Well for the next tip now. I discovered someone using Mr. Clean's Magic Eraser on their trim to remove wax residue. Again, I thought Ive tried everything under God's green earth to get that stuff out will little results. The eraser works but I just dont have the patience to sit out there with an eraser and work all the trim that is on the Kona Edition Focus, particularly the side moulding tire tread stuff from hades.
Again, curiosity got the better of me so I grabbed a Magic Eraser that I had laying around and went to work. I worked on three areas, one of the side mirrors, half the rear hatch trim and one of the door handles. Im happy to say, it 'seems' to work very well. The door handles were the least successful simply because that is a little coarser than the rest and will need a little extra effort.
Now, I have to say as fair warning, give me a couple days before you go out and purchase any Magic Erasers. I have tried other things that seemed to work to only have the wax residue reappear. But for right now, it seems we have a winner in wax residue removal.
I will endevour to try and report back here in a couple days and let everyone know if the residue is truly gone. The side trim is going to still be a chore, but if it will remove it for good, I wont mind spending the time to get it done. They are expecting another icy end of week and possibly weekend here, so I dont know how long it will be before I can get to the rest of the trim and I got tire issues to take care of before my car becomes a 2500lb ice skate.
____________________ My car is a synner! It uses Amsoil Synthetic Lubricants.
2001 Pontiac Grand Prix GTP
It whines a lot, but I like it
There aint no putty knifes going to be making it near my car. Nice tip, but I got so much black trim on this thing I might as well use a putty knife for the whole thing if I went that route. Call me old school, or just old, but I pretty much still prefer to do all the detail work pretty much by hand.
Also, I rarely use paste waxes, and I just cant see liquid waxes staying on the putty knife very well not to mention the amount that you would have to use. As well, most of the wax residue that is on the trim now (I did say most, not all) was there when I purchased the car and its been something of a battle trying to get rid of it.
____________________ My car is a synner! It uses Amsoil Synthetic Lubricants.
2001 Pontiac Grand Prix GTP
It whines a lot, but I like it
Nice tip, now im going to have to go look at the other tips... The wax residue is one of my biggest pet peeves with this car.. so if there is a cure outside of an eraser adn peanut butter ( yes i believe I tried that from pokes.. worked for a day or so.. and damn was it messy) then im going to try it.
____________________
It's not about what you have under the hood, it's about who you have behind the wheel...
SyntheticShield wrote: There aint no putty knifes going to be making it near my car.
Putty knives are made in different degrees of stiffness, and from different materials. Don't get a metal one. You have to go to a genuine hardware store & get the softest, widest, (maybe 8" or so" plastic putty knife. It will not scratch your paint & it works as well as masking tape. In fact it's better than using tape, because tape can leave a residue & the putty knife is much faster.
You can use it a couple of different ways. I put the blade of the knife against the car, & get a little wax on a soft cotton cloth. I wrap the cloth tightly around my finger, so I can see the impression of my fingernail. I put my fingernail agaist the knife & gently drawthe knife and my finger along the edge of the trim. You can also put a little wax on a Q tip and do it. BTW, I almost never use paste wax either. My car has absolutely no wax residue on the trim anywhere. Absolutely no scratches either.
Last edited on Mon Jan 10th, 2005 12:47 pm by Mr. Versatile
____________________ If you can't read this, you're illiterate.
Okay everyone. 4 days after I tried the magic eraser, no residue. Usually by now with other products I would be seeing the faint traces of the residue coming back cause none of them seemed to clean it out, just cover it up with the exception of the eraser.
I'll try and keep things updated on this. Im going out to do the rest of my car this weekend and switch the coolant over to Amsoil anti-freeze so I should get a good idea of how all this is going to hold up.
This might be a good thing for a tip section if it does hold up.
____________________ My car is a synner! It uses Amsoil Synthetic Lubricants.
2001 Pontiac Grand Prix GTP
It whines a lot, but I like it
You'd think after all this time on this board, what I had to say would be taken as gospel, but nooooooo, you gotta go test it out like I was playing April fools or something.
