Battle against Brake Dust, Remastered

It’s been a hot minute since we talked about Car Care, especially the Battle Against Brake Dust. In two previous articles we’ve tested products, we’ve developed short cuts and techniques, and in some cases we’ve won a few key battles… but have we actually won the war to keep our wheels clean?

That remains to be seen considering that when I wrote Part 1 and Part 2, it was in “the before times” and now, nearly 3 years later there are all sorts of new products we wanted to pit against our reigning champion ArmorAll Extreme Wheel Cleaner. Does this cheap alternative still have some fight left in it? Let’s find out.

Let’s set the stage

Like all things at GTM, this contest was bigger-and-badder than the previous battles. This time I employed some help with this all-day affair with big thanks and shoutouts to my wife (Jess) stepping in to keep this honest. **Be sure to swipe through all the slideshows throughout this article for different parts of the process we went through.  

**Important note: The Silver wheels are coated with Zymöl Wheel Coat, as mentioned in Battle Against Brake Dust: Part 2. And our focus is really the White wheels for the bake-off.

The Incumbent: ArmorAll Extreme Wheel Care

What is there to say about our reigning champion that hasn’t already been said before… it’s a cheap and powerful clean. 

Results: The ArmorAll Extreme Wheel Cleaner only needs about 30 seconds to start working versus its much slower competitors and was the only product where you could visibly see the grime melting off the wheels. The packaging is littered with warnings and even boasts needing very little, if any scrubbing. The ArmorAll Cleaner was able to penetrate and loosen the track residue, not 100%, but let’s see how it stacks up against the rest.

The Hopeful: Chemical Guys Diablo Wheel Cleaner

We’ve used “Car Guys (not to be confused with Chemical Guys) Wheel Cleaner” by the gallon for years, and have loved it for the daily drivers, and it does an OK job on the race cars. It was never a contender in this fight, but it was a rather affordable “do everything” soap in the gallon refill jug. However, many enthusiasts have told us, “if you like that, you’ll love Chemical Guys Diablo, it’s the same but BETTER” – which is what made it our “gut pick” going into this battle.

Results: uh huh, sure, mmmkay … same, same but completely different. Diablo is now sold on the shelves at big box stores for right around $10. For everyday use, I’m not sure I could tell the difference between it and things like Black Magic, Adams or anything else in the same price range that we’ve tested before. For track and hard to clean wheels, there are stronger options out there. #disappointment – note: we actually went back over the wheels treated with Diablo later, using Griots which did a nicer job.

Complete Surprise: Jenolite Rust Remover

Not marketed directly as a wheel cleaner, this British product has been around since 1939 and is designed and advertised to remove rust, grime and hard build up from just about anything metal. You’ve seen those ads on Instagram where they take a rusted cylinder head from 1953 and make it look new with some spray? … this isn’t *THAT* stuff, but maybe? 

Results: Clocking in as the second most expensive cleaner we tested, the Jenolite Rust Remover is NOT a spray and rinse product. The longer it sits, the better. Spray it on, watch the grime turn white and calcify and you can either chip it off (or scrub it off), buff, then rinse. The Jenolite definitely requires lots of time and elbow grease to be effective. Is it powerful – Yes; time consuming – certainly. If you’re in a hurry, you might want to try some of the other options first. Overall, we were extremely impressed with the Jenolite solution and may experiment with it and other offerings more in a future battle.

The Underdog: Jay Leno’s Garage Wheel Cleaner

We literally saw Jay’s cleaner for the first time while cutting through the car cleaning aisle at Walmart, had a chuckle saying “really?!? wtfn!” – so for $11.97, how bad could it be? –  why wouldn’t we try it?

Results: As you can see from the pictures Jay’s cleaner does a heck of a job! What isn’t shown here are the wheels we went back and re-cleaned with Jay’s after the competition was over, when cleaners like Diablo fell short. Jess said one of the funniest things when reviewing this soap, “OMG the smell… it’s like a bottle of cheap cologne and regret” – we still laugh about that now, because it’s 100% true. The scent that they chose is unappealing, but it gets the job done! Everytime we use Jay’s we remain utterly in shock at how it melts away grime. #whatsthatsmell

There are some rumors flying around that Jay’s wheel cleaner is nothing more than Adam’s Wheel Cleaner rebadged. We’d beg to differ, and as we saw in the original Battle Against Brake Dust, the Adams wasn’t all that impressive and we’d be willing to bet in a bake off of just these two products Jay’s would win. However, we have not yet had an entry from Jax Wax come through and from what I’ve learned might be a closer match up. #round4. 

