headlamp coating

[ironhead]

how long does the Delta Infinity 4.1 last after applied??

[Brent Deines]

That's a loaded question. On one of my cars which are washed frequently, waxed occasionally, parked indoors at night, parked facing a building during the day, driven about 15,000 miles per year in a relatively mild climate...probably 5+ years. However, that is not the way most vehicles are cared driven or cared for so I know it is not what you want to hear but the honest answer is "it depends", just as it does with the OEM coating.

Our experience has been that on average in our climate it holds up well for around 2 years and still looks better than pre-restoration after 3 years. We try to call customers annually to see how their headlights look after we have restored them and many claim that they still look great after 3+ years but we know what they think looks great and what we think looks great is not always the same. Rarely do we actually see a customer's car that doesn't still look good after 2 years but if they drive enough miles in the right conditions, don't wash their car regularly and always have the car parked outside in an unprotected area the coating can start to deteriorate in a year or so.

We used to offer a 3 year warranty for free but we have changed our policy to a 1 year free warranty with an optional 2 year paid extension, not because of the number of customer complaints, but because we wanted customers to bring their car back in every year so we could monitor how well the Infinity is holding up.

FYI, When Infinity 4.1 was developed we ran a series of accelerated weather tests comparing it to other popular products on the market and after making a couple of formulation changes in the early stages of testing it outperformed everything we tested it against. We even tested it against some off the shelf products we know are being used on headlights with the same results. Marine Spar Varnish is one that really makes the lens look nice when applied but fails miserably in accelerated weather testing.

Hopefully other forum members will chime in with their real world experiences in different parts of the country. The environment, the care the car receives, the miles driven, and of course the technician who applies it, all factor in to how long it will actually last.

[ironhead]

thanks, good info....I would be comfortable giving a year guaranteed then!!

[HW Miles]

FYI, When Infinity 4.1 was developed we ran a series of accelerated weather tests comparing it to other popular products on the market and after making a couple of formulation changes in the early stages of testing it outperformed everything we tested it against. We even tested it against some off the shelf products we know are being used on headlights with the same results. Marine Spar Varnish is one that really makes the lens look nice when applied but fails miserably in accelerated weather testing.

Brent,
Can you provide detailed results of this testing or some kind of report? You could hide the names of the products that you tested against if you are not comfortable showing them. It may be helpful for us to have some technical facts available when discussing the process with customers.

[Brent Deines]

When I first read your post I thought, "no problem", but I spent most of the afternoon digging up accelerated weather testing data from 2011 and various other notes on other tests we ran in years prior to and after 2011 and I have come to the conclusion that I simply don't have the time to go back through and edit out all of the names of competitive products we tested to compile a comprehensive report that would be useful for our customers. Every single document is filled with references to competitor products and proprietary formulation information that would have to be edited out prior to sharing publicly.

As we complete future testing however, I will try to do a better job of organizing and archiving data so we can make it available for others. This has never been my strong suit but I will try to get better at it.

I'm still on the fence about publishing the accelerated weather testing data that I was able to dig up today. It is by no means a complete set of data or a comprehensive report but it does show some of the photos that were taken comparing Infinity 4.1 to competitor's products before and after 100 hours in an accelerated weather testing machine. If this is something you are really interested in give me a call and we can talk about the possibility of sharing this information privately or perhaps you can convince me it would be beneficial to make the necessary edits and share on the forum.

[HW Miles]

Happy New Year Brent, I appreciate the effort, but I didn't mean to give you a homework assignment. In another thread you posted:

We used an accelerated weather machine to test Infinity 4.1 side by side with Coat2Protect and several other leading headlight coatings. The Infinity 4.1 lasted several times longer than Coat2Protect and all other products tested. Some of the products tested began to yellow and deteriorate very quickly, but the Infinity 4.1 showed very little color change or deterioration after the equivalent several years weathering.

I just thought that a simple chart showing the weather test results and a brief description of the test conditions would be helpful in allowing me to claim that I am using a superior UV coating. I'll give you a call later today.

[Brent Deines]

Happy New Year to you as well. It was nice chatting with you this morning. I'm not sure I can put together a chart like you are suggesting. I think you will understand what I am talking about you look at the test results and photos I sent you but I'll give it some more thought. Maybe there is a way to create something that could be used as a sales tool. Thanks for the suggestion!

[Rev]

I have been thinking about offering a Life Time Chemical Warranty with a 1-year service agreement. The Life Time Warranty be for as long as they own the vehicle and the service agreement will free for the 1-year, after that we will charge a $40 labor service fee. Any thoughts on this approach?

RevRand

[Brent Deines]

We do something similar but only for 3 years. I like your idea though and might have to consider doing a lifetime service agreement. Current statistics show that people hang on to new cars for an average of 6.5 years and used cars for 5.3 years so for most customers the lifetime agreement will only be effectively in force for 5-6 years. Also, if you make the agreement contingent on annual inspections you'll find very few people show up for those even if you send them a reminder prior to their their anniversary date.

http://www.cnbc.com/2015/07/28/american ... -ever.html