USING CLAY BAR CAN PRESENT MORE PROBLEMS THAN ITS WORTH,YOU NEED TO BE CAREFUL

I have been reading about clay bar use and how it is being over used. I have seen a car recently where the owner used it on his classic and regularly and can i say he has absolutely started to weaken his paint to the point you can see the undercoat.. Yet he wont believe it.. Then i started to read people who know..Wow There are some conjecture over its use at all.

One detailer says and I quote:

A clay bar treatment isn’t something that should be done on a schedule. It either needs to be done, or it doesn’t. If it’s been done recently, your paint is likely still smooth. The fact is, you should never clay bar your car and stop there.

Clay bars are abrasive and will mar your paint while they remove the contaminants. You need to polish the paint afterward in order to maintain a perfect finish. Even a mild all-in-one polish will be enough to fix any damage the clay has caused, and leave some protection behind.

Let me ask you this: would you wet sand your paint if there were no defects or scratches that needed to be fixed? Of course not! Well, using a clay bar is the same idea, although it’s far less aggressive. One of the golden rules of detailing is if something doesn’t need to be done – don’t touch it. Your clear coat will thank you.

In my opinion you must know the structure of your paint some paints are thin and soft, this apparent with a few Japanese brand manufacturers. Clay bar will do more harm then good there..

Did you know. The average factory paint job on a modern vehicle averages about 4-5 mils (thousandths of an inch) of total paint thickness, but some are closer to 3 mils. This usually is comprised of 4-5 different layers, with the top layer being the clear coat and accounting for roughly 1.5 mils.

That is not a lot of paint to work with, with out being cautious.. 

I hope this has helped people..