that and you get this little wipe there.
Detailer: Mmmhmmm...
Christian: So it's always...
Detailer: So a little bit overlapping on each side and work it a little bit.
Christian: Make sure you've got all your wipes and then come to do the next one.
Detailer: I just, often when we do white hulls, we put blue tape. So it's just a... we obviously go usually overlap.
Christian: So you're literally just putting a dot.
Detailer: Ok so a dot, cause we were definitely putting too much on the first time.
Christian: Yeah and that leaves sometimes like we said, it gets saturated.
Detailer 2: It works itself in I guess as you move it. Very little, its covering.
Detailer: It's covering. And you're putting a little, I can see, a little more pressure on there. You're kind squeezing the sponge a little bit.
Christian: The more you go, the less you have to, unless you start finding at the end of your section, you're not, it's not coming, not enough product is coming on, you can just apply a little bit.
Detailer: Sure... That's why I bought the tray. We kept kicking stuff.
[laughing]
Detailer: And now can you start to feel the rag is curing a little bit, sticking? That's what we were finding.
Christian: And that's more so the coating than anything. It's not necessarily the rag. I mean... these rags might be a little thin.
Detailer: Right...
Christian: Sometimes that creates more because, it's just, there is not a lot of substance there, see? I want to try and keep it as flat as I can.
Detailer: So what would you say? Maybe get some thicker microfibers?
Christian: Yeah, even the ones we have are a little bit thicker than this. I'd even get a little bit thicker, just so it...
Detailer: I think they call them Turkish towels. They're really quite thick.
Christian: I haven't done it yet, but apparently if you soak the microfiber in vinegar and then wash them, you can reuse the ones for the coating and they don't harden up on you.
