Purple Rain disappointment.............

sevenfourate

Devotee of OCD
Paid Member
Friend bought me some of this:

http://www.autobritedirect.co.uk/index.php/purple-rain-2-0-iron-decontamination-remover.html

I've never used this type of stuff before, but have clearly seen the pics of people detailing their cars who have completely dark purple wheels. I've also seen people apply to dirty wheels without any sort of pre-wsh. And whilst that may look good colour / bleeding wise in a photo.......this stuff isnt supposedly good at getting off road-grime. And its not what the instructions say. They say APPLY TO CLEAN WHEELS. Its purpose is purely for removing metallic particles embedded in or deeply ingrained in paint or on wheels.

Im in the middle of giving the wifes car a once over. Outside hasn't been done for a month or more. Her Silver alloys were literally black.

So i cleaned first of all with a sponge and fairly liquid (Wouldn't normally use this - certainly not on mine !- but i wanted something slightly harsher to get all the crud in the hard to get to bits off).

Rinsed and let dry as per the instructions and sprayed on the Purple Rain.

NOTHING. Barely a purple trail what-so-ever. 99.5% of what was coming off had done so with a sponge and fairly liquid. The effect of any Purple Rain was virtually zero.

I don't at all think the product ive used is poor. I just now think all the heavy-bleeding / dark purple wheel pics you see are people applying it to heavily soiled / unclean wheels.

Maybe i need to do this too. But if thats the case why would i spend £10 - £12 on a bottle when a sponge and some sort of lubrication has achieved the same thing..........

Anyone else use this type of thing in their regular cleaning regime ?
 
Maybe you just did that good a job at cleaning them initially, that there was nothing left for the Purple Rain to remove?

I've never used it so I can't really comment, but to me it sounds more like a cool gimmick than something that's actually useful.
 
Considered there might not be much brake dust? Were the wheels sealed? If so brake dust might not have even caked on...
 
If the wheels have been looked after then as said above you may not have any embedded metal. I used Iron X on the bodywork when I first got my 182 and it was bleeding all over, a year later done the same and hardly anything. I think these products are for extreme cases. I still use once a year as part of my detailing session but no doubt over kill.
 
  • Like
Reactions: sevenfourate
I think perhaps that product is for detailers who prefer to use several products as opposed to an all in one as they may feel that better results may be achieved from a product simply designed to do one thing e.g cleaning the wheel, removing iron contamination, removing tar and sealing the wheel. I personally use Sonax wheel cleaner plus and i'll never use anything else. Not only does it remove dirt and grime, but also iron contamination.

I've learnt that to get the best results, it needs to be sprayed on to dry wheels directly. I leave it to dwell for 3/4 minutes and then agitate it with a soft brush. The instructions say that little to no agitation is required but that doesn't really work from what i've found. It's hard to imagine a product that can remove 99% of dirt on a wheel without agitation imo. I then simply hose it off, making sure to hose down the surround bodywork too just incase some of it is blown upwards/across. I was so impressed with it that I purchased it in bulk (5 litres). I get a lot of brake dust and generally wash the wheels every week/fortnight but in the pictures below, the dirt has been on there for a good 5 weeks.

C07A6EF1-6E95-478C-89ED-96DB2A55EB07_zpsjb7yqdqo.gif

02B99D63-EB74-45B2-92D3-A5FB9D6418B6_zpsjwv3wh1s.gif

90BE7D13-5946-41B8-A8FF-C160B420124F_zps7ph1jfey.gif

63DACA33-A567-4129-BDB3-F92B90940749_zps75wi3od4.gif

255E8202-8924-441B-A91F-A3CBBF3BBC0E_zpsai7glbcx.gif

A9549F56-4BF9-4F4B-ACE0-0DBC28AD60D9_zpssdt1xha4.gif

DA2A5EF9-AAFE-44C5-8DEF-8F43127A942D_zpsjur0fns4.gif

4ADEA1EF-A9EA-4108-A7E0-8C7B354007CA_zpsdgbmknhc.gif