blackonyxES300

Well, I gave it another go last night, temps in the low 80s, dry air, and no rain in sight. I almost bought the clay bar from O'Reillys (our local retailer), but at $19.99, I was a bit hesitant, in fear of wasting more money on something I don't have much experience with, or knowledge of. However, I will be using the clay bar on my 03 Camry (white), when I get time to wax it, as it REALLY needs attention. I've put 172K on that car, so you know it's screaming for a deep clean. At O'Reillys, I told the sales rep my situation, what I had used, and asked if I should clay my car. He recommended that I should use that as a last resort if I don't get the results I'm after, and pointed me in the direction of Meguiars "Professional" Cleaning Wax. It's a liquid compound that is typically used with buffers, but can be manually applied. It wasn't even on the shelf with typical waxes, and in a totally different section of the store, who knew? I was a little nervous, thinking, Great, so I've attempted a wax with what I thought was superb wax (must have been the advertisement working me), and now I'm going to use a wax for professionals, and I'm nowhere near that level.........but I bought it anyway. So, I started with a Dawn hand-wash with a microfiber "shag" sponge. Unbelievable how that stuff gets to the bones, it was awesome. Yea, my errors are gone! After wiping it dry, I started to wax, one panel at a time. The liquid wax went on very nice and smooth, produced a perfect haze blend, and it took no time to dry. I literally probably only waited 2-3 minutes per panel before removing, but it was windy out, so that helped it along. I was very pleased with the results, and I did have some trouble with the hood again, some streaking, but I gave it "3" full coats, and it finally turned out. Happy Ending to this story, just learning from my mistakes. So, I'll be dawning, claying, and applying left-over NXT to the Camry, and using the leftover Cleaning Wax for my F-150 (black), so all is good. Thanks again for all of your help and tips, I really appreciate it. -- I've already requested a buffer as my birthday gift, so hopefully by then, I'll be expert enough to attempt that!

I agree with that, 110%. I have waxed all of my cars over the past 8 years in a humid setting "lived in NC", and I only ran into trouble when I didn't claybar the car first, then polish it, then WAX it. If you do this, you shouldn't have nearly as much trouble. Plus, claybaring the car will really make it shine, far more then just a wax job. 10 years later of learning about the claybar technique, I'm still amazed at how much of a difference it makes to car's appearance, and lasting perfomance over time. The thing that really impresses me with a clayed car, is the fact that when it's dirty, it still looks clean. Great help here all! I didn't know about the "Dawn" technique, so that will probably be my first thing to try. I haven't ever tried the clay trick, but I'm not opposed to it, so I may give that a shot as well. After seeing some of the responses, I now realize that my blotching is probably due to not removing the old wax, or just giving the car a full cleaning of old contaminents before starting. I had run the car through the automatic wash, took it home and wiped it down dry before starting, but I hadn't thought about the extra layer of old grime/film lurking, that needed removing. There's initial grime that's visible, and wiping a car dry after washing will take away that problem, but according to research I've been finding, there's a lot more there than meets the eye. So, since I've spent $17-18 on this NXT wax, I'm not about to give up on it yet, so I'll be trying again either tonight, Friday, or Saturday, and will update again with the results. The air should be mostly dry, warmer temps, and lower humidity, so it should dry faster, and I'll try just a panel at a time. Thanks again to all of you for your suggestions/comments.

I did try to allow it to dry to a haze before removing, and I noticed it took exceptionally longer than other waxes I've used, but the package says to let it dry before removing. The towel I used to remove it was a microfiber polish cloth bought at Autozone. It seemed to be a safe and ideal thing at the time, but the combination of everything must not have actually been ideal. I did try the ICE spray wax the second day, to see if that would even out the blotches, but it didn't do much good. That's when I re-applied Meguiars Tech wax back on the hood, slightly improving the situation, but not completely. If it were you, would you just re-wax the whole car again, on a dry day, and with what product?

Wax Rookie here, so I've waxed several cars in my life (Red Pearl Metallic and Super White clearcoats), but this is my First Lexus, Onyx Black '03 ES300, and I want to get it right, (or make it right now). I'm not sure what mistake I've made, other than choice of day to wax my car, but I purchased Meguiars Next Generation Tech Wax 2.0 Paste on Saturday 04/18, and decided to go for it. Well, after completion, I noticed it was difficult to remove the wax, (Note: it doesn't say on the package, but I'm guessing high humidity makes waxing really difficult? Especially with rain storms approaching), and I did this in my garage, so it wasn't necessarily exposed to the elements, other than air quality, but the results were terrible. In the garage, under the incandescant light, it looked good!! However, when I pulled out into the daylight, it almost looked as if I just took a paintbrush and applied darker coats of black paint here and there, blotchy, leaving places darker and others lighter all over the car, but I know the whole thing was covered evenly. To try and correct my mistake, I decided to re-do the hood a day later, air a little better, but no rain, and the results didn't improve much. Is there a "wrong" way to apply wax and remove it if you go in straight line back and forth motions (not circular), applying with microfiber pad, then using a microfiber polish cloth the remove excess, and going once over again with a clean 100% cotton cloth/or microfiber to dust off? Either Meguiars is over-hyped, I need to be using a different wax, or I just don't use good consistency when applying. One thing that really irked me was after removed, and having headlights shine on the back of the car at night, it just looked like a shiny smeared mess, but you can't see that in the day obviously, unless the sun hits it directly. The weather should be low humidity, sunny, upper 70s/low 80s this week. Should I try again with same wax, or ditch it and get something else. I noticed when applying, it was very soft, almost liquid-like, not like a firm paste. Was that part of the problem, I just thought it was the type of new wax? (Please offer suggestions of wax to remedy this, and/or a different approach in application to even out the blotches.) Thanks to all of you!!

Thanks for the helpful info. I wondered if that may be the case, but wasn't certain. I would have checked before installing anything, but that rules out an either/or option. Now, my question is, how labor intensive would it be to have OE or aftermarket ES300 housings for HIDs installed, replacing the current halogen setup? Would this require professional assistance, or would a DIY be possible, recommended?

New to Lexus Owners Club, and to the Lexus family in general. My 2003 ES300 has Composite Halogen Headlights, and yes, I've experimented all types of Halogen bulbs on previous cars, the only ones remotely close to delivering decent light are Silverstars. I'm trying out Philips Crystal Vision currently, and they are fine for now I guess, but obviously will never compare to HID, I know. Anyway, I'm toying with the idea of replacing my current composite headlights with replacement OEM HID ES300 headlights, rather than purchasing a Xenon Kit, since I've read here and there that those could still damage the original non-HID housing, correct me if I'm wrong. My question is: How complex would it be to replace the OEM non-HID lights with OEM HID lights, versus installing an HID kit? I know some will say, the cost of the original lights may be more, but cost aside, which would be the better solution, or is there any major difference. Thank you for any help or suggestions.