Dr. Beasley’s Bead Hero

 (Scroll down to get to the Water Beading Characteristics Video)

Backstory

Jim and Chris over at Dr. Beasley’s are launching a brand-new ceramic spray coating and I’m so blessed to be sent one of the first bottles to take for a Mike Phillips Test Drive.


From the manufacturer

Dr. Beasley’s Bead Hero is a hydrophobic ceramic spray engineered to add robust water beading properties and extreme gloss with spray-and-wipe ease. Based in ceramic nanotechnology, it’s formulated to produce beads that slide off the finish easily, taking dirt with them and reducing the chance of water spots.

• Produces Fast-Sliding Water Beads
• Creates Slick, Ultra-Reflective Finish
• Wipes Off Effortlessly With No Streaks
• Durable Hydrophobic Properties
• 100% inorganic formula
• Chemically compatible for use with any brand of coating and/or conventional waxes and sealants.
• Can be used as a spray-on, rinse off drying aid and booster as long as you’re using a de-ionized or reverse osmosis water system

A ceramic spray coating that makes beads slide easily.

Bead Hero is more than a spray-and-wipe hydrophobic coating — it’s specially engineered to make beads slide, which means more self-cleaning and less water spotting.

There are hundreds of spray-and-wipe detailing products that bead water into a dizzying array of beautiful droplets. Very few of these products, however, actually benefit the paint.

That’s because the beads they don’t move. If beads don’t move, they can’t pick up grime and self-clean as they slide off the finish. They can also dry into water spots (especially if you’ve got hard water with high mineral content).

To put it simply? Without movement, beads are functionally useless.

We solved this problem by formulating a new product that gets beads moving, fast. By borrowing technology from our low sliding angle professional ceramic coatings, we engineered a ceramic hydrophobic spray that actively pushes water beads off the finish so they’ll self-clean and won’t become water spots.

With those benefits, beads save the day for your paint.

That’s why we call it Bead Hero — it makes a hero out of beads.

Mike Phillips Test Drive

Testing - How-to and Review

I've never been good at writing just a review.  I figure, if I'm going to use the product in order to review it, I might as well include a how-to article and video at the same time.  Then if someone likes the results shared in the review, they also have my how-to article to follow as a guide when they get their own product.

Today I’m doing a simple test on my trusty, but not dusty, Black Truth Teller Demo Hood, the one many of you have seen me doing live demonstrations on at SEMA in Las Vegas for the last 20 years. (yes, 2022 was my 20th SEMA show).

Concept
The product is pretty straightforward, this is a liquefied ceramic coating so it can use a sprayable delivery system.

Application Directions
Surface needs to be clean and properly prepped before application and to maximize product performance, protection, gloss, shine and longevity.

Test Number #1
Because the manufacture recommends allowing the coating to cure overnight before product is stable on the surface, I cannot do any water beading tests until tomorrow.

To prep for the Bead Hero, I machine polished the paint on my Black Truth Teller Demo Hood then prepped using a popular coating prep spray.

Official product directions

Steps 1 through 6: The directions include the normal prep, application and wipe-off protocols. Below is the most important part and this is the manufacturer’s directions for how long to wait for best results.

Step 7: Leave undisturbed for two hours after application. Allow to cure overnight for best results.

Dr. Beasley’s Suggests:
Can be used immediately after washing or after doing a paint correction. More surface prep before application will result in longer lasting performance.

After prepping the paint, I then applied the Bead Hero with 2 solid mists to the panel.

Misting Bead Hero onto the paint

Spread with a clean microfiber towel.

I flipped to a dry side of the towel and then buffed to a dry, high shine.

Initial thoughts
Application via spray-on, spread over surface and wipe-off is just as easy as I expected. The thing I’m looking for is the tactical feel of the surface after wipe-off and of course, the water beading contact angle after full cure.

How does the paint feels?

I'm happy to say the paint feels slippery after wipe-off.  I like this in ANY paint related LSP I use on my cars or my clients cars.  I personally dislike any product that makes the paint feel tacky or rubbery and 99.9% of car owners also dislike their car's paint to feel rubbery or tacky.  Score one for Bead Hero.

Visual results

The paint is crystal clear after application and wipe-off using Bead Hero.

Mike's comments

Anytime you're using a product, especially spray-on, wipe-off products, HALF of a user's experience is directly related to the towel they are using.  The other half is the characteristics and performance of the product itself.  Read it again, and let it sink in.

HALF of a user's experience is directly related to the towel they are using.

Inexpensive towels, or the wrong type of towel can completely alter a person's experience with a product - making it either positive or negative.

For this test I'm using the Orange Brushed Edgeless 365 Premium Microfiber Terry Towel .

I like this towel for all types of paint related detailing tasks.  One thing I notice about both professional and enthusiast detailers is they usually don't use enough clean, quality UNCONTAMINATED towels when doing paint work.  Do yourself a huge favor and get the 25-pack bundle and then take care of them by keeping them uncontaminated.

25-Pack - Orange Brushed Edgeless 365 Premium Microfiber Terry Towel

Part #2 Testing

Now after 24 hours has passed, I moved my demo hood outside and simply sprayed some water onto it to check out the hydrophobic characteristics and took the below video and pictures.

On AutoForge.net

Dr. Beasley's Bead Hero

All Dr. Beasley's Products

Products you would use with Dr. Beasley's Bead Hero

FLEX 'The Beast' XC 3401 VRG Dual Action Orbital Polisher

FLEX XCE 10-8 125 "Supa Beast" Dual Action Polisher

FLEX XCE 8-125 "CBeast" 18.0 Dual Action Cordless Polisher Intro Pad Kit

Lake Country Buffing Pads for the FLEX tools

-Mike Phillips

Mike@AutoForge.net