Fusso Coat Floats Peugeots Boat

While it seems like yesterday I was recording a cringy intro for a soft 99 spring wax video, it was actually a whole five months, so now that we've said goodbye to summer and let autumn slide into the DMs, it's time to revisit the brand for a more durable but hopefully just as lustrous winter wax production. So after enhancing and protecting the finish of both the paintwork and glass of my own car with a selection of Soft 99's carnauba-based paste waxes and Glaxo DX sealants earlier this year, I thought it might be worth treating someone else's to a complementary layer of their flagship fluoropolymer-based 12-month Fuso Coat and Ultra Glaxo sealants, which both come as part of a convenient pre-winter protection kit. And with the owner of this quirky metallic yellow French fancy having recently politely declined the offer of a dealership made perfect sense to go ahead and thoroughly seal its exterior surfaces up with these products before the unwelcome winter weather arrived to mess with its mojo. Now before getting ahead of myself with the dedicated winter waxing and glass sealing, I had to ensure that the two-year-old 208, which I actually thought was brand new when I first saw it, was adequately prepared as there's no point committing to slapping on durable products if they're not going to properly stick. So once it had been thoroughly pre-rinsed with the pressure washer to quickly knock off any loose dirt and confirm it was indeed unprotected and non-repellent, got to work methodically contact washing its 4-0 yellow panels over with some stiff suds to strip back any light to moderate contamination that had accumulated over the past few weeks. And while I appreciate the car looks pretty clean to begin with, the point I'm trying to make by including a bit of dedicated cleaning footage here is that you should take the time to at the very least give your car a good wash with a product that's free from any gloss enhancers or protectants of its own to ensure its surfaces are free from day-to-day contamination, both seen and unseen. After the suds had been thoroughly rinsed off and while the car was still wet, I took the opportunity to then further deep clean its windscreen with some of Soft 99's Glaco compound which doesn't come with the bundle featured here but can of course be purchased alongside it. Used either wet or dry it does a great job at mechanically stripping back any light greasy film, screen wash residue or previously applied protectants which is important to do prior to the application of a new one and once its felt applicator has been primed with a gentle squeeze of the handy bottle, it's then just a case of working it over the surface every which way until there's zero repellency of it on the glass which lets you know you've successfully achieved a naked hydrophilic or non-repellent finish. So went ahead and did just that for the entirety of the windscreen which depending on how quick or cack-handed you are might get a bit messy but being water-based it rinses off fairly easily especially with a pressure washer so wouldn't worry too much about the odd bit of splatter. So it was then time to further decontaminate the paintwork and while claying it over with something like Soft 99's Smooth Egg Stuff would technically be your best bet, I generally prefer not to clay paintwork unless I'm also going on to properly machine polish which I wasn't here plus it was a relatively new car in pretty good shape so likely didn't need a full mechanical decontamination anyway so just kept it to a few select panels for illustrative purposes here before moving on to a stressful sun-soaked chemical decontamination instead using a full bottle of Soft 99's Iron Terminator which while primarily marketed for use on wheels can also be used to rid paintwork and other lacquered surfaces of hidden ferrous contamination and with the dealership this car came from being plonked right next to a busy railway line I knew there'd at least be some. Now with this being a strong chemical that ideally needs to be left to soak for a fair few minutes it's obviously better if you can get it done in the shade or undercover but if like me you don't have much choice but to apply it in the moment then just ensure you don't allow it to dry on the surface and have a pressure washer or hosepipe handy to thoroughly rinse it off afterwards as well as perhaps a damp towel to give it a helping hand first so it doesn't have to sit on the surface for quite as long and while re-shampooing or snow firming over afterwards to chemically dampen things down makes sense I was up against it time-wise with this one so just went with a straight pressure rinse here knowing that as long as I got things quickly dried off afterwards should be all right. As I say then before any unfiltered water or diluted iron terminator had the chance to dry on the Peugeot's attractive yellow paintwork went ahead and ran a large twist loop towel over all of its surfaces as a final means of preparing it for pre-winter protection which for the most part was a pretty self-explanatory affair and while heavy twist loop towels like these can tend to drag a bit over unprotected surfaces because these ones have just been freshly decontaminated it slipped over them a treat which was great but didn't really mean I could afford to be any less thorough when soaking up potentially chemically tainted rinse water than I normally be so methodically worked my way around the car until I felt everything was as free from water and any associated spots and smears as it realistically could be. So while I had both light and dark versions of Soft 99's Fuso coat here I'd be going with the lighter formulation for this yellow car although it's worth noting that it wouldn't do any harm to treat it with the darker version if that's all I had to hand it just makes sense when buying new to try and match it with the vehicle or vehicles you intend to protect as best you can. Now the key to successful application of this stuff is to dampen the supplied applicator pad first which will help to prevent any residual wax on it from drying out and to only apply a light layer of it as less really is more and while it's obviously not advisable to apply a durable synthetic sealant like this or any kind of protectant for that matter in the direct sun if I was to get things done didn't have much choice here but as I've said before if I can make things work in imperfect conditions then just imagine what you could achieve in more preferable or even controlled ones. After being left to dry for about five minutes which was more than enough time on these hot panels it was buffed off with a pair of plush towels the first of which was used to cut through the bulk of the residue while the second was employed to buff things to a smear-free high shine which I've got to say was pretty