With Spring having thoroughly sprung, there’s a good chance that spring cleaning is thoroughly on some of our minds. Sure, getting your home gleaming is great, but given the corner of the internet we inhabit, there’s a good chance that warmer weather means nicer conditions in which to clean your car. However, not everyone cleans their car the same way, so we’re asking you how you do it. I’ll go first by sharing a little example.
Last year, I joined RCLUB, a local car club with its own wash bay. Let me tell you, having a heated pressure washer, forced air to dry shut lines and intricate elements, and a foam lance has been a game-changer, especially since coin-op car washes tend to eat a lot of quarters. I typically start with a pre-rinse, then lubricate the surface with snow foam. If whatever I’m driving isn’t horrifically dirty, I can usually get away with going mitt-free, letting the foam lift contaminants from the surface before power-washing it off. From there, it’s just a matter of drying the car, cleaning the glass because visibility is key, and maintaining the coating atop the paint with a spray sealant. A quick vacuum on the inside to get any pebbles, and I’m all set.
Mind you, I tend to dedicate significant time to proper detailing once a quarter or so. Think fine-hair brushes, all-purpose cleaner, plastic conditioners, leather treatment, cleaning dust from weatherstripping, applying and then knocking down a little tire shine for that perfect satin sheen, getting under the hood, in the trunk, in the jambs, all that sort of stuff. It’s oddly therapeutic, even if it takes all day. For quick at-home maintenance washes, I use Optimum No-Rinse, as I can work panel-by-panel without needing a hose and still get a solid result. Speaking of periodic at-home maintenance, I usually clean kick panels and lower door cards weekly, just because stuff often gets tracked along them. A little bit of all-purpose cleaner and a microfiber makes quick work of it.
However, that’s just my regimen, and I’m in the minority at The Autopian when it comes to car cleaning. David often just lets rain do its thing, some of us have fewer qualms about automated car washes than others, and frequency of cleaning varies spectacularly. So, how do you clean your car, and how often do you do it? As ever, let us know in the comments below.
(Photo credits: Thomas Hundal)
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Hose down thoroughly, car wash soap with a wool mitt. Chamois dry. Wax, then buff. Rain-x all the windows. The wax I do at least once a year. In between it’s a wash and chamois. I usually hit the tires with tire shine. Spring I take all the mats out, hit them with wheel cleaner and hose them off. The soft top on the Bronco gets a treatment at least twice a year.
Spray the car down, car wash with wax in bucket with water, wash mitt, scrub sponge. Start with the wash mitt washing the roof and windows all the way around. Spray that off. Wash the front and hood and front fenders, spray that off. Wash the doors, spray that off. Wash the back, spray that off. Dry with chamois cloth (very important if you have hard water.) Then carefully spray each wheel and tire, use scub sponge on them, carefully rinse them. Done. I try to hand wax in spring and fall. I’ve missed a few springs and falls but at least my car lives in the garage.
Well I certainly don’t use a fried blooming onion (top shot)
I, much like the header image, clean exclusively with Bloomin’ Onions.
I have a GM matte finish paint, so I use a matte specific soap and good wash mitts
I’ve been using a combination of the 2-bucked method and self-service car wash booths. I’ll fully hand-wash with clay bar, buff and wax once every couple months and hit up the self-service on the way home in between to just spray down. I’ll probably default to a weekly hand-wash for the Summer months.
As an apartment dweller I go to the touchless carwash and then the coin op units.
Amen. It’s an art in itself knowing where the good ones are (and which ones ill-advisedly decided to switch to the abrasion special brushes for some reason).
Once a year, I pay a guy $20 to wash my car.
When my ex wife bought a new car, I went to town often… the whole two bucket process, microfiber, all the products I could buy. I work in the software industry, so never get my hands on things… it was satisfying to spend a few hours meticulously cleaning, waxing, buffing, claying, etc. It turns out it was just nice to get out of the house for a few hours for some quiet. In my divorce, I just go to the coin-op place and hose it down whenever I have a particularly impure thought.
