"The wipe down and love touches" Show/weekend car detailing

Meticulous-Detail

Meticulous-Detail

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Today at the local car meet we had a discussion about "love touches" not so much swirl marks but light scratches only seen in the sun usually caused by always wiping the car down with your spray of choice. Basically the wipe down performed before or at a car show or the local car meet. This is usually done after the car has sat in the garage for a week or two.

A friend of mine with 2 Stangs (silver & grey) stated he never wipes his car down period. Always washes the car using a heavy rinse, then wash, then floods and then drys with leaf blower. Never touches the car with a towel. I must say his 7 yr old paint (silver) on his
93 LX 5.0 looked immaculate but at the same time the car is lightly driven. His 09 GT500 (grey) also looked swirl/love touch free but then again only had 800 miles.

I usually wipe my car down with UWW and double plush MF towels. If car sits for 2 weeks in garage and has light coating of dust I will do a wipe down before I take it out. I do have some "love touches" but my bud has me thinking now. Which is better, the WW wipe down with MF towels or the light touch wash and no touch dry the better way to go for a show car ?

Is using a WW with several MF towels to wipe down a car causing these light scratches?

Every single car at today's meet had either swirls or "love touches".

What's everyone's opionion?
 
I stopped QD'ing and waterless washing my black BMW altogether. I got into doing this for a while, but no more. Now, I'm like your buddy. I think it does introduce the majority of the scratches.

The car does not get touched unless it's foamed -> pressure rinsed -> then washed (2BM or using a rinseless GDWM). Any QD'ing or spray waxing is done after the car is clean. Drying the car involves patting and blowing most of the water off, then using a spray wax as a drying lubricant.

If the car is dusty, I may blow it off with an AirForce Blaster, but I won't touch the paint. The only time I will "wipe it down" is if the car was just washed, wasn't driven, and was kept inside. Like, sometimes I'll wash it at night, and wax it the next morning - but it will stay in the garage.. I'll always blow the dust off before touching it.

Maybe I'm crazy, but I can't see touching paint without foaming and pressure rinsing the dirt off first. After that, there is little "grit" left.
 
swanicyouth said:
I stopped QD'ing and waterless washing my black BMW altogether. I got into doing this for a while, but no more. Now, I'm like your buddy. I think it does introduce the majority of the scratches.

The car does not get touched unless it's foamed -> pressure rinsed -> then washed (2BM or using a rinseless GDWM). Any QD'ing or spray waxing is done after the car is clean. Drying the car involves patting and blowing most of the water off, then using a spray wax as a drying lubricant.

If the car is dusty, I may blow it off with an AirForce Blaster, but I won't touch the paint. The only time I will "wipe it down" is if the car was just washed, wasn't driven, and was kept inside. Like, sometimes I'll wash it at night, and wax it the next morning - but it will stay in the garage.. I'll always blow the dust off before touching it.

Maybe I'm crazy, but I can't see touching paint without foaming and pressure rinsing the dirt off first. After that, there is little "grit" left.
Click to expand...

He said exactly the same thing. Sounds like I am going to change my methods. Thanx
 
I think a lot depends on the paint. Some cars swirl or scratch with just about anything that touches it while others are very resistant. For show cars this is great but for daily drivers the sand and road debris is more detrimental than washing. Again on lightly used drivers it's different.
 
Yeah I wipe my car plenty and haven't really gotten swirls from it. Is a two bucket wash a little safer, you bet!

When I will polish my car every year any ways, do I care in the slightest? Nope, not a chance. I'm not going to spend 3 hours washing my car when I can do the waterless in thirty minutes.
 
A funny thing happened to me this last winter. Because it was a very long winter I stopped even trying to hand wash or even touch the car. I knew I had rock solid protection on the car so I simply took it every two weeks to the local touchless wash. I was not worried about my LSP deteriorating even using a local touchless car wash. I had Duragloss 105 on my car.

Yesterday for the first time since last November I did a complete detail from clay to polishing to more Duragloss.

To my surprise I noticed the paint in almost perfect condition. In years past I would religiously hand wash my car during the winter with a rinseless wash and find myself correcting paint in the spring.

Not this year. My paint was as I left it last November and the difference was that I never touched it for the last six months.

There is no question my laziness this past winter left my paint completely swirl free.

