Thoughts on high pressure car washes?

If you are talking about using the high pressure wand the water can blast the dealer's vinyl stickers off the car. If the pressure is too high it'll remove the paint.

If you are talking about the drive through car wash the pads that contact the car will create swirlies.

Either way, I'm not paying someone to damage the car there's enough people out there that will do ir for free.

 

When necessary, Ive taken mine through automatic car washes but I prefer to wash mine at home with a soft sponge. The salesman told me to stay away from using brushes as the bristles may be too abrasive on the paint. As long as you don't feel the water is "too" high pressured it should b fine, but I wouldn't overly wash your Prius in those automatic washes.

 

I don't go through automatic car washes for fear of scratching the paint. I Do manual car washes in the bays with the pressurized hot soap water wands. The pressure doesn't seem super intense and I keep it at least several inches away from the paint.

I am considering going to a pro detalier to polish, buff, and wax the car; might be nice to do once a year or so. I understand it removes the top layer of paint, but that reveals a clean layer of paint underneath which removes the appearance of light scratches and apparently should make the finish look new again. I wonder how many times you can do that before there's no paint left.

 

I live in Chicago and in the winter if I want to keep the salt off I have to go to an automatic wash. I go to a car wash called Delta Sonic. They have several of them here. There are no swirling brushes or high pressure water. I think it is okay. It is the best I can find.

 

If you care about your paint, you'll treat it like baby's skin.

 

I've gotten some miner scratches on the rear hatch with the brush automatic I use. I've recently switched to the touchless and have no issues. The brush auto is probably what I would use going forward during the summer months (bugs on hood) and the touchless during the winter months (road chemicals).

 

Brush is going to scratch your paint.

 

Agree with the salt. It's easy for those in sunny States to say avoid car washes, but which is worse, a few swirls and scratches OR premature rusting?

I think the occassional use of a car wash is a necessary evil, but they do scratch and those scratches build up with use - just look closely at my paint!?!

The best way to wash a car is by hand with a soft sponge. If you haven't the time to spare, then prepare for slight scratching. A good coat of wax should help alleviate that.

 

May I be the first to admit I have only hand washed my Prius once. In fact, I have not regularly hand washed any of my personal vehicles for years. Call it lazy, to busy or what ever you want, but it's just easier to take it to a full service car wash. For what it's worth, anyone who lives/works/drives/parks in high congestion and/or environmentally unfriendly areas already knows that virgin paint is short lived anyway. Just got "another" door ding at the mall yesterday.

 

IMHO, any method used to wash a car, including hand washing, will damage the paint to some degree. If you use a sponge, you are still swirling some amount of dirt over the finish. My experience with touchless is that they don't get all the dirt and grime off, especially bugs. My experience is similar with the ones that simply swish soft material across the hood and top and swirl it on the sides. They don't generally result in swirls/streaks like the ones that rapidly rotate more brush-like material, but after 16 years of using all kinds on our van, I didn't see enough damage to worry about. Sure there were some swirls that were noticeable if the light was right, but that was nothing compared to 16 years of road trips behind and passing 18-wheelers on our illustrious freeways.

IMO, the best protection is wax, the more often the better. So far, the dealer ran our Prius through their car wash once and I've washed it all other times, including on a cold morning near Yellowstone. For me, the best investment I made was in an Original Water Blade to make drying easy. This last trip, we woke up one morning near Savannah to a car covered with a layer of frozen slush. I used the blade to simply swish it off and a clean microfiber rag to get the residual water off the windows, etc. Near Glacier, I used the DIY carwashes to soap it up, a microfiber rag to wash it, then sprayed off the soap before drying it with the blade. I was much more meticulous with my 1970 GTO, but that was before clear coats and better paints. If I trade it in 2017, I'll get it detailed. If I keep it longer, I know the bugs will do far more damage than a carwash. I've already got plenty of front-end nits from the 2 trips we've taken since July, but it's just a car and I'm not going to stop taking road trips because of bugs hits, etc.

 

Automated washing means you don't see the scratches and dings, they get neglected, start rusting. Also, it tends to not get in the corners, behind trim pieces. Obviously some people can't DIY hand wash, for various reasons, weather, apartment dwelling, and so on. But still good to hand wash at least infrequently, whenever you get the opportunity.

 

In my lifetime, I've used all 3 methods or more....

And IMO it all depends on what results you expect or want, and how much energy and effort you want to invest.

When I was younger, I use to hand wash and wax...all the time. And for results? It's the best. If you want a showroom quality finish, then doing your finish maintenance by hand is the best way. It's also the most time consuming and buying and owning all the equipment and supplies is a significant investment.

A touchless wash? I think put's the vehicle at the least amount of risk for scratches or swirls, but since it is "touchless" it also has a tendency to be limited as to how great a finished product you end up with.

When I had a black colored vehicle I would occasionally use a touchless wash as an "upkeep" or maintenance wash, between ACTUAL hand wash and waxes. My expectation was that it would give me a few more days of my well maintained and waxed black vehicle looking clean. My expectation was NOT that it would do a particularly good job if the vehicle was really in need of a significant cleaning.

I've also read some posts and threads at various sites, where people voice various concerns about the harshness of the chemicals used in a typical touchless wash. I'm not saying YES or NO to this, I guess I've never kept the vehicle or used touchless long enough to find out if these chemicals could do damage over long period of time. Short term or occasional? I don't think it is an issue.

As I've aged, and just find myself with less energy and time to devote to careful hand washing, I admit to more and more use of the regular brush filled drive through car wash's.

Purists, detailers, finish maintenance enthusiasts absolutely hate drive through car wash's. And their concerns are valid. Just look at the typical ones. Spinning brushes beating against your vehicle. It's a risk.

But on the flip side? A lot of people use them, including myself. And I think the risk of damage is blown out of proportion somewhat. Even if you are washing by hand, with your own equipment, all it takes is a piece of rough contaminant between your wash mitt and your surface to get a scratch. So there are no guarantees with any method.

Necessity has forced me to use the dreaded drive through more and more. And I would say, as long as you DO keep a good coating of wax or protectant on your vehicle, they do a good job of cleaning the vehicle. I think even with this "cheat" method, it's imperative to apply a good coat of wax occasionally, to help minimize any damage the spinning brushes of most drive through car washs might do.

You do hear the occasional full out drive through horror story, where defective equipment or simply something out of adjustment does some undeniable damage. The Drive Through is a caustic environment.

So while I do my best to minimize potential damage, and I do admit to using them, probably too much, I also admit there is always risk to using them. But I've changed my standards and expectations.

It comes down to what YOU want as far as your car finish maintenance and results. There really IMO is no wrong answer.

 

In Chicago in the winter sometimes the auto car washes are closed, if not, they are so crowded it is hard to get your car washed. Hand washing? Forget it. Weather wil not permit that.

 

I've used care washes and high-pressure sprayers as needed. Most for fast clean jobs...often after snow/ice conditions when it's more about rinsing off the car. Never really had a problem. I've learned to keep high pressure sprayers 1-2 feet away from the car as much as possible and spray at an angle. The "impact" of the stream weakens fast once it comes out of the nozzle.

Hand washing does the best job overall.

 

Here in tropical Buffalo NY, I use the touch less automatic car wash four times a month during road salt season.
No problems at all.