Cleaning Wheel Wells 2014 GMC

[Detailing by M]

Re: Cleaning Wheel Wells 2014 GMC

I guess the mobile app doesn't follow the "block people" rule.
this will be the last time I respond to you.

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[ShineOCD]

Re: Cleaning Wheel Wells 2014 GMC

I posted that I use Hyper Dressing

Sorry I missed that. Thank you for the advice. I will give it a try.

[Blueline]

Re: Cleaning Wheel Wells 2014 GMC

I guess the mobile app doesn't follow the "block people" rule.
this will be the last time I respond to you.

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Blocked??? Wow.. professional maybe, childish for sure. I hear about my 12 year old nieces blocking people. "Me thinks thou does protest too much", however, if you are so easily offended and not confident in your skills, then I apologize for my remark. Geeeeeeeez.

[ca2kjet]

Re: Cleaning Wheel Wells 2014 GMC

This thread has gone well...

The carpeted wheel wells are considered a meshed version of the solid wheel wells and are made of plastic. It's purely for acoustic purposes. They're designed to not hold much water and dry quickly. In some cases junk may be easier to clean off while at other times it may not. Twigs and pieces of grass can become lodged and don't fall off without a good scrub or pressure spraying. Do not use extremely high pressure cleaning as this will pull the material more than necessary and begin to break the slotted holes. The downside is that these meshes can degrade quickly purely from abrasion. They're supposed to be easy to replace but that depends on the brand. You can use any dressing you'd like and it's good to apply often because if the mesh drys out that's when it starts to fray and break until its flopping around and needs replacement.

[wifpd4]

Re: Cleaning Wheel Wells 2014 GMC

I clean them with a stiff brush, use the same soap I use on the tires and rinse with a high pressure washer. Dry with a leaf blower and then use foam tire shine sprayed lightly. This my second car with them and I've not seen any adverse effects.

[Michael Stoops]

Re: Cleaning Wheel Wells 2014 GMC

Aaaaannnnnnnd........ back it down. Everyone.



This move to what amounts to a short nap synthetic fiber material for wheel well liners instead of molded plastic is being done as part of the NVH (noise, vibration, harshness) issues being addressed by automotive engineers. Addressing interior noise concerns includes everything from sound deadening glass to active noise cancellation as part of the audio system, underhood liners, acoustic insulation in floors, roof panels and doors (or even blown foam in some cases) and these wheel well liners that absorb tire noise more effectively than smooth vinyl liners do.

But the fibers are synthetic in nature, not really all that unlike the smooth vinyl but presented as a fibrous material rather than hard and smooth. A potential downside to them is that they tend to hold onto things like road salt and organic material like grass clippings and bits of leaves. And that organic material can sometimes be a bit trickier to remove from the fiber material than it is from the smooth liners, as you can imagine. Pressure washing to remove that material as well as road salt, etc is perfectly acceptable provided you use common sense when doing so. But that holds true any time you use a pressure washer on your car.

But we digress.

Proper care of these fiber liners really isn't all that different from taking care of the smooth liners - wash them with soap and water, pressure wash if need be, and spray on a water based dressing of your choice if you so desire. Hyper Dressing is a very popular choice here as it's economical and won't impart a super high gloss shine but rather just a clean, satin appearance. While wiping down a smooth vinyl liner with an old towel to distribute the dressing makes sense, you might want to avoid doing so with fiber liners, especially if your towel choice has historically been old terry cloth. There is, of course, a much greater chance that doing this on fiber liners will pull some lint off the towel, and then you've got white specs on your black liners. Unless you've done a full custom "salt 'n peppa" theme to your car, you most likely don't want this. Instead, try spraying the dressing onto the liner and then lightly brushing with a tire brush to fully distribute. Or you could just spray and walk away, as is common practice.

We would recommend staying with a water based dressing like Hyper Dressing, M40, Natural Shine (though that's probably not the most economical choice, but it's still perfectly safe to use) or even Armor All if that's what you like in wheel wells. We would avoid any sort of solvent based dressing only because of the greater potential to attract dust since most solvent based dressings don't really dry like water based dressings do. And while a wipe on dressing like Ultimate Black is also safe to use, the application process on fiber linings is less than ideal. Stick with a water based spray: spray it on, give it a light brushing to distribute, and you're done.

[ShineOCD]

Re: Cleaning Wheel Wells 2014 GMC

Excellent Michael. Thank you very much.