I attend all the local car shows and the guy I usually park next to has flawless paint. I asked him how he does it. He told me " I don't touch the paint very much at all. I use the local touchless wash and I put down detail spray the morning of the car show ".
 
ihaveacamaro said:
Yeah I wipe my car plenty and haven't really gotten swirls from it. Is a two bucket wash a little safer, you bet!

When I will polish my car every year any ways, do I care in the slightest? Nope, not a chance. I'm not going to spend 3 hours washing my car when I can do the waterless in thirty minutes.
Click to expand...

These aren't swirls and don't come out in pics to well either. I am talking about back and forth hairline scratches that can only be seen in sun at an angle.
 
silverfox said:
A funny thing happened to me this last winter. Because it was a very long winter I stopped even trying to hand wash or even touch the car. I knew I had rock solid protection on the car so I simply took it every two weeks to the local touchless wash. I was not worried about my LSP deteriorating even using a local touchless car wash. I had Duragloss 105 on my car.

Yesterday for the first time since last November I did a complete detail from clay to polishing to more Duragloss.

To my surprise I noticed the paint in almost perfect condition. In years past I would religiously hand wash my car during the winter with a rinseless wash and find myself correcting paint in the spring.

Not this year. My paint was as I left it last November and the difference was that I never touched it for the last six months.

There is no question my laziness this past winter left my paint completely swirl free.

I attend all the local car shows and the guy I usually park next to has flawless paint. I asked him how he does it. He told me " I don't touch the paint very much at all. I use the local touchless wash and I put down detail spray the morning of the car show ".
Click to expand...

Sounds like " less touch is the way to go". Sometimes I drive a long distance to a show and car gets dirty by the time I get there, what do I do in this case? Leave the car dirty?

When I first got my Shelby I would wipe down at the show and then wipe down when I got home. I wish I knew then what I know now.
 
Meticulous-Detail said:
These aren't swirls and don't come out in pics to well either. I am talking about back and forth hairline scratches that can only be seen in sun at an angle.
Click to expand...

I know what you are talking about and they drive me crazy. They are so fine you can't see them on camera, and even in the sun. I can only see them at night at the gas station under fluorescent lights. Because I'm so anal and picky, these are the reason I stopped "touching" my car so much.

I've gone as far as to start correcting the paint at night, and driving to the local gas station to examine under their lights to see if I'm removing them by the least aggressive method.

Crazy? You bet.

ihaveacamaro said:
When I will polish my car every year any ways, do I care in the slightest? Nope, not a chance. I'm not going to spend 3 hours washing my car when I can do the waterless in thirty minutes.
Click to expand...


This makes total sense for most. The only problem is, I plan on keeping my car a LONG time. As we know, the clear coat is only so thick. So, I go to any length to prevent marring. I know I can fix it, and actually like the process. Just wish there was more paint on the cars these days.

That's why I'm an AutoGeek.
 
AHH...The Car Show Season:

We enjoy traveling to Car Shows that are, more often than not,
several hours to a day's drive (or more) away.
There is a certain camaraderie that comes from doing so.
That, and the "festival"-food and drink that are, literally, “to die for”!

Now...
"The Good Wife" also considers these Car Show trips as a mini-vacation.
Moreover…
The last thing she wants us to do is detail vehicles. I concur.

-Of course I always pack a small travel-detail-bag with at least some auto-glass cleaner;
WW/QD/MF-towels for bug-guts and bird-dung removal...Perhaps even to remove some "road dust"…
-It’s very hard to keep a vehicle clean for that long of a driving-time-span.

However…
-One of the things I've noticed about judges at these Car Shows is that they
expect the vehicles to be, at very least: "Clean".
-Sure, I have put some "love touches" to/upon my vehicles by trying to
appease the judges on occasions...(Not so much anymore, though).


Nonetheless…
I can absolutely guarantee you that I haven't introduced as many "love touches"
to/upon my vehicles as has the:

OH! So many disrespectful Car Show attendees that are:
-Hell-spawn from viscous demonic-bacteria;

-And/or their impish-offspring that are like evil sludge that
was forged in the bowels of road-kill by the Devil himself…


As an aside:
We have seriously discussed how wonderful it would be to
put some “love touches” to/upon these "alleged folks".
-If only it wasn’t frowned upon by the local gendarmes.

Bob
 
swanicyouth said:
I know what you are talking about and they drive me crazy. They are so fine you can't see them on camera, and even in the sun. I can only see them at night at the gas station under fluorescent lights. Because I'm so anal and picky, these are the reason I stopped "touching" my car so much.

