In this video, we applied Gtechniq EXO V4 Ultra Durable Hydrophobic Coating (that was a mouth full) to a brand new Toyota 4Runner TRD. We talked in-depth about some of the attributes of the coating that I have really enjoyed over the years! When it comes to a combination of gloss and ease of application, there isn’t too much better than EXO.

What is Gtechniq EXO all about?

The first thing you notice is the EXOv4 is incredibly easy to apply and remove. It is a non-hybrid formula comprised of two parts, an inorganic base coat and an organic topcoat. The base coat is a chemically bonding hard coat that bonds directly to the surface with which it is applied. This topcoat is very slick, wet-looking and is also highly dirt and water repellent. The hard film makes water-spots easy to remove, offers great resistance to all wash chemicals, road salt, and can help withstand micro-marring. You will be amazed at how glossy, slick to the touch and ultra-hydrophobic this coating is. Water will bead up in small drops and run off your paint with ease! EXOv4 stands up to UV rays and everyday elements for up to 2 years! It can be used on all painted surfaces including clear coat, matte finishes, enamel, single-stage paint, wheels, chrome, and stainless parts and trim. Protect your paint with ease with the Gtechniq EXOv4 Ultra Durable Coating!

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Video Transcription:

(00:00):
Hey guys, James here with Detailed Image and today we’re going to be talking about Gtechniq’s EXO V4. EXO has been around for a very long time. I remember when it initially came out in like the aerosol form and it blew me away. I thought it was like the coolest thing ever, a coating in aerosol form. And then, you know, there’s been reincarnation of EXO cause EXO has been just super, super popular. I remember old versions of EXO. Every version always looked incredible. Some were a little bit more finicky than others. Sometimes the residue was, was tough to remove throughout the years. And then we had, you know, a couple of years ago we had V3, which is the previous version of this. And it was awesome. Right. And everyone loved it and it was just a great top coat or a standalone coating.

(00:50):
And then they came up with V4 and that kind of just took it to a completely different level when it came to ease of application. It just became that much easier to apply. You had a little bit more working time and he was just, it made an already great product even better. Which is why it’s kind of why I wanted to talk about EXO today. It’s just been one of those coatings throughout the years that I’ve always turned to for different applications. It’s just been something that’s I just know is going to perform well on, on paint, on paint protection film on it can go on a variety of different surfaces, which makes it super usable in a lot of different situations, which is great. But to kind of go a little bit, you know, dig a little bit deeper into EXO V4 within the single layer that you ultimately apply to the surface, you have kind of two bits of chemistry kind of going on.

(01:44):
You have a completely inorganic base layer, and then you have your organic kind of top layer, your top part of the coating that gives. So you have your, your inorganic base layer creating the bonding elements. So making it durable, making it stick to the paint. And then your top layer is what’s giving you that inorganic top layers with giving you that self-cleaning effect the kind of signature crazy EXO water beating. So it’s, it’s kind of a cool element. Unlike, you know, specific SIO2 based coatings that are, have a much harder structure. This is a little bit more flexible. We use this a lot on paint protection film and it just from a look standpoint, there’s not too much better than EXO. And you can, you can do a variety of things you could say, okay, you know, I’m just, I’m on my car.

(02:36):
I’m just going to do two coats EXO and call it a day. And the finish is going to be incredible. You’re going to have durability up to two years, or you could say, you know what, I want to do a, a hard strong base coat, something like crystal serum light or crystal serum ultra. And then you’re going to top it with this for kind of like the best of both worlds. So you have kind of a harder stronger, slightly more scratch resistant base, and then you’re topping it with a flexible top coat. That’s going to give you crazy water beading, crazy self-cleaning effect. And then just bump up that gloss even more. So that’s a little bit of a, kind of an insight into EXO as a whole application. We’re going to kind of go over that a little bit and, and, and kind of rock and roll from there.

