Yeah, my applicator pads turn black too. You can hand wash them with All liquid detergent and they will be clean. They will still look a little dirty, but they will be fine. Don't machine wash it though or it'll fall apart. Of course, since they're not too expensive, you can keep a couple extra on hand too. You can also cut a couple of small squares out of a 100% cotton towel to apply Zaino, but I have found the applicator pads to be best.
As for the Z5, did you correctly prep the surface first? By that I mean, did you use a swirl-removing polish or glaze before using Zaino? Zaino is awesome, but there are products out there that are specifically formulated to remove swirl marks and should be used before the Zaino. The two I recommend are 3M Finesse-It and 3M Foam Pad Polish. There is also a new Perfect-It III machine glaze that I have heard about but haven't really researched yet. It looks very good though. The Finesse-It is more abrasive and should only be used if you have a lot of really deep swirl marks. Otherwise, the FPP is the ticket. There is one for dark cars, and one for light cars. Both can be applied by hand, but I really recommend using a buffer. Much faster, and the results are awesome. I just did our six-year old Jetta with FPP using a buffer, and there were no swirl marks by the time I was done. Zero. Can't wait to do my Explorer once I get it back at the end of the week. If you have any more questions, just ask!
peace
Mike
