Video Transcript for Comparing the U-Ace 3D MAXpider Kagu and the WeatherTech HP Floor Liners

Hello neighbor, this is Curt at etrailer, and today we're gonna be taking a look at a comparison between the WeatherTech HP custom floor mats and the 3D MAXpider Kagu custom floor mats. Now, if you have any experience with either one of these, please share them in the comments below. We'd love to take your story and share it with other neighbors to help them make the best decision for themselves. Now in this video, we're gonna be going over how they look, how they fit, what they're made of, how they maintain and clean, as well as a price comparison between the two. And by the end, I think you're gonna find out that the 3D MAXpider Kagu is a much more aesthetically pleasing, offers a quieter ride, and has a much more low profile look than the WeatherTech HP, which is gonna have a much more rugged design. It's gonna be very, very durable, really, really practical for those kind of tougher climates and tougher conditions.

And at the end of the video you'll be able to make the best decision for yourself. Now let's have a look. The WeatherTech HP is made of a single layer of a thermoplastic. It's gonna be very, very durable over time and is really intended for really a more rugged type of use. It's gonna give you more coverage typically with a higher sidewall, as well as over here by the dead pedal.

And it's constructed in a way that it's got these deep grooves and channels that are gonna pool any liquid or debris into this reservoir that'll be down here at your heels. So in essence, anything that you're gonna need to clean out later should generally be gathering right in this area right here. The anchor snaps are really, really well made. Once you get these popped on, they hold extremely well. In fact, it's a little bit of an effort to get them popped off when you need to go ahead and do your cleaning.

Now out of the box, that single layer of construction can sometimes has have its drawbacks. Very often when you get WeatherTech mats out of the box, because they're made of that single stiffer layer, you're gonna get some edges sometimes that don't quite conform exactly how they should around the edge of the area that the floor mats are going. Now that is fixable, of course, generally speaking, warmer weather and a bit of weight on 'em can help them mold over. Right now we're in Missouri in the middle of February, so this would not be the best time to get that form down. However, it is something that can be done over a little bit of time.

