A guide for a detailing dummy?

Stheno

Hey lads

I'm rather entranced after my respray, the chap who did it polished and waxed everything that didn't get resprayed, touched up the tyres with blackener stuff, and it looked fantastic today in the rain.

Car is going back to have the bonnet/front bumper done in a few weeks, so after that I'm hoping to get into a regular maintenance programme for the car.

I'm taking the mindset that the initial deep detail has been done, so I've a few questions.

What do I need to do for maintenance? Wash/wax every two weeks? Is there more?

Every six months is the full monty of wash, detar, clay and wax?

What about the interior?

I have leather seats that I need to clean and treat, so looking for advice on that.

Also the fabric/plastic trim is looking shabby, any advice on products to sort that out?

My car is also prone to misting up heavily, anything I can use to decrease that? I've autoglym glass cleaner to clean the glass so that's a start.

I have literally no products apart from the glass cleaner so any pointers you could give me would be great.

Thanks

166man

Good idea for a thread though I'm no expert and probably should keep quiet and let the real experts deal with this, I'll give it a shot!

So I'll just give you a general summary of how I'd go about keeping my car clean, a fair few boardsies have seen it and commented on it so I must do something right!

Best thing you could start with is something like the full ''Monty'' as you call it. Wash the car with Fairy Liquid and a Microfibre cloth first. This will essentially strip the paint of all the crap and old waxes and polishes you had on it and prep it for the detarring stage. Rinse well after is a must too.

After that, move onto the detarring stage - getting rid of those awful looking little black spots that dominate the paintwork and result in polishes and waxes not bonding properly with the surface. Some people but proper detarring cleaners, I just use petrol. 1 litre for €1.60, it's cheap and does a great job. After this wash the car again.

Next move onto the claying stage, using a lubricant this helps draw the contaminents out of the paint and give a really clean panel that's ready to be polished. Clay is expensive though but if you detar properly then a little goes a long way. You can use this step and all other steps on your wheels in exactly the same order too if you wish.


After this look to get a decent polish that can help ''fill'' in the swirl marks and bring out that shine. AutoGlym Super Resin Polish is a good default polish to use.

Then after this you can wax and then finally put a coat of sealant on the car to really hold it tight to the paint work.

The Products I'd recommend are;


1)Quick wash with Fairy liquid
2)Detar using petrol
3)Meguiars clay is the one I use, expensive at €13 for a small bar in Halfords.
4)AG SRP About €10 a bottle and a little does go a long way
5)Meguiars Carnauba Wax is decent and is about €15 for a large bottle
6)Autoglym extra gloss protection to seal the paint.

For the wheels you can use all the above products, for your leather I'd recommend Gliptone, expensive but worth it. For interior plastics a good wash with hot water and some back to black stuff would probably do the job.

If you want to clean your carpets, a €2.99 aggressive cleaning brush - household item and some hot water, then dry it with old cloths and a hoover after can work wonders - same goes for the interior mats.

Also as a sidenote - once you have done all the above to the exterior of your car buy some PH neutral shampoo, Chemical Guys Maxi Suds comes to mind. Using this will mean you won't strip off all your layers of polish and wax. Investing in some quick detailer mightn't be a bad idea for a quick shine on top of what you already have.



Tbh you could go out and spend a couple of hundred euro on all these special cleaners but in all seriousness I have tried most of them and the above is what I deem to be the best assuming we don't want to pour huge amounts of money in.

You could probably source nearly most of the products I listed for under €80 and you'd have a fab looking car for that money. That's just me though, I'm a student!

My final piece of advice would be to talk to Curran or MM on the subject, both know as much as the next on the subject and can guide you as to what products might be preferable to my petrol and scrubber brush!





Final final piece of advice is NEVER use a sponge again! Microfibre cloths only, if you're ever up North, pop into Asda and buy 6 cloths for £3. Fantastic value and they work well!



Best of luck!

Scortho

I would add if you use petrol, spray it on as opposed to rub it on.
I learned the hard way
I got trim gel of curran (chemical guys new look trim gel). While its no c4 it's done everything I've asked it to do (what was once grey is now nice and black) and you get about 10 times as much.
Another thing to look into is iron cleanse. It really is top notch stuff.
A good microfibre wash mit, while expensive at 20 odd quid, is well worth the investment, as it knocks a good chunk of time off the washing and rinsing process.
Wax wise I really like chemical guys xxx hardcore. It's easy to apply and smells unreal. And you get great beading off it.

It might be a good idea to email curran and see what he can sort out for you.

Chimaera

I'd second the petrol for tar removal, with the added step of using something like Chemical Guys Bug Bugger when you're washing down afterwards - it's better than regular car shampoo to get rid of the tar/petrol residue and it gets rid of bug bits too. Mixing a bit of diesel into the petrol helps it stick to the paint better when you spray it on - I keep empty de-icer trigger bottles for stuff like this.

challengemaster

I wouldn't intentionally go rubbing petrol or diesel all over freshly painted anything....

hoodie6029

Meguiars and autoglym have youtube channels with great videos and tips.