Advise on keeping my Black car/limo looking it's best

[jtav176]

Hello everyone I'm new to this forum but not new to detailing. I have a dilemma with my work vehicle. I am a self employed contractor for a black car company here in NYC. For those that are not familiar, Black cars in NYC drive corporate employees and their bosses around and to the city. We are basically fancy taxis.

That being said I have a 2011 Chevy Suburban in black (aka swirl city). Since I provide luxury transportation I need my car clean at all times so I have to rely on those real bad automated car washes for a quick wash maybe once or twice a day especially now in the winter.

So my question for you wonderful guys is what can I do to it once a week on Sundays (my day off) to keep it looking nice black and shiney and hide or eliminate swirls? I can dedicate 2-3 hours on Sunday mornings. I have a porter cable DA polisher and can use it pretty good. I have no problems up keeping my personal and my wife's car looking pretty decent but not this one. Help please. Thank you guys.

[Detailing by M]

Re: Advise on keeping my Black car/limo looking it's best

DAMF System wil do you fine. keep wax on it a lot so it looks glossy, that's all your customer want to see.

[The Guz]

Re: Advise on keeping my Black car/limo looking it's best

First of all stay away from those automated car washes. They instill swirls. Your best bet would be a coin op car wash to blast the initial dirt off and then do either a rinseless wash (ultimate wash and wax anywhere, D114, D115) or a 2 bucket wash.

Before you want to use anything, you want to be sure to clay the car to remove any surface contaminants.

There are a few options you could consider:
1. The DAMF system which is a great two step. If you go this route, I would recommend you top off the finishing wax with either ultimate wax or nxt 2.0 to give you more durability. You do have to wait 12 hours after you initially use the finishing wax to apply ultimate wax or nxt.

2. Use the ultimate trio (ultimate compound, ultimate polish and ultimate wax) with the proper foam pads. Maintain with ultimate quik wax and ultimate quik detailer. Should give you somewhere around 4-6 months. After that time frame, ultimate polish + ultimate wax should be all that you need. Of course assuming you stay away from automated car washes.

3. Substituting ultimate polish with M205 from item 2.

4. Using white wax which is a strong cleaner wax to use it's cleaning properties. Top it off with ultimate wax or nxt after 12 hours.

Those are just a few I can think of.

[wifpd4]

Re: Advise on keeping my Black car/limo looking it's best

The phrase "Ole Man Winter" does not apply to this winter. This winter Ole Man Winter is some lean, mean fighting machine kicking the daylights out of all of us. Without automatic car washes your days would be way too long. You almost need to use a car wash. As stated above, your customer is not going to care about swirls, just a clean shine. So as much as I hate saying it, a touchless car wash is not going to cut it unless you run it through the cheap wash cycle to wash off the snow and salt and immediately pull into a manual bay and use Ultimate Wash and Wax Anywhere. If you are dressed for work, no water involved and clothes stay dry.

If you decide to go through a brush or foam paddle wash, the car will look clean but you will suffer swirls till A) the summer or B) much more involved work on Sundays.

For me, 2 to 3 hours on Sundays would be a rush amount of time. A good hand wash and dry takes an hour to hour and half. Follow that with an all-in-one like ColorX and follow that with Ultimate Wax and you have killed 3 hours easy. You really need to establish that base coat of wax, stress test daily with snow and salt, refresh it daily by cleaning it and quickly coating it with a spray of Ultimate Wax or Ultimate Wash and Wax Anywhere.

Hope for an early end to the winter !!