Faster than a speeding bullet! More powerful than a locomotive! It is the perfect product. A fictional character revealed by our own unique biases and specific needs!
Hopefully, this becomes a constructive rant in addition to some awesome product recommendations!
Imagine being at a restaurant, hearing it has the best food from an online poll, to realize you are allergic to most of the popular dishes. Imagine a professional golfer at the apex of his or her game goes to find the best golf clubs money can buy. Everything is fitted and customized to his or her height and golf swing. Another elite golfing professional practices with those same clubs with disastrous results. The problem may seem obvious to many people. But when you ask what is the best wax, polisher, soap, microfiber, or any genre of detailing product you are committing this same critical error.
Some polishing pads are absolutely terrible choices to pair with on a rotary polisher but can be perfectly utilized with a standard dual action polisher. Some pads work better with a force rotation polisher.
The Gyeon line, for multiple reasons, are my preferred polishes. Meguiars 105 Compound and 205 Polish are popular among professionals. But I would not necessarily recommend these polishes to someone who is performing their first paint correction polishing session.
I want you to be mindful of this observation from my experience. The people who are often the least knowledgeable about a topic are often the most likely to offer their opinion about a vague question. People who are often the most knowledgeable are more likely to give someone honest feedback when they put some thought into their inquiry.
Even reading the reviews of a product can be very beneficial. I have become intrigued by and even purchased supplies from Detailed Image based upon reading (the details) a negative review of a product.
Some say having SIO2 in a product makes it the best. Jescar Powerlock+ or Wolfgang Deep Gloss Paint Sealant do not have SI02 in them to my knowledge. Both yield outstanding results. If you had only experienced $50 wash and wax details in your life, an application of a spray-on SI02 product is going to feel superior in your mind to any traditional wax or sealant.
I have used Wolfgang Deep Gloss Paint Sealant 3.0 on a properly prepped (washed and clayed) surface. It lasted noticeably for 6 months on my surface. The properties of the sealant did not deteriorate until the 5th month.
You may not want to deal with the hassle of getting a product perfectly clean including having to use a product that removes polishing oils prior to applying protection. You may want a product that is not as frustrating to remove excess sealant or wax. You prefer a product that is not as affected by humidity in an outdoor environment, unlike a SI02 product. A product where the excess can be easily removed with a little quick detailer and microfiber is more appealing to you. You ultimately want a versatile product that simplifies the detailing process. The good old days before coatings and SI02 products!
You should consider an all in one product like Blackfire One Step.
But you are giving up something with this product, although it is a high quality All In One (AIO). An all in one product comes with the convenience of a product that respectably cuts and refines paint, cleans paint sufficiently for the protection that it also in addition leaves behind. Being a jack of all trades makes it a master of none. An all in one type of product is inherently not likely going to be as good at polishing as compared to a product like Sonax Perfect Finish. It will not protect as long or quite as well as a dedicated product with similar chemistry like Blackfire Paint Sealant. You are also not going to know the true result (cut and or refinement) of your polishing process due to the protection left behind masking signs of paint defects. But the use of any AIO will give you the most efficient turnaround for a car. It is ultimately a matter of what is important for you! That may depend on the current condition of your car, how much you want to improve it, how much work you are willing to put into detailing, what you are most comfortable doing. I could go on and on!
So what is the best product? If you looking for simple answers while providing limited information, you will often be supplied with a plethora of uninspiring opinions to further confuse you.
Obviously I am not saying there are not generally superior or inferior products on the market. In fact the gap in the overall quality of some products may be huge. What I am saying is the the discovery of what is the best product for you, is just that; discovering specifically what is best for your needs and budget. It may be different from what everyone else loves or is using.
IGL Ecocoat Premier. It has been a popular SI02 sealant choice lately. It has some of the characteristics in terms of hydrophobic properties of a coating in a sealant. No I do not consider this a coating! But if you are on the fence about trying coatings, a good recommended start or practice is trying to apply a silica sealant. In doing so you will already have a maintenance product on hand.
“I want a coating and I don’t have a shelter and I am inexperienced detailing.”
Gyeon CanCoat (hybrid), a product I describe as a coating light type product!
You are old school and don’t want to change your wash habits. You will never purchase a polisher. Don’t worry, I am not going to judge you. You do not mind a temporary solution with some protection that fills in the micro marring that adds to the look of your car. Chemical Guys Black Light Hybrid Radiant Finish is the right option for you.
You do not enjoy detailing, you see it as a necessary chore. It’s ok to say it, or at least you need a break from hours of working on your car but you need to have SOMETHING (ideally minimally done). Try a spray sealant like Blackfire Synthetic Spray Wax! Wash and then apply spray sealant.
All too often in our quest for the best, failing to ask more questions while not offering more detailed information makes it harder to find specific solutions to your needs. You are unique, you are not like everybody. What I might suggest with my lense of perception may be 4 times more than you are willing to spend and 4 times the work you are willing to do to maximize what might be the best product on the market. But It could also be exactly what you want.