costco microfiber?

[way2evil]

Are these any good? I use them all the time with no problems but was reading somewhere that these are made with some sort of fibers that arent good for the paint. Any truth to this?

[Marylander]

Are these any good? I use them all the time with no problems but was reading somewhere that these are made with some sort of fibers that arent good for the paint. Any truth to this?

 

Like anything else, you generally get what you pay for with microfiber. I can't honestly say that the cheap ones will or won't do damage, but once you've felt and worked with Adam's MF you won't want anything else to touch your car. I admit that I do have some old cheap MF towels that I bought before I found Adams and I do still use them for cleaning wheels, tools and other less delicate surfaces.

[way2evil]

Like anything else, you generally get what you pay for with microfiber. I can't honestly say that the cheap ones will or won't do damage, but once you've felt and worked with Adam's MF you won't want anything else to touch your car. I admit that I do have some old cheap MF towels that I bought before I found Adams and I do still use them for cleaning wheels, tools and other less delicate surfaces.

What is the adams MF to use with detail spray and waterless car wash? I normally use the yellow costco MF to wipe the whole car down with DS or WCW and the rag comes out black so I just throw it out.

[Chris@Adams]

Like anything else, you generally get what you pay for with microfiber. I can't honestly say that the cheap ones will or won't do damage, but once you've felt and worked with Adam's MF you won't want anything else to touch your car. I admit that I do have some old cheap MF towels that I bought before I found Adams and I do still use them for cleaning wheels, tools and other less delicate surfaces.

 

With Rich! You get what you pay for! The Blue Adam's MF towels are nice!

[Bill-V8V]

I have some of the cheap ones for my exhaust tips. After I cover the tip in MP #1 I put one of the cheap MF's over a PowerBall Mini and stick it in the tip then crank up the drill and let it buff it to a great shine :2thumbs:

[GerryC]

cheap costco mf I use for wiping down tires, wheel wells, exhaust, and engine only.

 

adam's towels are for paint and glass, and are used for wiping off polish/wax/glaze residue and with detail spray for very light dust

 

waterless car wash has its own towel, its a waffle-weave so it's much more absorbent (similar to the white drying towel)

[Superdutytd]

cheap costco mf I use for wiping down tires, wheel wells, exhaust, and engine only.

 

adam's towels are for paint and glass, and are used for wiping off polish/wax/glaze residue and with detail spray for very light dust

 

waterless car wash has its own towel, its a waffle-weave so it's much more absorbent (similar to the white drying towel)

 

 

Its weird because some batches of cheapo towels are much better than others, its hit and miss on the quality but they seem to have gotten better at being more consistent.

[livingwater]

With all do respect:

 

If you really care about the finish on your vehicle then I wouldn't use a cheapo microfiber towel.

 

I basically have two high quality microfiber towels that I use.

One is a tight weave with over 200,000 fibers per square inch and the other is Adam's Super Plush that is extremely soft.

 

I have washed both types approx. 2 dozen times and they both still look like new

[Team Adam's]

There is an easy way to tell if your cheapo microfibers are safe for your paint.

 

Rub them on the recordable side of a blank CD... if it scratches the CD it most likely will scratch your paint. Speaking from experience the cheap yellow MF you can buy at costco are chinese made and use far more polyester content resulting in an inferior towel. Do yourself a favor and reserve those for use on door jambs, underhood work, and other areas. Get yourself some Adams Premium Microfiber towels and use those exclusively for your paint.

[Superdutytd]

There is an easy way to tell if your cheapo microfibers are safe for your paint.

 

Rub them on the recordable side of a blank CD... if it scratches the CD it most likely will scratch your paint. Speaking from experience the cheap yellow MF you can buy at costco are chinese made and use far more polyester content resulting in an inferior towel. Do yourself a favor and reserve those for use on door jambs, underhood work, and other areas. Get yourself some Adams Premium Microfiber towels and use those exclusively for your paint.

 

The man speaks the truth

 

I also use them for doing interior work.

[nooner]

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Edited October 1, 2009 by nooner

[Bill-V8V]

I use the walmart MF as long as they have no tag, for detail spray ect.

 

That would be a bad time to use a cheap MF. You are using DS to remove light dust and add shine, that is when your paint will be vulnerable to scratching as there are already contaminants on the paint.

[nooner]

removed by user

Edited October 1, 2009 by nooner

[Superdutytd]

touché, can't argue that logic. I could say I saw Adam using what appeared to be a tagless walmart brand (I don't know what brand, but I am 100% it was not the HQ ones) MF on a car, but in his defense, it was a crap rent a car and was being ued for demo purposes. I guess it could depend on how hard or soft your clear coat and how succeptble it is scratch/swirling. I think it has most to do with personal preference of how much you want to "baby" your garage queen, or if you just want to have a nice looking daily driver, that you know is going to get scratched aynway and though you are not trying to scratch it.... your not going to bend over backwards to prevent it from it like with a nicer car.