Just kidding, geeeesh, relax. Glad to know it worked out for you audiojunkie. Keep us posted on what your long term results are as well. Hopefully we all have found an effective way to deal with this little mess.
I like Mr. V's suggestion, I just dont have the patience when waxing to do it, hence the need for the Magic Eraser. In addition mine already had wax residue on the trim when I got it.
____________________ My car is a synner! It uses Amsoil Synthetic Lubricants.
2001 Pontiac Grand Prix GTP
It whines a lot, but I like it
I thought I would post a follow up on this. I was able to finally wash and detail my car some yesterday. I was specifically interested in how the Magic Eraser held up on parts that I used it on. Im happy to say that all the areas I cleaned are still free from wax residue and you can clearly see where I cleaned and where I did not.
So it would see alas we have a fairly easy and permanent solution to wax residue build up if you already have it. Maybe this should be put in a tips section. Its supposed to stay fairly nice around here for a day or so, and I have the Darryl Starbird trade show coming up this weekend so I think Im going to do some detailing and get rid of that nasty stuff once and for all and then I'll just have to take the power buffer out and go to town on the shine again paying a bit more attention to the trim pieces.
Ohhh, I should also mention, the water spots I had on the mirrors, well they are gone too after a cleaning with the Magic Eraser. I dont know what the thing would do to the paint job if used there, Im not sure how abrasive it is, though to the touch it feels as soft as any thing Ive ever used for waxing by hand. But maybe it could be used to remove water spots on the paint as well, and maybe even as a clay bar substitute, though I have yet to try it in that capacity. Maybe I can test it on a small area that isnt all that noticeable and see.
____________________ My car is a synner! It uses Amsoil Synthetic Lubricants.
2001 Pontiac Grand Prix GTP
It whines a lot, but I like it
As I said before, I am definatly going to be giving this a shot... Hopefully mid-late April ill be able to do my full detail, inside and out. Takes about 5 hours for me to do just the outside with a claybar. Although, after winter i assume it will take a lil longer.
When you say that it helped with the water spots.. maybe i missed something. Do you have painted mirrors or black ones? I might not have read everything here...
____________________
It's not about what you have under the hood, it's about who you have behind the wheel...
No, my mirrors had water spots on them, presumably from the previous owner washing the car and not drying off the glass on the mirrors. Ive noticed its a pretty common thing on cars in general. But they dont easily come off, kinda like water spots on your paint.
I took the Magic Eraser to it and with hardly any effort at all, it was all cleaned off and has stayed so. I probably should have taken before and after pics. Maybe I can do that with the rest of the parts I need to clean. I need to install the remote filter for my transmission soon so I may just do it all then anyway.
____________________ My car is a synner! It uses Amsoil Synthetic Lubricants.
2001 Pontiac Grand Prix GTP
It whines a lot, but I like it
This really has me curious as to the composition of this eraser.
I'll have to check one out myself. Being the detail nut I am.
I've used basic pencil erasers (larger hand held types) and have loved the results. Takes time though. Just like claybarring.
Back to the eraser - Daniel, is this something like a claybar material? I'm going to buy one myself and try it, but not quite yet. Still far too early inthe season here for hardcore detailing without the temps being far too cold.
PS - Let me know how you went about changing the coolant. I'm starting young on the life of this Duretec for real and I'm very curious as to how you're going to flush etc. as well as how your temp does after the change. *A how to section in the Amsoil section sounds like an idea to me.
____________________ Get in, Sit down, Shut up and HANG ON!
No, the Magic Eraser is nothing like a claybar. Its more like a very fine material sponge if anything. You just add a little water to it and start cleaning. It was meant to clean marks and stuff off of walls, and a fine job it does at that too. It dissolves away with water, completely environmentally friendly. You can use it about three or four times before it will dissolve too much to be of use. I think they are like $3 or $4 for a box of two or three of them, cant remember for sure and they make the job a WHOLE lot faster because you can just wipe away and keep going.
For me the bike tread trim on the Kona Edition is rough on the Magic Eraser and will start to shred it in quick order unless you take a little more time with it. So if you have any rough areas like that you may need a couple more than you would initially think. I think a box of three of them would get the car done pretty completely if you had rough areas that would start tearing the Magic Eraser apart.
