Devil's advocate wants to know.. could a good automatic car wash exist?

[Larry A]

Re: Devil's advocate wants to know.. could a good automatic car wash exist?

I have 2006 Ford Escape metalic blue in color. I work part time at a Toyota dealership. One of the perks we have is we can use the soft cloth car wash when we want . I wash my car twice a week , and I have not notice any marring or scratches at all. Belive me I look.

[Mary S]

Re: Devil's advocate wants to know.. could a good automatic car wash exist?

Probably. Plus you would put all of us detailers out of business!

I don't think so. In Kansas City, the #1 competition that any detailer has is the automatic car wash. There aren't enough professional detailers here to be anybody's competition. I think understanding your competition is an important part of any business.

We have more to offer than any automatic car wash can. Maybe they can compete with us on washing cars but not on detailing them.

[Mary S]

Re: Devil's advocate wants to know.. could a good automatic car wash exist?

So it lightly sands your pant after each wash? hehehehe. Interesting though.

Yes, the same way we use foam and fluids to lightly sand our paint with a DA.

[Cole Ziegler]

Re: Devil's advocate wants to know.. could a good automatic car wash exist?

They said it can actually have a "polishing" effect on the paint.

"The most current technology is a closed cell foam brush, which does not hold dirt or water, thus is far less likely to harm any painted finish, and can, in fact, provide a gentle polishing effect to leave the paint much shinier. "

So it lightly sands your pant after each wash? hehehehe. Interesting though.

[Cole Ziegler]

Re: Devil's advocate wants to know.. could a good automatic car wash exist?

Would this really be rocket science to automate a wash that works almost as well as hand washing?

Probably. Plus you would put all of us detailers out of business!

[Mary S]

Re: Devil's advocate wants to know.. could a good automatic car wash exist?

I went to the attended automatic friction car wash in my area yesterday. (The Mirror Image). This is a newer shop that was built maybe 3 or 4 years ago. I actually watched the washing process through an outside window (I didn't want to use my car as a guinea pig).

The friction material was blue and yellow strands that were wider at the base and narrower at the tips. They had a plastic or vinyl-like look.

I went inside and asked the manager what they were made of. He said they were made of a closed cell foam. He said they would not harm your paint's finish. He said he had a black Audi that he washed there everyday.

Googling it when I got home, Wikipedia had an article under "car wash" that mentions it. They said the closed cell foam cannot absorb up any dirt or grit or material, and that it is copiously irrigated with water to protect the paint finish. They said it can actually have a "polishing" effect on the paint.

"The most current technology is a closed cell foam brush, which does not hold dirt or water, thus is far less likely to harm any painted finish, and can, in fact, provide a gentle polishing effect to leave the paint much shinier. "

[Mary S]

Re: Devil's advocate wants to know.. could a good automatic car wash exist?

Marcki - I have used the Mirror Image on US 40 & Little Blue Parkway and also the one on South 7 Highway in Blue Springs once. For my money they are for winter use only to get sand & salt off the vehicle. They use a cloth strand thing that comes down over the vehicle in the middle their cycle and I cringe about the probability of swirl inducement in that section of the wash. I am more likely to go to a wand-style self wash and blast off what I can rather quickly.

apg56, Thanks for being my spy! "The Puddle, " the attended car wash I used when I first bought my Explorer and was working in Boulder, Colorado, used those cloth strand things too.

I guess there are currently 2 ways an attended automatic car wash could be a "good" car wash. One would to have 2 or 3 attendants do the "wash" part in the middle of the cycle when the car is soaped up, in the same way as you do a 2-bucket wash method, either using at least 1 clean mitt for each panel or rinsing the mitt at least once per panel. Anyway, have this replace the cloth strandy part of the wash, but the rest of the wash would be touchless with no "bad" chemicals.

Then the other way would be to come up with better chemicals, so that you could clean the car in a touchless car wash without stripping the wax.

And then the other less feasible way would be to "build a better mousetrap," make the friction part of the wash no worse than a hand washing. The robotic technology to do that sort of thing has been around for ages, so my thought is it would be possible but not necessarily inexpensive.

I think a big part of the problem is educating people to want such a thing, to make it worthwhile for them to pay more to have it done that way. As many years as I have been driving, I never knew before I joined this forum that you shouldn't use a touchless wash (or at least minimize the use).

[wifpd4]

Re: Devil's advocate wants to know.. could a good automatic car wash exist?

