Ground Speed
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I recently bought some Chemical Guys car wash stuff, including a foam gun kit and more. I was originally planning on doing the entire washing/detailing process on Saturday but I parked under a tree on Friday and came out after work to this:
That's not a "cookies & creme" paint scheme, it's every bird in central Texas apparently deciding that a coordinated simultaneous power dump on my car was the best use of their time. The black berries they ate didn't help either.
So I made the decision to go ahead and wash and dry the car Friday, leave it in the garage overnight, and then detail it Saturday, but just like the conspiracy of the birds, there were other challenges in store.
Below is the Chemical Guys stuff I bought. I originally thought I was going a bit overboard, but in hindsight there is more I should have bought, including the V07 detailing spray, some Jet Seal, and several additional UFO applicators (the red disc in the image below.) I thought two of the little applicators and one UFO disc would be enough. Turns out I drop these things constantly, or so it seemed. Once I dropped it, I only used the "non-buttered side" to continue the work, and luckily kept them off the ground long enough for each step do be done with its own items.
The first real problem I ran into was the foam gun. The CG website made it sound like it hooks right to a garden hose, and the image sure implies that. However, there is an adapter at the bottom of the gun that uses the threads your garden hose would need to hook to the gun, so I had to remove the adapter to be able to use the gun at all.
As you can probably guess, that meant the water pressure wasn't high enough to create the mountains of foam I envisioned when I bought this thing. I realize it wouldn't foam like a pressure washer and foam cannon, but the results were on par with filling a bucket with soap and water and then just splashing it onto the car.
I pressed forward, using the foam gun and the Honey Dew Snow Foam to spray down the car and all the bird crap. It had the best scent of the entire process.
I then used the 2 bucket method and the Citrus Soap, which is about the consistency of ranch dressing and smells like the inside of a Jamba Juice, along with the neon yellow/green wash mitt above. It worked great, and cut through both the bird crap and road grime that the car had been accumulating for a few weeks.
The picture below is after the wash, right before I was about to dry.
Proud of my efforts thus far, I prepared to dry off the car with the towels and noticed a bunch of little red dots on the car. Not just a bunch... thousands. The entire car was becoming coated with these tiny little bugs, each about a millimeter long.
This left me with a quandary: do I dry the car, crushing all the bugs and undoing my work, or spray them off and just let the car get water spots overnight and deal with it in the morning? I tried spraying them off, but like the birds on Friday, the bugs on Saturday were a second plague, and were sticking to the wet car as fast as I could spray them off. After about 15 minutes of constant spraying, I gave up. I didn't want to crush their little bug guts into my paint with the towels, so I just opted to park it in the garage and worry about the stupid water spots the next morning.
It is likely the bugs either happened to be migrating past my driveway at just that moment in time, or they were attracted to strong honey dew and citrus scents provided by Chemical Guys. Now don't get me wrong, I enjoyed both scents, and appreciated that each step of the washing and detailing process I was rewarded with a different pleasing scent, but if these little bugs are going to crash the party every time I wash the car, I'm not sure what I'm going to do.
The next morning I used a spray bottle with some very diluted Honey Dew Snow Foam to spot clean the parts of the car that had water spots. It only added 15 or 20 minutes to the entire process, and was worth it to make sure I got it all taken off.
My next step was White Light, which is a glaze, something I only realized was a thing since I bought this car and started coming to this forum. The CG website says this stuff makes the car look "wet", and I have to agree. After the wax at the end dulls it down slightly, this glaze step made the car look as good as I've seen it. Super shiny and reflect-y.
I even took the time to clean the underside of the hood and engine bay, under the deck lid, and the door jams. Basically anything that was painted Oxford White got cleaned and hit with the glaze.
I waited the directed time before wiping it off and moved to the wax. The Butter Wet Wax was actually quite simple to apply. A little goes a long way - which seems to be the CG business model - and it took maybe an ounce or two to do the entire car.
I could have gone with less, as I noticed I used too much on the hood where I started, and by the time I got around the car I had figured it out. There is a very easy learning curve and the best part was once I was finished, it wiped off instantly. While it doesn't shine quite like it did with the glaze, it's still pretty impressive.
I also used the Silk Shine Dressing on the tires, upper and lower grille, splitter, etc. It really makes them pop, though I'm somewhat concerned because the dressing looks, feels and smells exactly like Armor-All, which I've always heard actually damages what it is supposed to protect. Hopefully CG has a better formula for this stuff than Armor All does. In the short term, however, it sure looks great.
And yet while I took a few pictures and admired the shine, what did I see on the roof of the car? More of those stupid bugs! Back again! I'm guessing it was the honey dew that I used to get the water spots off. Luckily by this time the car was dry and waxed, and eventually the bugs flew away.
Another thing I noticed before I get to my questions is that this process tore my hands up pretty badly. Today they are peeling and dried out. I don't know if it is because the microfiber towels felt somewhat scratchy, or my hands were immersed in water for two hours on Friday during the washing step, or what, but now I know why everyone in car detailing videos wears those black gloves, a best practice I'm going to adopt starting next time I wash the car.
Now to my questions:
Is there a place that sells an adapter that works for the foam gun so I don't have to remove the thing that makes the pressure actually foam the soap? If so, what is the adapter called?
Second, has anyone else attracted bugs when they washed their cars?
Friday's Total Wash Time: 2 hours
Saturday's Total Detail time: 3 hours
If you're still reading at this point thank you for the time, and to show my appreciation, here's one more picture that ended up being my favorite one of the weekend.
