Exterior Care for Harsh Environment - Year Round Brine/Salt

The TL;DR which you can probably conclude from the title is that I get salt and brine exposure year round due to living on a dirt road that gets brined spring through fall, then good old Michigan road salt the rest of the time. Detailing, et al, is not really a hobby of mine though, so I am hoping to not make a huge thing of it.

I have a plan of attack for the undercarriage, that being annual Krown treatments, which should hopefully take decent care of the lower end of things.

On the shiny side...I'm not sure what's appropriate. The odds of me washing the thing every week, well, I'm gonna be honest - probably pretty slim. Once or twice a month should be doable. So where does that leave me..is some sort of ceramic treatment my savior (a detail shop local to me offers XPel..)? Ceramic plus some biannual deep cleans? Will that be a waste of $1000+ and I should do annual DIY grade paint detox and sealant?

 

^Find a touchless car wash in your area and drive through it every week? That's what I do in the winter when temps are above freezing.

 

At least from what I see, all the drive through places here are not touchless, or that would be a good option..

 

Or you can do your own ceramic. Gyeon Pure, I recently put on my Tacoma, is probably one of the easiest coatings to work with. If you can apply a sealant, then you can do this. During the winter, when brine is put down, I take it to spray and pay to get the salt off. If it works up enough I may do a rinse less wash at home.

 

Thanks for the suggestion, I'll check that out more. Certainly more affordable than a pro treatment, I am guessing a lot of the cost involved in that though is prep/labor and not outright product cost.

 

A large portion of going professional coating is the paint prep portion. Now with that said the coatings are different and are usually not available unless you are an installer.

 

Are typical pro-grade products that much better or is something like the Geyon you pointed out above going to be pretty close, but maybe just require more frequent re-application? There's a ton of products and opinions out there but I am getting the impression that a DIY coating will be doing well to last a year in less than ideal conditions. Contrasting with that, a place local to me offers a 5 year warranty on their coating - but also doesn't spell out any details whatsoever about that warranty, its terms, and what it does and doesn't cover.

 

Seems the pro coatings offer/advertise longer longevity. Some like GTechniq Crystal Serum Ultra can only be removed by sanding.

What coating is the local detailer offering you?

DIY coatings depend upon what you get. Do not look at spray ceramics as they are not true coatings. Several DIY coating offer longer than a year of longevity.

 

The one most local to me is offering XPel Fusion Plus. Looking at the manufacturer's page, they offer a 4 year warranty, so I wonder if this shop is offering their own warranty in addition to, or just extending, the manufacturer's. They quoted $1400, but I also now see they have different products for paint, glass, plastic, etc. so I don't know if that was for a bumper to bumper treatment or painted areas only.

 

That's about the going price in mid west mitten. I paid 1500 for mine. I washed it real good the night before I handed it off to the shop to apply the coating. They washed, detailed, and clayed the truck. Further removing any contamination. They did all body panels with the hood and doors closed. All glass, headlights and tail lights. It's very important that you allow it the 7 day cure time before you go to wash it after it's application. There are also special washing proceyou should adhere to for best results of the coating. Avoid automatic car wash at any cost. I know this is an old post, but hopefully this helps you or someone else out.