1.7 Cleaning Solution Formula 4

Hard parts dressing by Matrix Concepts

Art who always becomes my best friend when he gives me free stuff to try. Gave me a bottle of 1.7 Cleaning Solutions with a 4.0 formula; I have no real idea what that means, the good people at Matrix could no doubt shed light on this.

It says “Spray Shine & Protection for Frames, Wheels, Suspension and Components” It’s also “Earth Friendly” and “Non Toxic Biodegradable” which are all good things.

Art knows I’m anal when it comes to keeping my bikes clean and looking good, but he gave the bottle to me anyway. I have my methods and stock piles of the goodies I need to keep my bikes looking as new and fresh as possible. And quite frankly thought I’m sure I won’t really need this product it would just add to the products I already use.

I’m getting my 2016 Husky FC350 ready for this weekend’s International Old Timer race being held at Glen Helen so I thought after I’ve done all my normal prep I would try this stuff on the engine covers. So per the instructions I sprayed it on the covers the muffler brake and shift levers and waited for a minute then wiped it off. (And this is where the only complaint I have comes in, the spray nozzle has two settings it will shoot a strait stream or a fan spray. The fan spray kind of dribbles out in a fan spray, I think the fan spray needs to be much finer almost like a mist) Shoot I was very surprised, it worked and it worked well. Normally I would use the show and shine or shine and show products which are really for plastics on the engine covers etc. and it does a good job but always feels like it leaves a film. The Matrix dressing didn’t do that, after wiping it off it felt like it left a hard coating and it was brighter. So I sprayed it on the frame the fork tubes, the swing arm etc. I even sprayed it on parts of the engine just see if it made them look better, it did.

So for anal guys like me it helps those hard parts look even better. But there are a lot of guys out there that aren’t as anal and don’t care as much about appearance as guys like me do, but when they get ready to sell that bike they may want to make it look as good as possible, this stuff really works and will no doubt make those parts look much better, even if they have been neglected.

I have a 2012 KTM 500EXC that I bought a few years ago and I spent many hours trying to make it look as good as possible. The guy I bought it from looked after the mechanical part of the bike but didn’t care about the looks of it (That’s one of the reasons I was able to purchase it for much less money than I normally would have) I’m now anxious to use this stuff on the 500 to see if I can help those hard parts look better. I also want to see how this product holds up on my Husky after I’ve race it and cleaned it up again. So I’ll wait to finish this latter.

As I had hoped when I cleaned my bike after last weekend’s races the hard parts I had treated still looked great. The water actually beaded up on those parts and dried looking just as good as before, which means I won’t have to use it every time I wash the bike, unlike the show and shine products for the plastics.

The question now is how many times can I wash it before I have to reapply it?

I’m sold.

Doug 21J