I'm very new to concerned car care, but I now frequent two washes with my black car. One because of the blow dry in the automatic lane and doors on the by-hand lane, so I can hand wash out of buckets undisturbed in the by-hand lane. This place is adjacent to a gas station and I asked the manager if he could program the computer to forgo the chemicals when I enter a specific code into the coin machine. I even offered to pay for dozens of washes in advance. Nope, no can do. I keep watching for a repair technician so I can talk to someone who really might know.

Another wash I frequent because I been there often and they will turn off the chemicals during tri-color foaming and clear coat application, but only if one of the attendants familiar with my requests is on the job.

I drive through a lot of salt. So I always look for a car wash with undercarriage water jets.

It's a pain to have a small, unheated garage in the winter and a black car is white with salt. Hard to find a car wash open when it's 5 below.

[cd36]

Re: Devil's advocate wants to know.. could a good automatic car wash exist?

In the winter I just go to a coin op wand wash and blast it off myself. I usually go before work when its dead so they don't mind if I use a bucket and hand dry it either. I make sure to spray good on the underside of the car, so salt doesn't last to long on my car usually.

[agp56]

Re: Devil's advocate wants to know.. could a good automatic car wash exist?

Marcki - I have used the Mirror Image on US 40 & Little Blue Parkway and also the one on South 7 Highway in Blue Springs once. For my money they are for winter use only to get sand & salt off the vehicle. They use a cloth strand thing that comes down over the vehicle in the middle their cycle and I cringe about the probability of swirl inducement in that section of the wash. I am more likely to go to a wand-style self wash and blast off what I can rather quickly.

[Michael Stoops]

Re: Devil's advocate wants to know.. could a good automatic car wash exist?

I seriously want to know though, which are the good ones. I want to find them.

Ah, this is where you have to be a detective..... or a guinea pig! It's doubtful you'd ever find a data base of carwashes that do no damage to your paint, and even if you did it would likely be highly subjective. Of course, where one car might not have any issues with a specific facility another might depending on how scratch sensitive the respective paint systems are.

You could always hang out on the drying area of a car wash and see how many high end black cars come through that still look good, but even that is no guarantee.

[Mary S]

Re: Devil's advocate wants to know.. could a good automatic car wash exist?

I seriously want to know though, which are the good ones. I want to find them. For example, there is an attended wash in my neighborhood that opened in 2006. Maybe they didn't take advantage of what modern technology might have to offer, but maybe they did. http://www.mirrorimagecarwash.com/services.aspx

There are some that are still running that might be 20 years old that may not be able to backfit new technology into their existing systems.

[Michael Stoops]

Re: Devil's advocate wants to know.. could a good automatic car wash exist?

There absolutely are automatic car washes that won't rip your paint to shreds, but has been noted they can be a bit tricky to find. The problem is, especially when talking to a group of detailing enthusiasts, we've all seen the worst of the automatic washes and that tends to put us in the mindset of "they must all be like that". Well, they aren't. But it does indeed seem that the bad outnumber the good. On top of that, as enthusiast detailers, our standards tend to be a quantum leap beyond that of the average car owner - we are not only crazy picky, but we actually know what to look for.

As for removing road salt during the winter, you're down to sort of a "lesser of two evils" here. On the one hand, even the best automatic car wash facility might be challenged on extremely busy days in the winter as they run a couple hundred horribly salted/filthy cars through their system. On the other hand, that salt is incredibly corrosive and you want it off your paint ASAP (if not sooner). No wax is a match for a thorough coating of road salt, so even if you're worried about the detergents of a touchless wash stripping your wax, you've got bigger things to worry about. Besides, if your car has been covered in salt for a few days there's probably not much wax left anyway.

Get the salt off the car. Worry about a few swirls in the spring.

[Mary S]

Re: Devil's advocate wants to know.. could a good automatic car wash exist?

I am proud to say I have never once taken my car through a car wash. Given, I haven't always washed it the right way, but I have never taken it through a car wash. I swear my car shudders every time we pass by a car wash.

I have, but it was based on the ignorance of not knowing any better.

Here is the beginning of my new patented carwash system.

You know those "things" that flop all over your car in the friction-based car wash?

They will be made out of patchwork quilts of these:



Remember, you saw it here first!

[CieraSL]

Re: Devil's advocate wants to know.. could a good automatic car wash exist?

I doubt there will every be a "good car wash." I think it's unrealistic to expect a car wash to do a good job with the few dollars that the average Joe is willing to spend on a car wash. If a car wash has attendees, they must have the proper tools and training to do a good job, which I doubt most car wash owners are going to pay for.


I am proud to say I have never once taken my car through a car wash. Given, I haven't always washed it the right way, but I have never taken it through a car wash. I swear my car shudders every time we pass by a car wash.