Do you take your car to the car wash?

[Kestas]

I think washing a car in the winter does little to prevent it from rusting. All it does is make the car look clean. It helps a little, but I think it's more of a placebo for people to think they're going to significantly stave off corrosion from their vehicle. At most you'll enjoy a few days respite from the salt (assuming dry roads) until the next snowfall. Rarely does rust form on the flat outer panels of a car, yet that is what we wash. Rust forms from the corners, crevices, laps, joints, and seams of a vehicle. Just the act of driving mists up the salty brine from the road and drives it deep into the recesses and cavities of a car (as does the recycled salty wash water at a car wash facility). It is hard to keep these areas clean, dry, and salt-free.

 

[JHZR2]

I don't take the car to the car wash ever. Sometimes if there is a nice winter day, I will spray with water on outer surfaces and under the vehicle/in the wheelwells... but that is a cold proposition.

What Ive found to work well is to buy a cheapo pump-to-pressurize spray unit, like you would spray insecticide or lawn , put in some rust-away or similar spray-on anti corrosive, like they use for marine environments, and spray it into the nooks and crannies. This way Im sure that there is a protective coating that will reasct with salt that is on there and leave a film to protect from new salt coming on.

I like to use this stuff - http://www.saltawayproducts.com/

JMH

 

[nyr197]

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I don't take the car to the car wash ever. Sometimes if there is a nice winter day, I will spray with water on outer surfaces and under the vehicle/in the wheelwells... but that is a cold proposition.

What Ive found to work well is to buy a cheapo pump-to-pressurize spray unit, like you would spray insecticide or lawn , put in some rust-away or similar spray-on anti corrosive, like they use for marine environments, and spray it into the nooks and crannies. This way Im sure that there is a protective coating that will reasct with salt that is on there and leave a film to protect from new salt coming on.

I like to use this stuff - http://www.saltawayproducts.com/

JMH

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That sounds like a phenomenal idea. I'm heading to West Marine right now, and doing this!

 

[Steve S]

The only way my vehicles get washed is when they get run through the car wash.

 

[Doc8404]

I use the numerous touchless car washes that have sprung up everywhere in central NY.

 

[LouDawg]

Despite the horror stories some have shared, I have NEVER had a problem with a vehicle taken regularly through car washes. I typically use the hand-wands cause I think I can do it better than the auto. But when time and conditions warranted, I've used the auto-touchless washes many times. In 25+ years of driving and vehicle ownership, I've never had one rust or fail to look good. Now I do try and dry it off, chamois, and/or microfiber it after I do that, so I'm sure that helps.

Maybe I'm just lucky, but so far so good. Of course doing it myself by hand will always look better, and for auto detailing freaks, carwashes are verboten. But for everyday use, the hand-wand wash bays suit me just fine.

 

[mazduh30]

I take my vehicles to the spray wands, just to clean the under carriage.

 

[Bryanccfshr]

Winter time I use a wand car wash, my wife goes through a gas station touchless car wash with every fill up on her vehicle. In the summer I do hand washing and waxing. At home. We use our shop vac at home and microfiber towels to to clean and dust the interiors and a glass rag and watter and vineger solution to clean the glass. That's it.

 

[NYEngineer]

I wash my cars by hand except in the winter.

 

[Quest]

(*stoopid humour*)

- I took my car through a dawg wash and it was too big to enter the rinse cycle....

-and then I tried to take my dawg through a car wash and it refused to enter the rinse cycle....

I guess I'm just being a little nuts here...(and ended up taking my soapy dawg home and hand-rinse it while leaving my soapy car out on the rainy PNW winter days to air-dry....)

Q.

 

[peterr]

It got above freezing one day last week so I took it to the two dollar hand wand thingy.

Currently I am driving a 13 year old winter beater so I neither feel the need to preserve it, nor make it look nice. However it had been about 2 months and the whole thing was covered with a thick layer of salt. A colleague of mine got a ticket because the cop could not read his plates.

I used to winter drive my previous Porsche and so I would take it once a week to the hand wand thing then park it in a heated garage for a couple of hours just so the locks wouldn't freeze.

April to November it is just hand washing at home.

 

[Cicero]

The touchless places are OK to a point if you have no other choice. They don't get off the dirt film too well and the soaps are pretty hard on your wax/sealants.

I two-bucket hand wash and only once in a blue moon go to a pressure washer place in an emergency. IF YOU HAVE A GARAGE and live in a cold/snowy climate you can wash/dry a car in a closed garage with QEW, a gallon of water and a bunch of microfibers. Check the detail sites for instructions. It works, it's simple and lots of people have learned the technique. I'm not joking. Quick and Easy Wash, not even the best product out there, is available at most RV supply places.

 

[Kestas]

For the first time I used my power washer to wash my car. Not only did it get the car clean, but I was able to blast all the leaf litter from the crevices in the car. The results were better than I get with soap and sponge. Does anybody have an opinion on using the power washer during the winter?

 

[Cicero]

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For the first time I used my power washer to wash my car. Not only did it get the car clean, but I was able to blast all the leaf litter from the crevices in the car. The results were better than I get with soap and sponge. Does anybody have an opinion on using the power washer during the winter?

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Good to hear you are happy with your power washer.

Be careful washing near the radiator. Pressure washers can and do bend the cooling fins if you get too close. No doubt they get into most hard to reach areas, but a full flow nozzle and good quality car brushes gets there pretty much too and then some. I would still recommend using a quick detail product afterwards as there will be a film left after the power washing.

 

[NYEngineer]

Yeah. My opinion to using a power washer in winter is that if the wind blows those little droplets of water back at you, you'll only use the power washer in the summer.
Years ago, when I was working at my father's generator shop, one of the workers washed his car with the pressuruzed steam cleaner. He blew all the clearcoat off his Monte Carlo and tried to get my old man to pay for it. I was dyin'. What a dodo.

 

[harry j]

I go to the car wash because they have a no spot, high pressure setting on the power wand. I usually dry it with a California squeegee and then a micro fiber towel, or if in a hurry, just drive like mad and let the wind dry it (spot free of course).

 

[Jeepster_nut]

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why are some people so obssesed with their cars? it's just appearance. i used to be like that with my first car but then got tired of it real fast and stopped. now i only use scrub-a-dub car wash and never wax. car looks fine. I think people can do way better things in their free time than crawling around their cars licking it till it shines. it's gonna get dirty real fast again and all that work and time wasted for nothing. just my oppinion.

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Agreed. I use drive through car washes and only wax my cars the day before I go to trade it in on a new one. The Salesman says- everytime " Boy, you sure took nice care of this car".

 

[thunderchild]

I have always washed my cars at car washes. I have never had a problem with them. No premature rusting or scratches or anything. This has been since I was 16 in my first car. I am 46 now and have to say people always ask me if my cars are new! I do a good waxing every 2 months in the summer. It protects them from road salt in the winters. When I run it through any number of car washes I come across, they always come out looking like new. Good waxing in the warm month's what does it I guess. Or maybe it is the cold beers that go down so smoothly after the waxing.

 

[PT1]

This thread is hilarious...especially the CA. guy who was upset because it went down to 20 eight times. I ride my motorcycle when it's 45 degrees here. I always try to hand wash cars because the car washes hear really beat up the paint. But I have a large garage with floor drain. So when it hits 30 degrees the heat from the engine is enough to dry it overnight. But all the car washes close to me use recycled salty water.....so why bother going paying $10 for a salt bath.

 

[thunderchild]

Bump!

I like these real life topics that affect all of us!