Automatic Car Wash Checklist

Avoid the pull-through car washes. With the ones where the car is off/stationary, half your issues are gone.

If at all possible, DIY car washing, in the driveway or wherever, is preferable. At least periodically; the automated car washes are superfluous, and you will tend to miss spotting the minor mishaps that a car accumulates.

 

If it's a pull-through, make sure that your hybrid battery is at or near full charge, and turn off all accessories (radio, A/C, etc.) Good Luck.

 

1--yes
2--yes
All windows up.
Transmission in neutral. You get to neutral one of two ways---push the shift lever sideways and hold it for a second or two. You'll see the N light up. Or, tap the shifter left twice to the neutral position. It'll shift to neutral, give you the N light, and a couple more dratted beeps.

Don't worry about the charge nor the collision thing. Ignore the dratted beeps and let it pull you through. When it's time to exit just move the shifter left & down to D. It's easy. You're a pilot, so think of flying an Airbus where the computer won't let the pilot do much wrong. The system in our Primes does most things for us better than many can do for themselves. There are a couple of ways we can manually maximize things, but not many.

If they have a place for it, park and wipe the door jams. The rear hatch gasket is not near the lip, so dirt & suds accumulates there.

 

I don't know if the Prime has the big rubber strip on the roof that runs along the driver & passenger sides from front to back, but those are notorious for coming out of track in automatic car washes on just about every car that has them. Make sure to run your fingers along them with pressure after the wash if the Prime has them. Also, if your brave, tack on some Gorilla glue to them to keep them in place. Worked for me.

 

I go through the same wash every week. It's a pull thru. Learned the first time with the prime that i needed to fold the mirrors in. But oddly enough today my prime scraped the guide on the underside when i entered the Guide part (the front wheels go into.) Just very so briefly.. i stopped and looked and it seemed fine. Strange part is that I've been through that wash about 5x and never had this issue. Although... I had a 48 pack of bottled water and a 200 load wash jug of Tide in the trunk. (Both heavy items) Could they have some how led to the underside of the car touching something that I've never touched prior?

On a side note, thinking of cancelling my wash pass and using the Manual Wash bays with my own brush and bucket. Not cheaper but i think better for the car with those whizzing brushes.

 

Cdn, were your tires fully inflated? Could the guide have been awry in some way?