I STRONGLY believe it would work as well as a claybar in removing the little embedded stuff that is on the surface of the paint on the car, however being of a sponge like material Im not sure what kind of scratches and such it would leave behind. I also think it would work very well at removing bugs and stuff from the bumper in the summer.
Now for the Amsoil Anti-Freeze:
To flush the system I just bought a bottle of the Prestone Super Flush and a few gallons of distilled water. When the motor cools off I just drained the old coolant and then closed the drain plug, added the flush and then filled it with the distilled water. Start the motor and let it get up to temperature and turn on the heater to high.
Note: I would suggest that you maybe drive the car around the block or something. Letting the car idle at a fast idle didnt seem to get the coolant warm enough to open the thermostat. So to do a really good job you may need to do that then let it cool back down again add more distilled water and drive it around a couple miles to get everything really cleaned out. This is probably going to yield much better results than just a fast idle.
Once you have run the motor with the flush in it at temperature for about 20 minutes, shut the car down and let it cool off then drain the system. Close off the drain plug again and then refill with just distilled water. See Note above. Run the car again for about 20 minutes or so then shut it down and cool it off. Drain the system again. Now at this point you can refill with distilled water again and do one more flush to maybe get all that you can out, or you can refill with a mix of anti-freeze and distilled water.
The Focus, atleast the Zetec only holds about 6.5 quarts of coolant, so in order to get the protection I wanted I ran 1 gallon of Amsoil anti-freeze and then filled the rest with distilled water. I dont remember the exact ratio at the moment, but I ended up with protection down to about -40 degrees, a little overkill around here, but I though a little stronger concentration of anti-freeze would keep things a bit cleaner for the time being. There is a chart on line and on the back of the gallon container that shows you what temp. you will be protected down to at various mix ratios.
I flushed my system, 1.) Because it had been almost 2 years since I had done so and since I was running the green coolant its recommended you flush that out about every 2 years. If you are running the orange coolant you can go longer. Amsoil anit-freeze is compatible with all OAT and HOAT coolants so you can use it whether you are using green or orange or the newer yellow coolant. 2.) Because I dont like flushing the coolant system because it is such a time consuming task and the Amsoil coolant is good for 7years or 250,000 miles, so I wont have to mess with it for a good long time. You can get flushing kits in the store but you have to cut into hoses to install it and I aint to keen on that idea and adding in locations for a leak. 3.) I had to replace my thermostat housing and wanted to go back to the stock temp. thermostat as well after running the 180 degree thermostat for a while.
Ive been using the Amsoil coolant now for a little over a month and as for lower temps I havent noticed anything. As I mentioned, I used it because I wont have to worry about it for a good long time. It was more of a maintenance and time savings for me than anything else. I just wish Amsoil would have made some of those stickers for the coolant that the do for the Air filters so you can record when it was installed.
I love it so far. Ive had no problems with it either, everything has been completely normal.
____________________ My car is a synner! It uses Amsoil Synthetic Lubricants.
2001 Pontiac Grand Prix GTP
It whines a lot, but I like it
* The Mr. Clean Magic Eraser is a highly effective cleaning tool. Test first on an inconspicuous spot with light pressure to see if surface may scratch or dull. Not recommended for use on surfaces that are polished/glossy, or on brushed, satin, dark, or faux finishes. Do not use with chlorine bleach.
____________________ My car is a synner! It uses Amsoil Synthetic Lubricants.
2001 Pontiac Grand Prix GTP
It whines a lot, but I like it
I have no idea what they make that thing out of, but it's like a miracle, not just magic. Gets all that weird tub and sink discoloration right off. It does shred itself on rough surfaces though, I would imagine the Kona treads aren't its friend.
I must say though, I had to test its warning of not using on dark surfaces, so since my house has deep green, red and blue walls in part of it, well... the eraser pulled up the paint a little, left a faded mark in an inconspicuous area (thank god). And that part of the sponge I used turned dark blue. Sooo... not sure what it'd do to the car, I suppose walls don't have clearcoat liek cars do, but still I'd be frightened to try it on the painted surfaces!