Not until this goddamn pollen lets up for the season. There’s no point right now. Otherwise car soap, fluffy noodly scrub thing as pictured top to bottom, soft vinyl brush on the wheels if I’m feeling fancy
In winter: the two DD’s have unlimited subscriptions to a local touchless car wash with all the goodies – but the most important being the underbody blast. The ability to wash as many times as we want per month (well, up to once per day) combined with the ceramic coating on the Cruze definitely helps keep them a lot cleaner than years past when I didn’t want to go broke constantly washing them if they got dirty. Now, the more we wash them, the better a deal it is.
In summer: two bucket wash method (when I actually manage to get around to it), Meguiar’s Hot Wheels for the wheels/tires, Meguiar’s Gold Class Car Wash and a nice soft mitt for the body/glass, dry with an assortment of microfibers (and the Meguiar’s waffle weave towel), swear at the thousand of weepers that never stop, and then some Chemical Guys Tire + Trim gel for the tires and air dam. I use CG InstantWax+ for the Volt after washing, but nothing on the Cruze since it is ceramic coated. I also use CG Speed Wipe on these cars to quick detail if they’re not too dirty, instead of washing again.
For the Cobalt, I practically never wash it anymore because it is garage kept and I try and avoid it being driven in rain to keep it clean. So it just constantly gets the Speed Wipe to clean it off. The Camaro is all patina, so I use the Sweet Patina “Happy Ending” quick detailer, as it has Patina Sauce on it (and also lives in the garage and goes out even less frequently).
I have a foam cannon, a pressure washer, and a vacuum. I usually just blast them with the foam cannon and then again with the washer and leave it at that. Every few months I use a mitt to scrub them also. My cars all have rough paint and are parked outside so I don’t bother putting a ton of effort in.
The regimen for both cars:
Annually I polish and wax using Meg’s Ultimate Polish and Wax on my cheap-ish Zota DA polisher. Twice per year I use Meg’s Natural Finish protectant on interior plastics and Lexol cleaner/conditioner on the leather surfaces. When I think about it I hit the black trim with Mother’s Back To Black. I never, EVER use tire shine.
I’m a huge Meguiar’s fan myself. Bang for the buck, it’s hard to find better over the counter, more readily available stuff.
I do like a slight tire shine (Meg’s hot shine) though myself. 😉
I drive through a stream. But seriously, i did have to break out the pressure washer when i replaced the power steering hose on my Ranger.
Haven’t cleaned my car in 3 years.
As an urban dweller, I’m a connoisseur of local car washes with very specific requirements.
Have to be touch-free, self-serve (i.e. no guys with rags of unknown provenance at the end), and have to have a parking lot or other space nearby so I can complete the job.
I’ve developed a whole routine – I like to go in the off-hours so I’m not rushed as I spray on tire/wheel/bug cleaner and let it sit for a few minutes before entering; can inch out at the end to maximize dryer time; and then have plenty of space to completely dry her off, apply any needed dressings, etc.; and then idly marvel at her for a few minutes like Clint Eastwood in Gran Torino.
My local-ish self-serve has had their high-clearance bay closed for the last few months. So then I had to find another local-ish high-clearance self-serve and that one has a tight turn-in and short hoses that really make it a struggle with my 9-ft tall van. Cleaning big cars is hard.
Yikes. I’m spoiled by having small cars, so I usually have a few options. But my local favorite is currently closed for remodeling, so I had to cast a wider net – I think I found the only other touch-free in like 25 miles.
This question contains certain unstated assumptions:
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I drive past a coin up on my way home, so many Fridays I swing by and give it a spray. My work parking lot is gravel so it gets dusty over the week. Every few weekends I get out the hose and buckets and wash some of our cars. I tend to go with whatever big jug of detergent was on sale and give the interior a quick vacuum and the dash a wipe while I’m doing this. Spring time I often leave a sprinkler (I have one of those cheap donut ones) under the car to get rid of what I can from under there. My wife’s car has the dustiest brake pads ever so I make sure here wheels get a scrub or it looks awful.