(03:23):
So for application, what I recommend when you are, are kind of staring at a panel, you’re about to start, you obviously just want to make sure that the panel is properly do greased oil free. There’s no polishing residue leftover that could be a isopropyl alcohol mix that could be Gtechniq panel wipe. It could be a variety of different oil removers, but your, you basically, your goal is to have this panel to be completely naked, no oils, no residue, no nothing. You want that coating to bond perfectly to the paint. After that point you’re going right into the installation. Nice thing about Gtechniq. They’re always their labeling and their instructions is always on point. You have your kind of instruction manual here in the box. You have your applicator pad, you have your pipette, you have the coating, and then you have the gloves as well for, for hand protection.

(04:21):
And installation is really, really, really simple. All you do is you unscrew the cap here at the top of the bottle, take that off you have in or I should say on, on the top here, you have a dropper already preloaded in the, in the in the bottle itself. So you can go right in and start pouring the product totally. And that would work out great. And, and I’ve actually loved to use this specific style of dropper, or you can use this one, which is obviously gives you a little bit more control. Obviously the coating is going to go within this pipette. And then you can apply it on the applicator pad totally personal preference. They give you both options, which is cool. As far as application goes I like to do a couple of straight lines sometimes like about three straight lines, not too much product on the applicator pad itself.

(05:12):
I wanna make sure that I have kind of distributed across the pad to get a good glide to this particular pad. Otherwise you’re going to maybe generate a little bit too much friction and potentially mar the surface. So you want to have that enough coating to be able to kind of spread evenly. And what you’re doing just like most coatings is it is a crisscross pattern spreading that coating evenly, you’ll notice an immediate darkening effect which is great. And then obviously you just want to track where you end and be very deliberate about your application. Don’t just kind of start going everywhere. I try to keep it on in a two by two section, the simplicity and the ease of application of this particular product is going to, it’s going to make it seem like you can just kind of go crazy and apply it everywhere.

(06:04):
But I would still be stringent with it. I would still keep within that two by two section just in case obviously the, where how you install it is going to be depend, depend on the temperature, humidity, all those different things. So you’re going to experience if you stick within these guidelines, I think you’ll be successful in a variety of different climates. After that’s, the EXO is applied, you have about a two minute sit time, something like that. And then you can start your what I like to call your, your three towel method for removal. Your first towel, right, is your initial wipe off straight line motions, almost no pressure. And you’re just slowly removing that coating. Your goal here isn’t to remove everything. Your goal here is to remove 80% of the residue, right?

(06:56):
So we put that one to the side. We grab our secondary towel here and we go over the same surface. I always like to usually pair this particular towel with a, with an led light. And this is example of a scangrip light and this and our goal here is to see any high spots, anything that’s leftover. Another good tip to do to implement is always check the adjacent panels to make sure that when you’re, when you started wiping off, maybe that first initial coating with the, with the first towel, you may have pushed coding on two other panels that you hadn’t applied. It’s good to kind of check those just to make sure the coating wasn’t, hasn’t been pushed onto that panel, and then it could potentially dry. So you’re just checking with an LED light and that’s pretty much it, I mean, just Gtechniq recommends with EXO to do a minimum of about two layers.

(07:49):
So what you can do is if we started on this panel, you can apply to the whole vehicle two by two section. Once you get back to this area, you go boom right into round two apply it all the way around. And that would be if it was a standalone coating. Now, if say you did it with a crystal serum light crystal serum light is your base coat. So you would apply crystal serum light. And then once that application is done the same thing, once you got back to your initial spot, you could go right into EXO first layer, then EXO second layer or you can wait a couple hours in between crystal serum light and and EXO, totally your preference. I think you have about up to 12 hours to, to, to still be able to do the EXO application. And then you just have a very, very easy finish to maintain and just for the just a really, really, really nice coating. And if you guys have any, any questions at all about EXO please comment below. We’d be happy to answer any questions. Thanks guys.