Thread: Keeping it clean.

After looking around for quite some time to see if someone else had already covered this subject I decided to take it upon myself to make sure there was a thread dedicated to keeping our cars clean.

First I want to discuss things that should never be left on your paint. And I'm not just talking about the regular "never leave on your paint" kind of things, like; other paints (damn punks), gasoline, thinners, or pretty much any other chemical. I'm talking about the things most people don't know, and why they shouldn't be on your paint.

One thing you never want on your paint is egg. Besides making your car smell bad and look awful, it contains enzyms and other chemicals like sulfur that damage clear coats and can cause paints to dry and crack.

Another is bird poop. Yup, them pesky flying critters damage your paint as well as your pride. Again, its heavy in enzyms and other chemicals that act as a thinner and can make blotchy marks appear wherever the messy substance falls.

And detergents, things that clean can sometimes clean too much. Loads of "car safe" cleaners have harsh detergents that can actually strip your protective coating if left on for too long. Or they can dry out your plastic and rubber components that will get faded and crack before their years.

Now lots of people already know these things, but there seem to be loads of new car owners here so I figured a little information to help keep some nice cars out there staying nice would be useful.

So now that we know what not to have on our cars, what's safe? Well, thats up to a load of debate. Some people spend hundreds of dollars keeping their vehicle mint, others.. $1.50 in dish soap and a used ice cream pail. Me, I use Sunlight Antibacterial dish soap and hot water. I haven't really found a product that is worth the $25 price tag that does better than my dishsoap. Becareful which soap you use though, Sunlight Antibacterial uses 0.5% Salicylic Acid which is a mild abrasive that doesn't damage clearcoats if rinsed off within a moderate amount of time (usually best to always wash soaps off before they dry). I recently purchased a Mr.Clean Autowash, I did this to test it for one, and to at least use the filter function of it because the water around where I live has a lot of minerals in it and dries really awful.

Brushes, gloves and shammies.

Use ones that are non-abrasive, soft bristles, and from reputable brands. Knock-offs will make you cry with their trashy results. Microfiber is only as good as when it's clean, soft it may be, but it holds dirt which means it rubs dirt around. Drying shammies should be the wet type (ones that you have to wet before you use them to dry), sounds odd but they really do work with really good results.

Bubbles wash better than water, thats because they have more of the detergent in them, so when using your brush to wash your car, scoop the bubbles from the top of the water rather than just wetting the dirt off.. doing this also makes sure you don't accidently pick up the dirt you just washed off and rub it all over your freshly cleaned car too.

Now..... how do you keep your coupe clean? Got any tricks?