Is there any other Decontamination I should know ?
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You have alkaline based degreaser some called APC and some degreaser. This is useally used when you soften up bug squash or you have a lot of road film it can be effective. Also some prewash foams and TFR (traffic film remover) is alkaline based. So pretty much loosen dirt that a car soap has a little more struggle to remove. And I use it in weak dilution as a first step with a prewash foam. To have as clean as possible before I touch the car.
Then you have the water spot remover or in some cases an acid based cleaner. It will help on freshly water spots and where a water spot has etched it will not remove the etching but the mineral deposits and lime scale that caused the etching it could help to desolve that part. More acid based cleaner is helpfull on gelcoat and where the waterline has been. And on vehicals where you have problems with acid rains. So your vehical has gotten like an orange hue color on it. And also as an iron remover and industry fallout remover. Many QD and waterless washes is slightly on the acidic ph levels. One that I have noticed stands out is Duragloss Aquawax which is down to ph 4-5. And with hard water you are often up to alkaline or base ph levels. So water softerner helps getting the water softer with acid based chemicals.
Then you have the citrus based degreaser and APC and cleaners. They work to desolve a wider range of dirt and contaminants than the useally degreasers on both APC and solvent based degreasers like tar removers.
I go with the wording of that different kind of dirt and contaminants is desolved by different kind of of chemicals. So when you know what the dirt is it's often more effective to use the right chemical to desolve it. But chemicals works also with different effectiveness on the dirt and contaminants you have. So some works good on a typical dirt but with another chemical it works awesome to desolve it if that makes sense.
These is often on very neglected paints where you use all of the different chemicals to get a thorough decon. On well maintained vehical you just need to take an extra notice of what you get on your car in case of contaminants. Here in Sweden during the winter months. We have a lot of road salt and with many driving on studded winter tires we get a lot of contaminants from the roads during this time. Useally it's also gets longer times between the washes cause of the cold temperatures.
This is a month worth of build up tar. So the month before I removed the tar and this is how Carpro TarX looks like on an application on a dry paint the month after. Here you can see the gravel that gets on the vehicals here too. After this which is applyied on the lower side panels and the back of the car. I apply an alkaline based degreaser over the whole car and right over the TarX when it has dwelling enough. Then a PW to clean with the water pressure from it and the rinse bucket after a wash is very clean after a wash.
This is before and dry paint.
This is TarX doing it's thing.
This is the beading the day before on the hood.
This is after the alkaline based degreaser and the PW clean rinsing it off. So not washed yet just the prewash treatment done and PW cleaning.
So why I do this is to minimize the risk of wash indused swirls and scratches. And also don't get the tar in the mf wash mitts and pads I use. It can be hard to get them clean from tar if not removal of tar is done. Also the little gravel stones you see can get in the tar spots. And imagine what that will be doing if getting in your wash media.
When preping for polishing it's the same way as when I going to be washing. I want to have the paint as clean as possible before I touch it. And this will be the claying part or the wash before I clay. But if I have tar spots and the wash don't take off older tar spots. This will get into the clay. And also tar attaches easier on iron particals in the paint. So if doing a iron removal before the claying. There can be iron particals under the tar spots you clay off and you shave off the top of the iron partical only. So I start with the tar remover and follow up with iron remover. With a stronger alkaline based prewash you useally breaks down the older LSPs with too. And the claying gets easier and faster done. Also as a decon wash and reapply the LSP you can get the paint very clean without the need to be claying.
So it's very much of the environment you live in that you have different kind of contaminants you gets on the vehicals. Also the seasons during the year depends on what kind of contaminants you get to handle with. For an example the prewash foam and some rare cases an alkaline based degreaser is takeing care of the bug squash. So not so extreme as during the winter months. The chemicals is an assistans to the PW that does the heavy lifting with cleaning for me.
