Good wax that doesn't damage old paint

[smytsa]

I'd like to start waxing up my old Giulia. However, I'm afraid that I'll "rub" paint off. Almost everytime I waxed before, the rags would take the color of the paint. Is that because the car wasn't polished for a while and it stops to rub off eventually? Is that normal? Sorry if these are dumb questions... I searched the detailing forum but I didn't see anything about waxes that damage paint -- especially paint that's 40 years old.

Any suggestions are appreciated.

Serge

[lowmileage]

Couple of things. "Cleaner" waxes will take paint off. True waxes only (like just Carnuba only without cleaners) won't. But you can't (well you can but it doesn't make sense ) just true wax over a dirty or oxidized finish. I don't like cleaner wax combo's. I feel they are a half azzed way of doing it. But on that classic of yours, don't go buying rubbing compound and start wheeling around with a power buffer. I like Mothers products. Most of the time I just use the Step 2 sealer and glaze followed with the Step 3 Carnuba only. If you need the Step 1 Cleaner (which is a fine compound), I'd go real easy because you could end up going down to the primer - which is not good!

[Damo105]

Zymol has a great range of waxes and cleaners, and curiously they have a wax specifically for Italian cars (called Ital Glaze), based on the notion that old Italian cars don't have the same thickness/quality of paint that some other cars do.

Haven't used the Italian car wax, but have used their standard HD-cleanser as well as titanium wax, which I've found to be excellent on my GTV. Albeit my car has been repainted in the past.

The cleaner seems to be non-abrasive, and I was amazed at how many surface defects it removed with lots of elbow grease. The wax is just a wax with no cleaning element.

The Zymol range is quite expensive, and the Ital Glaze is REALLY expensive, and some of the other products have just silly prices (one of the waxes is $1100!!). I paid about $200AUD for a kit, and was stoked with the results, my GTV shines like a bald man's head in a heatwave.

I think you can get a kit including the Ital glaze for about $150USD.

Their website is www.zymol.com

And no affiliation, I'm just speaking from my own experience.

[101/105guy]

No need to go crazy on this..........you just have oxidized paint and if you want it to shine, you gotta remove the oxidation. If it really is 40 years old paint, there may not be much color left. Especially on the horizontal surfaces that take most of the sun. Just stay away from polishes and cleaners to remove as little paint as possible.

[Craig LNU]

I too can vouch for the Zymol line...that said, head on over to autopia.org for all the detailing info you could ever want.