 

But then again, you have a tone of experience and I have none. I am actually going to do things "my way" and "experiment" with different things and see what scratches and swirls my car the most or not as I have never owened a swril free car before nor had anything to compare it too. I will give you my results in a year or so lol, so don't hold your breath. But for now, I am going to use the walmart MF for pretty much everything other than polishing and waxing.

 

 

I can ALMOST guarantee you that Adam wasn't using a cheapo towel.

 

These towels are much better than Costco or Walmart towels and once in a while I will use some cheapo towels only if I'm COMPOUNDING (not polishing, using NON Adam's products) to wipe off the compound as when I'm doing that I will be doing at LEAST one more polishing stage, sometimes two.

[nooner]

removed by user

Edited October 1, 2009 by nooner

[Superdutytd]

This seems weird. Are you sure it wasn't a glass towel?

[GerryC]

Whether or not the tag is sewn into the seam doesn't automatically dictate what is quality microfiber and what isn't. There could be some crappy brand of towel that doesn't have a tag at all, but all you have to do is feel the material to realize that it is nowhere near the quality of Adam's towels.

 

The idea with the tag is that, a. if it is sewn into the seam it is stuck to the towel and can scratch your paint; and, b. if you remove the tag completely it will unravel the stitching of the towel. Regardless of where the tag is, the material that the towel is made of is the most important thing when it comes to the quality of the towel and whether or not it will harm your finish.

 

Adam's towels are more expensive than others because they ARE better. They use peel-off labels because, well, you wouldn't want to unravel the stitching on one of your expensive towels.

[jjwvette]

I don't use any that are made in China:D

[nooner]

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Edited October 1, 2009 by nooner

[GerryC]

You originally said:

The problem that makes MF "cheap" or undisireable, is the tag. If it is a peel off tag, it is generally good. If it has a tag sown inthe seem, it is no good

You could have a package of rump roast with a tag stuck onto it, one that has a tag tied onto it, and one that doesn't have a tag at all, but neither will be as tender as a fillet (so yes I did understand your meat analogy). That's my point with the tags, is that they don't matter. What matters is the towel itself. In my post I was merely clearing that up. I know you know that Adam's towels are superior, but it's important to realize that the inferior towels are inferior not because of the tag but because they use cheap made-in-china material.

 

All I am saying is that is was not a plush MF towell. It could have been a glass towel (I don't know where that is or what they look like, do you have a link?) all I can tell you is that I could not tell a difference between it and a the walmart brand MF towels that I have at my house by either look or by feel.

 

If anyone has ever been to any of his previous shows and can say he has never used anything other than the plush on demo cars, than say so. I have a hard time believing that he would only use these kind for one show, unless it has to do with forgeting to bring them and not wanting to use the ones on sale?

I was never discussing what towel Adam may or may not have been using at the show. I've been to Corvettes at Carlisle for the past 4 years and I've only seen him use his own towels on paint and glass. He has used junk towels for cleaning dirt off of tires before applying VRT, etc, as I have mentioned that is my only use for them too. There are other towels he could have been using, depending on what product he was demoing at the time. There is the blue waffle towel that is used with the Waterless Car Wash, and there are the blue (or yellow, same towel) glass towels. If he was using a different towel, I don't know, I wasn't there. If he sees this topic I'm sure he'll chime in.

 

Other than the huge differnce between the plush MF and the "thinner" MF towel. I have never been able to tell a difference in feel or sight between MF towels that are of the non-plush variety. It is the kind with the slightly softer one side and the less soft other side, just the kind you get at walmart.

You're right, there is very minimal difference between the different cheap "thin" mf's that you get at costco/walmart. Tag or no tag, they're all the same, and that's why we reserve them only for areas of the car that have actual dirt or grime, or that won't scratch as easily as paint or glass. I had a package of yellow ones from Costco that had tags sewn onto them, and now I have a package of blue ones from Walmart that have no tags at all. Neither of them touch my paint or glass.

Edited October 1, 2009 by GerryC

[Team Adam's]

maybe the experts can veryify the truths or inacuracies in this post

 

 

I thought MF is MF. The problem that makes MF "cheap" or undisireable, is the tag. If it is a peel off tag, it is generally good. If it has a tag sown inthe seem, it is no good (but for tires/undercarrige ect.) if you cut the tag or rip it off, the MF will unravel.

