Building a car/truck wash

CKN said:
This has been discussed before. Most carwashes are owned by limited partnerships. Carwashes are a great way to have an income stream while you wait for the land underneath to appreciate. Limited Partnerships love this business model.
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The ones here are franchises.

So I am inferring then that someone wants to own the land, and I read above you can depreciate your entire expense of the car wash in year 1, so I put up a car wash, make enough money to pay for itself and the taxes, and wait for appreciation of the land?

So why a limited partnership, vs a c-corp or LLC? Where is that advantage?

The things you learn here. Amazing.
 
SC Maintenance said:
The ones here are franchises.

So I am inferring then that someone wants to own the land, and I read above you can depreciate your entire expense of the car wash in year 1, so I put up a car wash, make enough money to pay for itself and the taxes, and wait for appreciation of the land?

So why a limited partnership, vs a c-corp or LLC? Where is that advantage?

The things you learn here. Amazing.
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Are you sure. We have "Quick Quack" and Mister Carwash here. Both are owned (in part) by an investment firm.
-https://www.carwash.com/quick-quack-investment-kkr/
https://www.carwashadvisory.com/top-car-wash-companies/mister-car-wash
 
TimeFlies said:
The laserwash 360 couldn't be easier, or more foolproof for anyone to use.
I've never seen anyone in front of me have trouble with it.
Then drive inside until the lit up sign says stop, and stop.
You just sit there, and the wash arms move around your vehicle. When done it says thanks, please exit, and you drive away. Your vehicle doesn't move while being washed. As you drive away you can choose to slowly exit under the overhead blow dryer, or not.I usually don't waste much time under the dryer, I just drive away, because 40 seconds later I'm on the hwy heading home and then the speed dries my pickup. So why waste 40 seconds slowly creeping ahead under the dryer leaving.
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The problem with those type of washes is that once a car is in there, the guy behind him is sitting there waiting for 5 minutes. If you get a lineup of 6 cars that’s a half hour wait! I have a monthly wash deal for my Civic and it’s an old school tunnel wash that pulls you through. I often get there and see 6 or 7 cars ahead of me but instead of waiting 30+ minutes it only takes 6 or 7 (they can get one car per minute to start going through)
 
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Patman said:
The problem with those type of washes is that once a car is in there, the guy behind him is sitting there waiting for 5 minutes. If you get a lineup of 6 cars that’s a half hour wait! I have a monthly wash deal for my Civic and it’s an old school tunnel wash that pulls you through. I often get there and see 6 or 7 cars ahead of me but instead of waiting 30+ minutes it only takes 6 or 7 (they can get one car per minute to start going through)
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Yes I'm aware of that.
 
I don't go through the kind that pulls your car through by the tire. There is some special procudure you have to follow for both the Bolt and Prologue for that to work, and as more cars get "complicated" it's just going to get worse.

I would only ever go through the kind where you stop, it washes around you, and then you drive out.
 
My F150 has been through a laserwash 360 hundreds of times, and I get the deluxe wash, takes me 4 minutes and 15 seconds. The next car is pulling in as I'm driving out, there is usually a line up, very rarely is it empty. Seems very reliable, it's rarely broken down. You tap your credit card, pick from the 4 washes, and drive in. Washes cost from $7.99 to 12.99 Canadian. I sat there 1 day for about 2 hours and just watched people wash their vehicles.
Nobody had trouble, and the time ranges from 2 minutes and 35 seconds for a basic wash, to 4 minutes and 15 seconds for the deluxe. Talking to the owner, he checks on it once a day, and replaces the drums as needed of soap, wax, and he showed me how to do it, maybe 90 seconds to change.
 
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TimeFlies said:
My F150 has been through a laserwash 360 hundreds of times, and I get the deluxe wash, takes me 4 minutes and 15 seconds. The next car is pulling in as I'm driving out, there is usually a line up, very rarely is it empty. Seems very reliable, it's rarely broken down. You tap your credit card, pick from the 4 washes, and drive in. Washes cost from $7.99 to 12.99 Canadian. I sat there 1 day for about 2 hours and just watched people wash their vehicles.
Nobody had trouble, and the time ranges from 2 minutes and 35 seconds for a basic wash, to 4 minutes and 15 seconds for the deluxe. Talking to the owner, he checks on it once a day, and replaces the drums as needed of soap, wax, and he showed me how to do it, maybe 90 seconds to change.
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Now I'm thinking we need a way to wash cars with actual lasers! And it would be sooooo green 'cause no water!

Ok, I'm no help.....but I amuse myself
 
TimeFlies said:
Does anybody know about building a touchless car wash, or a hand high pressure truck wash?
I would like to build both.

Any information about it would be helpful.
Thanks
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After taking a brand new at the time 2023 Ram 2500 Promaster Van ( empty) low roof ( still kinda high) with 600 to 800 miles in it to a drive through car wash and ASKED if this will fit and when asked again "are you sure" ?????? Then they said yes it is ok. Then the blow er nozzle brackets filly dented the roof and it cost them $ 11,000 to fix. If it was full of Plumbing stuff or electrical wire it would of made it.