:cheers:
- Ground Speed
That's not a "cookies & creme" paint scheme, it's every bird in central Texas apparently deciding that a coordinated simultaneous power dump on my car was the best use of their time. The black berries they ate didn't help either.
So I made the decision to go ahead and wash and dry the car Friday, leave it in the garage overnight, and then detail it Saturday, but just like the conspiracy of the birds, there were other challenges in store.
Below is the Chemical Guys stuff I bought. I originally thought I was going a bit overboard, but in hindsight there is more I should have bought, including the V07 detailing spray, some Jet Seal, and several additional UFO applicators (the red disc in the image below.) I thought two of the little applicators and one UFO disc would be enough. Turns out I drop these things constantly, or so it seemed. Once I dropped it, I only used the "non-buttered side" to continue the work, and luckily kept them off the ground long enough for each step do be done with its own items.
The first real problem I ran into was the foam gun. The CG website made it sound like it hooks right to a garden hose, and the image sure implies that. However, there is an adapter at the bottom of the gun that uses the threads your garden hose would need to hook to the gun, so I had to remove the adapter to be able to use the gun at all.
As you can probably guess, that meant the water pressure wasn't high enough to create the mountains of foam I envisioned when I bought this thing. I realize it wouldn't foam like a pressure washer and foam cannon, but the results were on par with filling a bucket with soap and water and then just splashing it onto the car.
I pressed forward, using the foam gun and the Honey Dew Snow Foam to spray down the car and all the bird crap. It had the best scent of the entire process.
I then used the 2 bucket method and the Citrus Soap, which is about the consistency of ranch dressing and smells like the inside of a Jamba Juice, along with the neon yellow/green wash mitt above. It worked great, and cut through both the bird crap and road grime that the car had been accumulating for a few weeks.
The picture below is after the wash, right before I was about to dry.
Proud of my efforts thus far, I prepared to dry off the car with the towels and noticed a bunch of little red dots on the car. Not just a bunch... thousands. The entire car was becoming coated with these tiny little bugs, each about a millimeter long.
This left me with a quandary: do I dry the car, crushing all the bugs and undoing my work, or spray them off and just let the car get water spots overnight and deal with it in the morning? I tried spraying them off, but like the birds on Friday, the bugs on Saturday were a second plague, and were sticking to the wet car as fast as I could spray them off. After about 15 minutes of constant spraying, I gave up. I didn't want to crush their little bug guts into my paint with the towels, so I just opted to park it in the garage and worry about the stupid water spots the next morning.
It is likely the bugs either happened to be migrating past my driveway at just that moment in time, or they were attracted to strong honey dew and citrus scents provided by Chemical Guys. Now don't get me wrong, I enjoyed both scents, and appreciated that each step of the washing and detailing process I was rewarded with a different pleasing scent, but if these little bugs are going to crash the party every time I wash the car, I'm not sure what I'm going to do.
The next morning I used a spray bottle with some very diluted Honey Dew Snow Foam to spot clean the parts of the car that had water spots. It only added 15 or 20 minutes to the entire process, and was worth it to make sure I got it all taken off.
My next step was White Light, which is a glaze, something I only realized was a thing since I bought this car and started coming to this forum. The CG website says this stuff makes the car look "wet", and I have to agree. After the wax at the end dulls it down slightly, this glaze step made the car look as good as I've seen it. Super shiny and reflect-y.
I even took the time to clean the underside of the hood and engine bay, under the deck lid, and the door jams. Basically anything that was painted Oxford White got cleaned and hit with the glaze.
I waited the directed time before wiping it off and moved to the wax. The Butter Wet Wax was actually quite simple to apply. A little goes a long way - which seems to be the CG business model - and it took maybe an ounce or two to do the entire car.
I could have gone with less, as I noticed I used too much on the hood where I started, and by the time I got around the car I had figured it out. There is a very easy learning curve and the best part was once I was finished, it wiped off instantly. While it doesn't shine quite like it did with the glaze, it's still pretty impressive.
I also used the Silk Shine Dressing on the tires, upper and lower grille, splitter, etc. It really makes them pop, though I'm somewhat concerned because the dressing looks, feels and smells exactly like Armor-All, which I've always heard actually damages what it is supposed to protect. Hopefully CG has a better formula for this stuff than Armor All does. In the short term, however, it sure looks great.
And yet while I took a few pictures and admired the shine, what did I see on the roof of the car? More of those stupid bugs! Back again! I'm guessing it was the honey dew that I used to get the water spots off. Luckily by this time the car was dry and waxed, and eventually the bugs flew away.
Another thing I noticed before I get to my questions is that this process tore my hands up pretty badly. Today they are peeling and dried out. I don't know if it is because the microfiber towels felt somewhat scratchy, or my hands were immersed in water for two hours on Friday during the washing step, or what, but now I know why everyone in car detailing videos wears those black gloves, a best practice I'm going to adopt starting next time I wash the car.
Now to my questions:
Is there a place that sells an adapter that works for the foam gun so I don't have to remove the thing that makes the pressure actually foam the soap? If so, what is the adapter called?
Second, has anyone else attracted bugs when they washed their cars?
Friday's Total Wash Time: 2 hours
Saturday's Total Detail time: 3 hours
If you're still reading at this point thank you for the time, and to show my appreciation, here's one more picture that ended up being my favorite one of the weekend.
:cheers:
- Ground Speed
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