Product wise I’m not picky. My wash mitts (Still don’t know why I have 2) were a gift when I bought a new car many years ago. Detergent is what happened to be on sale. One bucket is from home depot, the other Canadian Tire.
You’re supposed to wash these things? Huh.
I have actually owned cars that I have never washed the entire time I owned them.
Same. And feel no guilt.
I had a winter beater for 2 years that I was afraid to wash because of how much water could enter the interior. Also it wasn’t worth washing. Still cleaned the interior because I had to sit in it.
Well for my Vehicross I’m starting by cleaning the title. I posted for sale and an interested car dealer informed me carfax has it listed as totaled back in 2012. It also has a bunch of parts ordered for repair the same day. Let’s see how well Carfaxs telephone less error correction process works.
I’m extremely picky. Pressure washer with foam cannon for both rinsing and soaking, then two buckets for the microfiber I use to scrub down, one for a rinse, the second to rinse even more, with a grit-guard in the bucket, Doing the plastic trim on my CX-30 absolutely last since that tends to get the most grime on it. The wheels get an entirely separate brush (chemical guys foam drill brush for wheels) and wheel cleaner, and a pressure wash rinse after. Also a quick-wax post wash down that goes on wet which helps keep water spots to a minimum.
Interior gets semi-regularly vacuumed, and all leather/pleather surfaces get a leather cleaner/conditioner cleaning at minimum monthly, and plastic surfaces get at least a quick wipe down as well to keep grime to a minimum. I try to not bother passengers with aggressive restrictions like no eating, sticky drinks, etc, so keeping a fairly regular cleaning cycle really keeps grime to a minimum, as does rubber floor mats and trunk liners which are amazingly easy to clean.
Needless to say, automatic car washes of ANY kind are unacceptable, even the few little swirls in the paint from the dealer washing it prior to delivery (which I tried to fight against) absolutely kill me. Mazda’s Polymetal Gray is a phenomenal color, and darn it I want to admire it as often as I can.
The dealer swirl-o-matic mangled the Soul Red Metallic paint when I purchased my car. I took it to a co-worker who details cars on the side and he buffed it to perfection.
That’s a huge shame, soul red is an absolutely stunning color! I have some stuff for paint correction, but only a cheap buffer and not a true random orbital buffer. I’m used to working on 20-40 year old single stage paint not mostly good shiny clear coat haha. One day I’ll get it corrected, but that’ll be after I finish paying the thing off.
Rain
I had a neighbor who swore by this. Every time it rained (and this is in Seattle, mind you) he’d be outside pouring a bucket of soapy water on his car, then leave it in the rain. Most of the time the rain here is just an airborne mist, but somehow he couldn’t ever see the soapy film he’d built up over years.
No soap for me, just rain.
Pressure washer/foam cannon and Ego blower with a stubby nozzle. I keep them clean enough that they haven’t needed a deep detail since I ceramic coated them (which was very labor intensive, but easy). I do not abide by the two (or three) bucket method. I put regular car soap in a pump sprayer and do the wheels separately. I rinse then foam the entire car then I use a few microfibers to rub everything down, then rinse again and blow dry. Sometimes I’ll use a chamois to wipe down the jambs and weather seals. 2x a year I apply gummi-plefge stift on all of the seals. One of my weirder things is I’ll use Griot’s speed shine on the piano black/shiny wood interior trim. It gives it a nice deep shine, and if I’m gonna have to deal with piano black, it may as well look nice.
I have a subscription/membership to a soft-touch nearby. I have a 2019 Kia and a 2002 Chevy, so that feels plenty good. I mostly like to get the crap off the underbody in the winter. RCLUB sounds much better, but I don’t think there’s anything like that here.
If I had something I felt more protective of, I’d put in more effort. Probably a touchless, at least seasonally, so I could still get crap cleaned off in the winter without a lot of extra effort.
When in the drive way, hose, washing fluid, tire shine, wheel cleaner, drying squeegee, and a dust brush for the inside and armor all.
When I don’t have time touchless carwash with under carriage
I hose or pressure wash the underside to remove the mud after the off-road park and then go to the car wash. That is it.