Unsure about Interior plastic care

[alex_nz]

Hi,

I'm new to Meguiars car care. You definitely got me with Ultimate Quick Wax. I absolutely love it, stunning product!

Now, I drive a 2006 Volkswagen Phaeton, which has besides a lot of leather also so called "soft touch" plastic (feels soft to the touch and it' s matte, but gets sticky and shiny if treated wrong. If this happens then it's too late. The only option left then is changing the parts. Since the Phaeton is sometimes consideres as "Entry level Bentley" you might imagine the costs of replacing all the soft touch parts.)

Now, interior plastic care is much more confusing than exterior care for me. I asked some detailers, and got different replys. Some said I should use no interior care products as these might cause the hard plastic to crack and the soft touch to bloat. Some others meant, that I should definitely use interior detailing products, cause If I wouldn't the plastic would crack. Some mentioned glass cleaner, but I can't imagine that that is a good idea, I mean glass cleaner contains alcohol which in my opinion causes the plastic to dry out.

So I was thinking about Quick Interior Detailer or Natural Shine Protectant. Since I have wood panels (as far as I know painted with some kind of "plastic") - would these products safe to be used on the wood trim as well?

Do QID and Natural Shine Protectant contain any silicones or maybe "outgassing" ingridients? I sometimes spend 12 hours in my car driving, and I do care about the health aspect of the products used. Since I usually keep the cars I like for a very long time, I would be interested about long term effects of using / not using Meguiars interior care products as well as interior dressings in general.


Looks like keeping the interior in perfect shape is a bit more complicated than keeping paint in perfect condition.
Thanks, Alex

[Murr1525]

Re: Unsure about Interior plastic care

QID would be ok, esp if just sprayed on your cloth and then wiped around to pick up dust.

[tato20vt]

Re: Unsure about Interior plastic care

You are making it complicated dude its as simple as this, for a complete process of the interior first clean all the plastics, clotch and leather with meguiars APC diluted 1:10, or 1:4 depending on the dirt, these will leave the interior complety clean and "naked" so if you dont use any protectant its possible that sun may crack your panels so after averything its dry apply megs QID on all the hard areas like dash, door panels, steering wheel, this will leave a matte finish and protection will be added, I personally use natural shine on the seats plastics, seats rollers, and rubbers natural shine will leave a satin finish, now condition the seats with your favorite leather conditioner and clean all the glass, for the wood you can use UQW if you want more shine and protection, now that you have your interior full detailed its time to maintain it so everytime you wash your car use megs quick interior detailer in all the areas and condition the leather every month this will keep the interior in top condition...thats the way I do it on my car and my dads mercedes and I dont have any problem...I repeat the full process every year becouse doing it everytime its unnecesary QID will do the mainteining job

[yfwong]

Re: Unsure about Interior plastic care

For interior, I use QID on everything including carpet too.

[SLO3K]

Re: Unsure about Interior plastic care

Tato20, that was a great explanation but I have a question about using APC. Do you spray it at 10/1 right on the interior surfaces or on a towel? And is it best to scrub it using something like a brush then washing it off with water or just picking it up with a towel? Thanks.

[The Guz]

Re: Unsure about Interior plastic care

Spray APC onto a microfiber towel and wipe the surface. Then use another MF towel to wipe off. If you have textured pastic then a tooth brush works well with APC. I spray it onto the brush before using it. If I want to take it up a nothc then I follow with QID to remove anything left over by the APC. If I want to go even further then I would use a protectant (natural shine, supreme shine, ultimate protectant).

[Murr1525]

Re: Unsure about Interior plastic care

I spray on a towel.

And then following up with a protectant or QID, or UQID would remove any residue, no need to a wet towel step.

[Eldorado2k]

UQW on woodgrain? Hmm, never thought about that. I'll do a test spot.

[SLO3K]

Re: Unsure about Interior plastic care

Great info guys thanks. I'm waiting excitely to try the APC out on my 20yr old car!

[Michael Stoops]

Re: Unsure about Interior plastic care

This is a revival of an older thread, but with some basic points that confuse many so we'll address a couple of points just for reference:

If you are really worried that use of a water based conditioner such as Natural Shine could cause any sort of damage, then stick with Quik Interior Detailer for all interior plastics, vinyls, even nav screens and instrument cluster covers. But always spray onto a folded microfiber towel and wipe the surface rather than spraying directly onto the panel. You simply can not control overspray by spraying onto the dash, console, etc and you run the very real risk of not seeing some overspray that will get onto delicate surfaces and self dry, which can cause issues. Nav screens and instrument clusters are very sensitive, and allowing anything to self dry after being sprayed onto it is asking for trouble - but wiping these surfaces with a microfiber towel that has been lightly dampened with QID is perfectly safe. QID actually has very capable cleaning abilities, and it leaves excellent UV protection without adding any gloss, slipperiness, etc to the surface.

Leather surfaces are best treated with a light application of Gold Class Leather Cleaner/Conditioner. This all in one product has very light cleaning ability but excellent moisturizing properties. Again, we recommend applying to a folded microfiber towel first and gently working it into the leather rather than just spraying or pouring onto the surface.

Tato20, that was a great explanation but I have a question about using APC. Do you spray it at 10/1 right on the interior surfaces or on a towel? And is it best to scrub it using something like a brush then washing it off with water or just picking it up with a towel? Thanks.

This is a bit of a change up from the above and is best left for situations where the surface is quite dirty. Whether you choose APC or a dedicated leather cleaner there are a couple of options here:

1) You can spray onto a folded microfiber towel and massage that against the surface, wiping dry with a second towel.

2) For really deep cleaning, spray product directly onto the surface and work it with a natural boar's hair or horse hair brush, then wipe dry with a clean microfiber towel. Optionally, steam can be used with a fitting that can be wrapped in a microfiber towel to deliver both the steam and cleaning properties of the towel in one go.