If I was younger I would do the same as you are doing and build one for company vans and midsize utility trucks, but for after researching there are ZERO drive through cleaners for many of these vans. They all have to be hand washed at a self serv, which are becoming rare in the suburbs of Minneapolis.

For these vans I would have spinning side brushes but no top spinners, where you would have just high pressure sprayers so if the van had ladders or conduit tube holders it would clear those. and have lazer height tp get as close as you can to spray the roof.

This is a drive through or drive in a wait while the brush unit moves like small gas station car wash do.

.
 
Mainia said:
After taking a brand new at the time 2023 Ram 2500 Promaster Van ( empty) low roof ( still kinda high) with 600 to 800 miles in it to a drive through car wash and ASKED if this will fit and when asked again "are you sure" ?????? Then they said yes it is ok. Then the blow er nozzle brackets filly dented the roof and it cost them $ 11,000 to fix. If it was full of Plumbing stuff or electrical wire it would of made it.

If I was younger I would do the same as you are doing and build one for company vans and midsize utility trucks, but for after researching there are ZERO drive through cleaners for many of these vans. They all have to be hand washed at a self serv, which are becoming rare in the suburbs of Minneapolis.

For these vans I would have spinning side brushes but no top spinners, where you would have just high pressure sprayers so if the van had ladders or conduit tube holders it would clear those. and have lazer height tp get as close as you can to spray the roof.

This is a drive through or drive in a wait while the brush unit moves like small gas station car wash do.

.
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Brushes scratch, so I don't want one.
The reason they call it laserwash, is that it has sensors, and the larger the vehicle, the further the equipment moves to adjust for the size. A smart car, or work van are vastly different sizes, and it adjusts. At the car wash I frequently go to, they have no employee on duty, the guy checks on it once a day briefly. There is a max height sign, and also before you enter it, is a bar hanging on chains, that if too tall, a vehicle will bump into, incase they cannot read the max height sign.
My full size 4x4 pickup truck still has plenty of clearance, be it width, length, and height. Maximum height is 2.38 Meters or 7'10 in the one i go to a lot.
 
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TimeFlies said:
Brushes scratch, so I don't want one.
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The problem with touchless washes is that they really don’t get the paint totally clean, especially in the winter when it’s covered in salt. I remember being frustrated back in 2004 when I started driving my black C5 Corvette in the winter so I bought a 90 day pass for the Glide car washes from Petro Canada. Back then they were touchless (now they use brushes) My paint never got fully clean and I ended up going to a detail shop every Saturday morning for a proper hand wash (believe it or not they only charged $10 back then!)
So with my Civic I am glad that the car wash near my house has brushes. I pay $28 a month for that, and my car always looks clean because I use it about twice a week (as long as it’s not below -10C) I’m really not concerned about micro scratches, they aren’t really that bad, you can’t even see them from ten feet away. And I have a good buffer to remove them anyway (or if I don’t feel like doing it, my son is a detailer who is amazing at paint correction)
 
Patman said:
The problem with touchless washes is that they really don’t get the paint totally clean, especially in the winter when it’s covered in salt. I remember being frustrated back in 2004 when I started driving my black C5 Corvette in the winter so I bought a 90 day pass for the Glide car washes from Petro Canada. Back then they were touchless (now they use brushes) My paint never got fully clean and I ended up going to a detail shop every Saturday morning for a proper hand wash (believe it or not they only charged $10 back then!)
So with my Civic I am glad that the car wash near my house has brushes. I pay $28 a month for that, and my car always looks clean because I use it about twice a week (as long as it’s not below -10C) I’m really not concerned about micro scratches, they aren’t really that bad, you can’t even see them from ten feet away. And I have a good buffer to remove them anyway (or if I don’t feel like doing it, my son is a detailer who is amazing at paint correction)
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I would rather have pretty clean, and no scratches.
Instead of cleaner, and scratched.
There is a brush wash 10 minutes drive from the one i like, hardly anybody uses it, because they don't want brushes on their cars.
 
Cruisin'n5thgear said:
Now that's a hot take, I'm working through Better Call Saul right now. I just might agree with you.
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I absolutely LOVED Breaking Bad but I just couldn’t get into BCS. It was too slow paced for me and the only characters I liked were the ones they brought back from BB. Even Saul in BB was way more entertaining to me than Saul in BCS.

For me the best thing about BB was Jesse and Walt. Without them, any spinoffs would never be as good. I did love it when they made a brief appearance in BCS though
 
Patman said:
I absolutely LOVED Breaking Bad but I just couldn’t get into BCS. It was too slow paced for me and the only characters I liked were the ones they brought back from BB. Even Saul in BB was way more entertaining to me than Saul in BCS.

For me the best thing about BB was Jesse and Walt. Without them, any spinoffs would never be as good. I did love it when they made a brief appearance in BCS though
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Took me two times to get into BCS. First season or two is a snooze to be sure.
 
Cruisin'n5thgear said:
Took me two times to get into BCS. First season or two is a snooze to be sure.
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I almost gave up after season one and I am surprised that I even bothered after season two. I was just hanging around for those moments with the BB characters. Otherwise I would have not even bothered
 
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