 

 

 

You are off by a loooooooooong ways.

 

While the tag being sewn into the seem versus it being a removable sticker is a difference between quality mf and cheap mf it is not the only determining factor. If you really want me to get into the nitty gritty of this allow me to enlighten you. Sit down, open yer peepers, and prepare to absorb

 

First lets talk a little chemistry... what is microfiber composed of? Primarily its a blend of 2 different synthetic material fibers, Polyester and Polyamide which is essentially nylon. While blends can vary, typically your cheaper chinese made (translated the crap you get a walmart of costco) have a blend that is cheaper to manufacture. The ratios tagged on each towel refer to the amount of polyester vs the amount of polyamide... since polyester is cheaper the chinese made junk towels tend to have a ratio of 80/20 or worse. What does this mean to you?? Higher polyester content means less plush, which means more likely to scratch and swirl up your paint.

 

Ideally you want a towel with a higher polyamide ratio... like the Adams towels. These are fluffier and more safe for paint use than the cheap-o's from walmart/costco. Also you have to contend with the sneaky chinese tendency to sneak other cheap materials in there as filler... some have been found to have rayon, cotton, plastic, and all manner of other fillers in the mix... its the same reason they use lead based paint on kids toys or poisons in dog food... its cheap and hard to prove until the product is already sold and in the consumers hands.

 

Now theres fiber count or weight... your typical cheap towel will have a weight somewhere in the range of 200g/m2 (give or take) where as a quality towel like Adams is in the neighborhood of 600g/m2 or higher... at around 350g/m2 you're safe to use it on your paint, but any lower than that you run the risk of inducing swirls. The higher the weight or density of the fibers the better it is at trapping and removing potential swirl inducing contaminants thus making it safer for dusting etc.

 

Edging also plays a huge role in having the 'safest' towel. A lot of the ones you'll see for sale at the local autozone, walmart, costco etc. will just have a stitched edging. This is another area where Adams towels are ahead of the game using 100% microfiber edging... a soft paint safe edge is around the entire towel, so if you accidentally drag an edge or fold an edge into your paint you don't run the risk of swirling. The surge binding and hot wire cutting of the mass produced cheap chinese towels will DEFINITELY scratch your paint if it happens to make contact or be rubbed on the surface.

 

Theres also differences you can't see with the naked eye such as defined microfiber structure... cheap manufactured towels are produced in such volume and so quickly that they often times have deformed, misshaped, or closed cross sections. What this means to you is that its less effective at doing what its supposed to do. Heres a cross section of a microfiber thread and a terry cloth thread... cheaper towels will have countless threads thru the weave that closer resemble the terry than the MF... its a side effect of mass producing a cheap product.

 

 

So to answer your question the differences between the garbage available at your local walmart versus the Adams true blue towel are more than just "mystery meat versus filet"... its more of a case of steaming pile of dog poo versus kobe beef... the differences are in the details and a tag does very little to define good or bad towels.

 

As with anything you get what you pay for.

Edited October 1, 2009 by Dylan06SS

[MitsukiGT]

Wow, nice write up, you should put it in a sticky!

[Team Adam's]

Wow, nice write up, you should put it in a sticky!

 

Thanks, but I don't think so. The chemistry and specifics of manufacturing mean little if anything to people.... bottom line is that there is a vast difference between an Adams towel and a Walmart towel, if someone can't tell that at first glance then they certainly won't be swayed by the post I made.

[MitsukiGT]

Just my opinion.

 

Personally your writeup scared the crap out of me. Nooner wasn't the only one that thought the "big" difference in a quality towel was having a tag. Sure Adams towels look allot better, but even I said they were "magic" in some other thread. I knew they worked 100 times better but no idea as to why. If I had read that description for the towels in the Adams online store, no question I would have bought 3 times the amount I did. And really for those that have never seen or used one in person it really is hard to tell the difference. I only ordered more because I used them first hand and experienced the magic. Had I read that writeup I would have bought more initially.

 

I was cheating a bit and using walmart towels to wipe up the "wet" DS and then I followed with the Adams to make the finish perfect. I figured as long as I made sure the tag wasn't touching the finish I would be fine. I wanted to save my Adams towels and not get them wet. I won't be doing that again and now I need to make another order:)

 

So in my case the facts are important.

[Hillmizzle]

EDITED

 

Please do not post links to competitors products on ours site

 

- Dylan

 

Ah yes apologies didn't think about it that way.

Edited October 1, 2009 by Hillmizzle

[MitsukiGT]

LOL, you guys really wanted to make sure I ordered today

 

http://www.adamsforums.com/forums/showthread.php?p=70788#post70788