The Unexpected Guest: GYEON’S Q2M IRON

Porsche Al came to us recently with a submission from across the Pacific. Something he found online known as “GYEON’S Q2M IRON Remover” designed for cleaning hard to fight stains and doubly marketed as a wheel cleaner – sounds a lot like Jenolite, right? Rather than wait until the Battle Against Brake Dust, Part 4 – we figured we’d slide this new contender into the mix and see how it stacked up.

Results: As you can see from the pictures above, we were pretty impressed with GYEON’S Q2M, it is available on Amazon only, and comes in at a hefty $33/litre, yes… $33 PER LITRE (or a full gallon refill jug at $109). That said, you really need to read the directions before use. Do not use in direct sunlight, wear eye and skin protection, be in a well ventilated space – its unclear what hazardous nuclear material this is made of, but it’s legitimately caustic, has an atrocious lingering skunk smell … that said – it does work! 

Honorable Mention: Dawn Heavy Duty Degreaser

Oops! You caught us… we did slip some “dishwashing liquid” into this battle. The Dawn Heavy Duty Degreaser actually started off as our “control cleaner”, why? We know what to expect from it: Dawn is “tough on grease and safe for ducks” and all that. This super-concentrated version of regular blue dawn is effective as a general cleaner. Wash the car, wash the wheels, wash your pets, and your BBQ grill all on the same weekend – it’s all good. We do think Dawn deserves a place with all the run of the mill cleaners we’ve mentioned before. But for those that don’t want to spend $10 on less than 1-litre of wheel soap, Dawn is always a cheap and effective alternative, just expect to work a little harder for the results, adding Dawn to a spray bottle doesn’t help either, you have get in there and scrub!

Facts & Figures

The Final Four

4th Place – Zymöl Wheel Cleaner … man, do we love our Zymöl around here. The Zymöl wheel cleaner is hard to find, but has all the natural properties, ingredients and scents you come to expect from any Zymöl product. But as a detergent, it does better than the average wheel cleaner on every day wheels and only requires a light mist to be effective, which means despite the price you won’t be using a lot of it. It did a respectable job on the harder to clean race wheels, but compared to the new podium, it unfortunately fell short.

We tied the Jenolite Rust Remover with Zymöl for it’s sheer ability to disrupt all the other cleaners we tested. With more time and experience we feel the Jenolite could be extremely effective.

After many rounds of cleaning, scrubbing… lather, rinse, repeat. We settled on the 2 strongest contenders to try and tackle our champion: ArmorAll. This left us with Griots and Jay’s.

3rd Place – Griots Heavy Duty Wheel Cleaner. We’ve seen these products in many of our friends garages, especially folks with high-end cars and collections. Griots is “the one you’ve seen in the magazines” – but is it really worth it? We have to say that value per ounce, roughly $22 for 35-oz bottle sets it surprisingly in the middle on price. You don’t need much Griots in order to get the job done, unlike other products that require complete saturation or multiple applications. We liked the Griots a lot, and it might become part of the line of solutions we employ, but it lost points when we went back over it with Jay Leno’s wheel cleaner and more grime started to come off.

The New Podium

ArmorAll dethroned? Say it ain’t so!  – Yes & No, we dropped ArmorAll to 2nd place for a couple of reasons. 1). The ArmorAll solution is becoming harder to find, and when you can find it, the markup suddenly makes you avert your eyes to other options. 2). It’s definitely EXTREME, it works well, there is no doubt, but do you want to always suit up like you’re going on a lunar exploration every time you clean your wheels? 3). Jay’s is acid-free which also helped it edge ahead.

Initially, it was a tight race between Griots and Jay’s. Griots is really quite good, we like it, and if you’re brand loyal … buy it! like Zymöl products, Griots is designed to work together as a solution so it makes sense to add it to your collection of car care products.

If you’re more budget conscious and want something that can tackle your daily drivers,  tow rig, trailer wheels, and the race car… #askushowweknow – Jay Leno’s Garage Wheel Cleaner is for you, and is our new Battle Against Brake Dust champion!

Jay’s is available at every big box store, its cheap, and really works… just hold your breath. LOL #cheapcologne. – STAY TUNED FOR LATER THIS SEASON WHEN PART-4 OF THIS COMPETITION COMES OUT. DO YOU HAVE SOME SUGGESTIONS FOR PRODUCTS WE SHOULD TEST? CONTACT US!