Now this surface that's on here is also a very, very tacky surface. It doesn't gimme any indication that it'll be very slippery even when it gets wet. And the overall aesthetic of it really does speak to it being a more rugged and durable option. So in contrast, the 3D MAXpider Kagu floor mats are a three layer design. The top layer being a thermoplastic rubber with this very specific texture that I find does a really good job at removing debris off of your shoes and boots. It has this extra padded area here for underneath the gas and brake pedal that's gonna help reduce overall wear from the mats themselves. They still have a walled design. It's not quite as high of a wall as you're getting outta the WeatherTech HP. But one of the things I did notice on this particular model anyway is that the back lip going up under the seat is a little bit higher than it was on the WeatherTech itself. Now the middle layer of this, which is that XPE foam layer is gonna give you a much more cushion feel when you have this floor mat under your feet. It's also gonna help you reduce a lot of the road noise you might experience while driving, while also helping maintain the temperature inside of your vehicle by adding a layer to block out hot and cold weather from the outside. Now the anchor points on the 3D MAXpider Kagu are also very solid, but they're not nearly as important on these mats. And let me show you why. Now we've gone ahead and turn these both over so we could take a look at exactly how each mat is gonna interact with our factory carpet. In reference to the WeatherTech here, the construction on the bottom is the same exact one piece material that thermoplastic that we get on the entire mat as a whole. There are some studs here to help grip into the carpet, and you'll see some cavities in the back as well here. All of this is made to help grip that carpet in case the anchors fail. However, having this kind of hollowed out design behind it is gonna take away from some of the comfort and cushioning out of this. However, the overall rigidity and durability will be great for you in those more rugged conditions. Moving over to the 3D MAXpider Kagu floor mats, the third layer, 'cause we had mentioned earlier there we inchesre three layers to this mat, are these MAXpider fibers on the bottom. These are patented fibers from the 3D MAXpider Kagu company and they do an excellent job of really gripping into the carpet without making any imprints or doing any damage to the carpet at all. And matter of fact, when the anchors fail, or in the second and third rows where they don't tend to use the anchors, but rather just covers, we've moved them around or tried to move them around, putting weight on 'em, moving our feet around on 'em. And they really do a great job of staying stationary. So both of them are very, very safe on your factory carpet on the bottom, and both of them have a really, really good chance of staying exactly where you need them to stay. With that in mind, let's take a look and see how they fit in our vehicle. So as we can see the fit, we do get really nice coverage on the sidewalls as expected and as described earlier. We don't get as seamless of a fit around the edges as we would often like. But again, that does come from this one piece construction. The sidewalls on this aren't quite as stiff as the 3D MAXpider Kagu so we can expect that a little bit. However, again, it can be trained to go in the proper position. It's just really kind of the climate helps in that warmer weather these mold a lot easier. So warmer weather with a bit of weight on it, and you should be able to mold the sidewalls and the edges of these floor mats very easily. The anchor mounts went in place, they snapped in, it's a little bit hard to snap 'em in, but that's okay. That means they're very, very secure in place and once those anchor points are pushed in, you really don't have any movement at all with the floor mats when your feet are on them and when you're operating the vehicle. And as we could see with the fit from the 3D MAXpider Kagu it really went in very well. Right out of the box, all of the edges line up and mold perfectly with the interior of the vehicle. The sidewalls rather, aren't quite as high as they are on the WeatherTech, but you still get, especially on the inside, near the gas pedal, you do get a pretty good couple of inches of coverage on the sidewall and still giving you a lot of protection in that area. The one place that might be lacking compared to the WeatherTech is that they also on the WeatherTech have the sidewall protected here near the dead pedal, which they don't do in the 3D MAXpider Kagu. The anchor points are firmly in place. However, even without those in place, this because of that MAXpider fiber on the underneath, they really don't go anywhere. They're really quite immobile. And also because of the accuracy of the fit, they're gonna stay in place for you for a really, really long time. So as you can see, these are both gonna be a great fit for your vehicle. The WeatherTech had a few issues around the edges that again, are easily fixed. The 3Ds are really good to go right out of the box, so it makes 'em a little more low maintenance in that sense. But both of them use laser technology to get that perfect fit for your vehicle's floor mats. With the 3D MAX taking that extra step by using a 3D laser guided process. So with that being said, let's take a look at the durability of both of these mats. Now we went ahead and researched the internet from all over just to see what kind of results people we inchesre getting who maybe used both of these floor mats. We also wanted to determine maybe what the average lifespan of these were. So from what we could tell, the WeatherTech HP's have a tendency to last people about 7 to 10 years while the 3D MAXpider Kagu's last people around the 5 to 7 year mark. Now what'll happen over time with the WeatherTech this a single layer thermoplastic could start to get a little bit stiffer on you and these edges might start curling up. People have also noticed that there is some discoloration in fading that gets involved with the WeatherTech over time as well. However, with that lifespan of 7 to 10 years, that's still a really good long amount of time where these are gonna not only be functional, but look correct in your vehicle as well. The 3D MAXpider Kagu's have a lifespan of around that 5 to 7 year mark, which is still a great lifespan 'cause again, most people only own their vehicle for around that five year mark these days anyway, so going beyond that is really more of a luxury than anything. So we're gonna do a little test on these. What we're gonna do is take a pair of boots, get 'em nice and muddied up, and we're gonna grind into them, stomp on 'em and everything else just to see how these hold up to it, see what kind of grip we get at the bottom of our boots. And also to see what kind of debris on our boots these will actually scrape off for us. Once we do that test we're also gonna take them out and give them just really a simple hose down just to see what cleaning these is gonna be like as well. So why don't you join us for that. All right, so we got our shoes nice and muddy and full of snow and all kinds of other dirt and things. And we went ahead and just gave these a really good stomping, tried to grind in as much as we could and let 'em dry for just a little bit so that we could see how these compare when it comes to a simple cleaning. Now we won't be doing any heavy scrubbing or anything like that. We're just gonna give them a simple hose down and we'll see what the results are. So let's take 'em outside and find out. And because we're unable to really simulate months of wear before cleaning, we're really gonna do about a 10 to 15 second hose off of each and see what our results are from there. And we're gonna start cleaning off with the 3D MAXpider Kagu. (water splashing) Alright, and we'll continue over here with the WeatherTech. (water splashing) Now both of these hosed off pretty cleanly. It took a little bit extra to get it out of some of the grooves in the WeatherTech, but it really wasn't anything overly difficult. And as you could see, both of these are holding a pretty impressive amount of water and we're completely dry underneath. So now that we've dirtied up and hosed off our mats, we brought them inside to let them dry a little bit so we could see exactly what kind of dirt might have been left over. In a real world situation you'd probably hose 'em off for a bit longer than that and wipe 'em down as well. But before we wipe 'em down, we just wanted to see what was left on each of these. So as you could see, there is still gonna be a little bit of leftover dirt. We got a little bit up here, mostly down here where our heel was and where that big reservoir is to collect all of the water. Now one of the things that we have heard is that sometimes these deep grooves that we have up here can really cake in a lot of dirt over time. So after a few months, in a more realistic scenario, there might be some dirt and grime in here that you're gonna have to dig out a little bit when you wipe these down. In our test, that wasn't the case. One of the things we did notice though is as we go to wipe off some of this dirt, it takes a little bit of a push down and rub down to actually get it off rather than just a simple wipe off and clean. So do expect when you do end up cleaning these thoroughly that you might have to put a little bit of extra elbow grease in to really clean all of the dirt and debris off of the weather WeatherTech floor mats. So there you have it. Both offer really good protection for your vehicle, much better than what you'll get out of the carpet factory floor mats. It really all depends on what you yourself are looking for. If you're looking for maximum protection and durability, the WeatherTech with the higher walls and the thicker mats, I think are gonna do that for you. They're built for much more rugged conditions. And speaking of rugged, that's the aesthetic as well. It's a much more noticeable look. It has a more industrial look. However, it will require a bit more maintenance than the 3D MAXpider Kagu. It's a little bit more difficult to clean these and you are gonna have to work over time with helping it maintain its shape. If you're looking for a more luxurious modern look, then the 3D MAXpider Kagu would definitely be for you. It's got a more cushion feel, which is gonna help it with that road noise we discussed earlier. It is a more lightweight and easier to maintain and clean floor mat as well. And from a price point aspect, you do get an awful lot of value with the 3D MAXpider. So again, if you have any experience with one or both of these mats, please leave them in the comments below. Again, this is Curt at etrailer. Thanks for stopping by.