Any Tricks to Washing these Cars?

[efnfast]

Wow.

No offence guys, but after reading this thread I just want to and bang my head against the wall. it's pretty obvious most of you don't know anything about proper detailing, even simple washing.

whenever you touch the paint, you're either improving it, or damaging it (i'm going to let damage be a very broad term here, meaning both scratches, as well as finer micro-marring like swirls and defects that only show up under direct sunlight or under a 3m sun gun/hallogen/fluorescent/brinkman/etc...)

in terms of washing, if you touch the paint without removing the heavily bonded on crap, and loosening the remainder, you're just rubbing the contaminants in and 'damaging' the paint.

one can argue about the best way to wash, but here is a basic way to minimize damage:

- rinse with a pressure washer to remove the heaviest particulates (a garden hose can't begin to compete; make sure p.w. is properly sized, like 2000pis and 2.4gpm; nothing stupid like one for etching concrete)

- foam lance the car to loosen the dirt; let dwell for 5-10minutes

- rinse the car again to remove the loose dirt

- rinse once more

- 2 bucket wash panel by panel (each bucket with a grit guard)

- rinse

- BLOT with a microfiber waffle weave towels. Do NOT use a waterblade, chamois, or anything that requires you to move across the paint. B-L-O-T.

Originally Posted by Ron61

When I had mine I never used water on it. Most of us around here use a product called wet paint which doesn't scratch if you have some fine dust on it and leaves it slick and it gets a deeper shine every time you use it. And big clumps of dirt or mud, I just wiped off with a damp cloth. The wet paint also works great on the chrome.
Ron

If you have dust/dirt and apply anything, you're going to marr to swirl the surface. Not necessarily scratch, but the other two for certain. When you touch the paint, if there's any contaminants beneath you're just rubbing it in.

Originally Posted by Bill Bess

Something that really works great for me is this: First Step....Small general purpose spray bottle with dish soap and water. I use this to remove bugs, road grime and dirt.

you're stripping oils and wax from the finish using that method. only use dish soap like dawn to strip it before you're going to clay and polish. and even then I wouldn't use it because it's going to strip out the oils. just say no to dish soap.

Originally Posted by REAL 1

I mist down the car with a spray bottle.

I take a wet terry towel. and matt it gently over the surface of the car. This losens all the dirt etc.

Do not run the towels in circles/swirls. Go back and forth along the length of the car. A Zaino trick. Fine scratches (impossible to avoid completely are harder to see if they run north and south then if they are circular.

It may loosen the dirt, but you're chance of marring and micro-scratching with the bonded contaminants is pretty high.

If you've PROPERLY cleaned and prepped the vehicle, you can run the towel any way you want (e.g., in swirls, side to side, whatever). your "fine scratches" are VERY easy* to avoid with the PROPER washing technique. If you can swirls and fine scratches (which can easily be polished/compounded out), then you are NOT detailing your car properly.

*Since your paint is single stage black, you'll have a harder time - single stage is naturally very softer (easier to marr) than clearcoat; however, ss black is the worst of the worst, because its' naturally soft, and the carbon black pigment mixed with the resin when it's painted means soft paint diluted = realllllllllly soft final paint.

[Ron61]

Originally Posted by Ron61
When I had mine I never used water on it. Most of us around here use a product called wet paint which doesn't scratch if you have some fine dust on it and leaves it slick and it gets a deeper shine every time you use it. And big clumps of dirt or mud, I just wiped off with a damp cloth. The wet paint also works great on the chrome.
Ron

If you have dust/dirt and apply anything, you're going to marr to swirl the surface. Not necessarily scratch, but the other two for certain. When you touch the paint, if there's any contaminants beneath you're just rubbing it in.

I had my car for over 10 years and I used a California duster on it before using the wet paint. I have had many people look at it out in the sun, shade, and every place, including Curt Scott of Cobra Country and they could not find any swirl or scratch marks. They did find the paint chips from the racing where I just touched them up with a rattle can and a toothpick, or in the case of larger ones, a small touch up brush. But being white even they didn't show up very bad. Curt Scott even complimented me on the color combination and said he hadn't seen one yet that he couldn't find some swirl marks or scratches in until then.
Ron

[efnfast]

Originally Posted by Ron61

I had my car for over 10 years and I used a California duster on it before using the wet paint. I have had many people look at it out in the sun, shade, and every place, including Curt Scott of Cobra Country and they could not find any swirl or scratch marks. They did find the paint chips from the racing where I just touched them up with a rattle can and a toothpick, or in the case of larger ones, a small touch up brush. But being white even they didn't show up very bad. Curt Scott even complimented me on the color combination and said he hadn't seen one yet that he couldn't find some swirl marks or scratches in until then.
Ron

To be honest with you (not trying to bust your balls or anything ) most of the population, even car enthusiasts, don't know **** about detailing.

I've pointed out SEVERE hollogramming to people who just stare at me blankly and say 'yea, that's normal those markings there'. Since most people don't know how to remove hollogramming, swirls, micro-marring, etc..., over-time they start thinking everything but deep scratches is normal.

Plus your car is white; it's very difficult to find a lot of the defects I mentioned unless you're in the right angle and lighting......that's why I like silvers and yellows for my cars so much - very easy to hide and make look perfect to most people's eyes.

Of course the advantage there is that as long as you arn't looking at it 'properly' (which most people won't) you won't see them.....but I guarantee ya, come into my shop and I"ll use my sun gun and brinkman to make you cry for mercy when you see your paint's true condition =)

[Ron61]

Originally Posted by efnfast

To be honest with you (not trying to bust your balls or anything ) most of the population, even car enthusiasts, don't know **** about detailing.

I've pointed out SEVERE hollogramming to people who just stare at me blankly and say 'yea, that's normal those markings there'. Since most people don't know how to remove hollogramming, swirls, micro-marring, etc..., over-time they start thinking everything but deep scratches is normal.

Plus your car is white; it's very difficult to find a lot of the defects I mentioned unless you're in the right angle and lighting......that's why I like silvers and yellows for my cars so much - very easy to hide and make look perfect to most people's eyes.

Of course the advantage there is that as long as you arn't looking at it 'properly' (which most people won't) you won't see them.....but I guarantee ya, come into my shop and I"ll use my sun gun and brinkman to make you cry for mercy when you see your paint's true condition =)

I don't doubt that if you looked hard enough you would find some swirls in my White, but you are talking extremes with using the equipment you mentioned. I didn't use my car for shows but raced it and you don't have to be an expert to find all of the paint chips that i touched up. If I was so worried about a car that might have a swirl mark of scratch in it that I wouldn't drive it, I would get rid of the car. You are way out of my league when it comes to show car painting. I sold the car three years ago and it is still running and winning in Arkansas and they took it to their Country Car show and won Best Of show, which I was completely stunned by. But it was not and isnot by any means a show car.
Have a great holiday weekend.

Ron