effortless considering it was a durable direct sun applied protectant and while the two towel technique isn't paramount as a wipe flip and buff with a single item will likely do the job just as well did manage to get the entire car buffed off with just the two towels here which shows just how much or how little residue you should be aiming to leave behind with a less is more type application. Now it's recommended the paste sealant be applied in a crosshatch manner to ensure neat even and adequate coverage which I did for the most part here but I also threw a bit of old school circular and go with the flow motion in for good measure as I think if you're going to put a product to use for the sake of others who for whatever reason might not strictly follow instructions you might as well test it every which way but honestly regardless of the specific manner in which you choose to apply it so long as you ensure you don't miss any spots and keep it away from any unpainted surrounding trim should be able to achieve a satisfactory result with relative ease. Soft 99 reckon a single 200 gram tin of Fuso should provide up to 30 applications which I equates to pretty decent value for money especially considering how long it lasts and while I'm not sure if you'll be able to notice a discernible difference in the finish of the yellow paintwork on camera I could definitely tell in a moment that as well as slickening up the surface the sealant was also serving to brighten and glossify it which is good to know as most people will be approaching this product primarily with protection in mind and rightly so but if you can noticeably enhance as well as protect for up to 12 months then even better so with that in mind continue to work my way around the compact body of the car until all parts have been adequately treated which probably took me a good few hours between faffing with the two cameras before finally downing plush towels to get to grips with the ultra-glaco glass sealants instead. So to try and illustrate the difference between protected and unprotected glass I taped the little Peugeot's freshly compounded windscreen down the middle before treating one side of it to soft 99's ultra-glaco sealant or liquid wiper as they also like to refer to it which much like the Fuso coat aims to provide up to 12 months worth of water repellent protection. Applying the sealant isn't too dissimilar to applying the compound however here you're not aiming to mechanically cut through anything with abrasive elbow grease but simply lay down an even all-encompassing coating of the product which an overlapping crosshatch method seems to do best but again you don't have to be completely rigid with this and could go with the flow to an extent so long as there's no gaping holes in your technique. With no strict drying time it's simply a case of waiting for the residue to turn cloudy which only took a couple of minutes here but so long as it's not left to bake in the sun anywhere from two to five minutes should be sufficient but feel free to leave it for longer if you're working in cooler or more controlled conditions. I simply used a general purpose towel to progressively remove the residue here and found that the more you buff the slicker the surface gets so it's worth persevering at for a minute or so to achieve a nice crystal clear residue free finish that both you and your car can be proud of. Now while you should really give the glaco 12 hours to set before exposing it to water I didn't have that luxury here so just gave it as long as I realistically could before spraying it down for the sake of some satisfying repellency shots. Treating the rest of the glass to some of soft 99's glaco de cleaner in the meantime which is the perfect product for routinely maintaining previously treated glass but because it contains light protective properties of its own could also be used as a standalone product to build some superficial protection elsewhere if you prefer to save the dedicated stuff for windscreens only. As per usual I used a basic lint-free glass cleaning cloth to work it over the surface before buffing off to a nice smear-free shine with the general purpose towel which regardless of the condition of the glass this cleaner seems to do an absolute treat. So before the low-lying autumnal sun left me in the lurch went ahead and sprayed the freshly protected surfaces down with the pressure washer as what a pre-winter protection video without some subsequent hydrophobic action. Now despite not having time to fully cure you could still clearly see the difference between the protected and unprotected parts of the windscreen with the treated side instantly repelling water and therefore not needing the assistance of physical wipers when on the move and the other holding on to it and therefore necessitating the constant swish of them in the rain and once the frosty weather arrives removing that from the surface in the morning should be a breeze as with a sealant like this applied won't be able to properly stick. The water behavior on the freshly sealed paintwork I felt was even more impressive mimicking that of a professional ceramic coating which for an affordable paste-based sealant is pretty damn impressive and if you keep it maintained with Soft 99's Speed and Barrier Quick Detailer which incorporates the Fuso technology in lighter form could realistically have this level of freshly protected repellency indefinitely. Aside from reducing wiper reliance, repellent dirt and of course looking cool using products like these also means that you can take advantage of the reduced friction on the surface to effortlessly blow things dry which I think is always a satisfying affair especially if you're used to tediously towel drying insufficiently protected surfaces. So while this little 208's 4O Yellow paintwork didn't look like it was in desperate need of attention to begin with if it had been left to sit unprotected through the winter would have quickly lost its joie de vivre so definitely think it was worth preemptively trying to seal that in and despite this being a sponsored video still genuinely can't recommend this stuff enough. So much so in fact that I'm gonna have to find time to treat my own car to some of it now that the previously applied carnauba based protection has diminished but with 10 million tins sold globally doubt I'm the only one willing to put my credibility on the line by singing the protectants praise. Now I'm sure if you're still watching at this point then you enjoyed seeing me pamper this Peugeot so please do thank Soft99 for assigning me the task of finding something quirky to feature alongside their winter protection time set by giving their immaculately designed dedicated product pages a visit via the links below but not before seeing things out until next time with these slick final pots and after shots.