I've gone as far as to start correcting the paint at night, and driving to the local gas station to examine under their lights to see if I'm removing them by the least aggressive method.

Crazy? You bet.




This makes total sense for most. The only problem is, I plan on keeping my car a LONG time. As we know, the clear coat is only so thick. So, I go to any length to prevent marring. I know I can fix it, and actually like the process. Just wish there was more paint on the cars these days.

That's why I'm an AutoGeek.
Click to expand...

Now that's funny, maybe I will talk to the local gas station at see if they will let me polish the car at night in there lot.
 
FUNX725 said:
AHH...The Car Show Season:

We enjoy traveling to Car Shows that are, more often than not,
several hours to a day's drive (or more) away.
There is a certain camaraderie that comes from doing so.
That, and the "festival"-food and drink that are, literally, “to die for”!

Now...
"The Good Wife" also considers these Car Show trips as a mini-vacation.
Moreover…
The last thing she wants us to do is detail vehicles. I concur.

-Of course I always pack a small travel-detail-bag with at least some auto-glass cleaner;
WW/QD/MF-towels for bug-guts and bird-dung removal...Perhaps even to remove some "road dust"…
-It’s very hard to keep a vehicle clean for that long of a driving-time-span.

However…
-One of the things I've noticed about judges at these Car Shows is that they
expect the vehicles to be, at very least: "Clean".
-Sure, I have put some "love touches" to/upon my vehicles by trying to
appease the judges on occasions...(Not so much anymore, though).


Nonetheless…
I can absolutely guarantee you that I haven't introduced as many "love touches"
to/upon my vehicles as has the:

OH! So many disrespectful Car Show attendees that are:
-Hell-spawn from viscous demonic-bacteria;

-And/or their impish-offspring that are like evil sludge that
was forged in the bowels of road-kill by the Devil himself…


As an aside:
We have seriously discussed how wonderful it would be to
put some “love touches” to/upon these "alleged folks".
-If only it wasn’t frowned upon by the local gendarmes.

Bob
Click to expand...

I don't care who ya r, that's funny right there.

This habit of wiping the car down is going to be hard to break. Going to be hard to leave the car dusty until I can wash it.
 
Bob you crack me up!

I have decided to wash my car the day before and have been going back and forth about using Ultima Waterless Wash on the paint the next day before the show.

Most of the guys show up with dirty cars and just use Megs Quick detailer to "Clean" their car (AKA induce tons of swirls). Then they compain to me about how their car looks good in the dark but not in the sunlight!

I must say though that my car is not "Love touch" free.
 
WRXINXS said:
Bob you crack me up!

I have decided to wash my car the day before and have been going back and forth about using Ultima Waterless Wash on the paint the next day before the show.

Most of the guys show up with dirty cars and just use Megs Quick detailer to "Clean" their car (AKA induce tons of swirls). Then they compain to me about how their car looks good in the dark but not in the sunlight!

I must say though that my car is not "Love touch" free.
Click to expand...

That is my method wash day before and use UWW with a Adams double plush towels. These towels are super soft.

This thread and my friend and his sweet paint have got me thinking I should wash before show and don't wipe it down at show or when I get home.
 
One trick is to go to the show early and pick your spot. If you can't find shade then at least account for where the sun is going to be during the judging period which is usually after lunch.
 
When i dry my car, i drag a guzzler hd towel across the car. I always check if i made any scratches or swirls to the paint, and it's always flawless. I glide the towel without putting and pressure at all.
 
I have the same problem pretty much. Before taking the chevelle to any show I will make sure it is totally cleaned inside and out. It's black so during the day it will accumulate both dust and filth. I usually have a whole arsenal of products with me such as some ww or qd. No matter what, I will eventually inflict some harm into the paint during show seasons. I have decided it's just part of it. It's usually nothing a little 85rd can't take care of. There are some shows that I actually wont go to now because of the locations and dust problems(dirt roads,etc...) I really enjoy indoor shows but usually only do those twice a year or so. It's nice being able to put a barrier up and not worry about all the sticky fingers.
 
It's part of owning a car and when it comes down to it, it's a car it's meant to be driven and its going to get dirty. Thats the fun of cleaning driving and maintaining. Jay Leno said it best
" I restore it to 100 percent, drive it to 70 percent and then restore it again"
 
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