Prima products

im looking at stocking up the **** with some new product mainly the prima line. id be buying Prima Swirl, Amigo, Epic, and Glide along with the respective pads for each. Has anyone on here had previous experience with this line? good... bad... what are you talking about...

I've used all their stuff and it's great! here are some before and after photos of my classic Mini:

BEFORE



AFTER











PRODUTS USED:

Porter Cable random-orbital kit with multiple pads
"Swirl" polish
"Finish" final polish
"Amigo" glaze
"Epic" synthetic final wax (2 coats).

I maintain the shine with:

"Mystique" car wash
"Hydro" post-wash spray.

I also use:

"Nero" vinyl/rubber trim spray
"Clarity" window cleaner
Various "monster fluffy" cloths (the best, softest MF cloth on the market IMHO).

I've used this same process on my modern MINI as well, and the wax was still slick enough for a microfiber cloth resting on the paint to slide off as if greased even 6 months later! Awesome, awesome stuff. If you put in an order, ask for Heather and tell 'em that ImagoX (Matt) sent you.

how do u like prima finish?? from what i have researched no one really uses it unless they are dealing with really soft scratch sensitive paint. the prima swirl on an orange then white pad followed by amigo on a white pad then epic is all i really see being used.

I used it on my Suburban too, which had very hard paint. it looked just as good as the BMW/Mini paint.

Swirl/Amigo/Epic sounds like a good plan. Before I learned about Amigo (I thought that glaze was only beneficial on older, single-stage paint which is not the case), I used Swirl by itself, first on a medium orange pad for initial swirl removal, then more Swirl on a white, fine (non-cutting) pad - it's quite a fine polish, and breaks down as you use it, and even without Finish or Amigo gives quite good results in my experience.

Just be sure to READ AND FOLLOW the directions on the Prima products - it's quite concentrated and I find that most people use about three times as much product as they should be, leading to poor results (clogged polishing pads, residue, etc.). Using the Porter Cable f ro every step, even waxing, generally helps you not overuse product, since the machine polisher can spread things so thinly and evenly. I can't say enough good things about the RO polisher in this respect.

Also be sure to clean your pads well ASAP when done - products like Epic, being a synthetic, can cure even in a sealed plastic bag, which WILL lead to bad scratching/swirling if you try to re-use the pad later on. I'd also dedicate a pad to a product like they recommend - cross-contaminating products is usually not the end of the world, but it generally does lead to a shortening of the final application's useful life.

Damn stuff looks good. May have to get some and try it on the focus to see if i can bring the black out more than with the meguiars. RIP the old mini.

hey imagoX, how long does a bottle of the swirl or epic last on your car or how much of the bottle do you use per application?

I just ordered some of their stuff!!

Epic wax, Slick detailer, and wheel armor!

I would've gotten the black wow trim re-finisher.. but that was expensive, maybe next time.

I can't wait, hopefully it gets here in time for the Dells, since Thursday or Friday are scheduled for washing, claying, waxing, and cleaning the wheels and trim.

Eeee I 'm excited!

Grinder wrote:

hey imagoX, how long does a bottle of the swirl or epic last on your car or how much of the bottle do you use per application?

I use the Swirl twice a year, spring and fall, to polish out cobwebbing. I use the Porter Cable when I do. Every time I use the Swirl, I use only about 10% of the bottle on the entire car (I'm still on my first bottle, which I bought almost 2 years ago). the trick is to READ THE LABEL and not overuse the product. As I said, I've watched people polish and wax their cars, and I'd say 80% of them use way too much product - this leads to waste as well as sub-optimal results. Using a random orbital polisher actually helps with this quite a bit, as it spreads the product out MUCH more evenly and thinly than you can accomplish by hand (unless you're an expert).

I use Epic wax along with the Swirl - the polishing process strips off the synthetic wax, making a re-application necessary. I find that even 6 months after application, so long as I use a proper car wash shampoo (which doesn't strip off wax like, say, Dawn dishwashing liquid will) the car remains slick and shiny all the way to my next polishing. I use Hydro after each wash to keep the wax protected and the car maximally shiny, and I use their Slick detailing spray for wipe-downs in-between full washings.

A side benefit of my process is that I no longer have to use clay bar on my entire car - the polishing stage with Swirl -> Amigo/Finish effectively strips off any contaminants that may have embedded themselves in the wax. I generally have a clay bar on-hand just in case I do have major contamination (tree sap particularly as well as the occasional spot of road tar on the lower panels), but only because I don't want a chunk of anything stuck the pad I'm using to polish my car with. Clay-barring this way only takes a few minutes, as opposed to the hour or more I used to dedicate to totally claying my car before - much faster.

Last, for what it's worth, I've found that it's best to stick with an entire product line on a car, because that way one product will not interact poorly with another. For instance, Turtle Wax ICE seems to react poorly to Meguiar's detail spray and doesn't seem to last as long in several (admittedly unscientific) tests. What I CAN tell you is that all the major companies (Meguiar's, Detailers paradise, Griot's, etc.) do extensive interaction tests at the chemical level to assure that Product A will not negatively affect Product B. Since going 100% DP, I've noticed a definite increase in the duration of my wax and the overall shine.