Why your coating failed early

When somebody calls to say their two-year-old coating has stopped beading, the cause is nearly always one of four things, and only one of them is the coating itself.

The first and most common is automated brush washing. Rotating brushes at a fuel station carry grit from every vehicle that went before yours. A handful of passes will abrade a ceramic film badly enough to destroy its hydrophobic behaviour while leaving it visually intact — which is why people are surprised.

The second is application over uncorrected or improperly prepped paint. A coating bonds to whatever it lands on. If polishing oils were still present, it bonded to those, and it will leave with them.

The third is chemistry: dish soap, wheel cleaners used on paint, and traffic film removers left to dwell. These are all designed to strip surface protection, and they are extremely good at it.

The fourth, genuinely, is product failure — and in our experience it is the rarest. Which is why our warranty conversations always start with how the car has been washed.