drying?

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MONSTERMATT

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I got water spots last time, and iam planning on going at it again soon, i notice the water spots on the hood mostly, what is the best way around this w/o a blower? dry it out of the sun??? Maybe it was because i didnt use the foam gun last time, and i used dish detergent in an effort to strip the wax that was already on, just wondering how this happened , i have never had it happen before, how can i prevent it??
 
outside of direct sunlight is always a good choice .... I also use a detail spray to add lubrication while drying and trying to avoid scratches. Several nice green guzzler MF towels help too.
 
You get this because of minerals/deposits in your water. It's called hard water. The water evaporates leaving the heavier minerals/deposits on the paint. It can cause etching and water spots.

I use a blower, a QD while drying with a WW microfiber. And I'm looking into a filtration system of some sort, as well as washing the whole car with PH neutral soap without rinsing then rinsing at the end (not tried yet).
 
Use the sheeting method to remove most of the water from the car (works best when car has a good coat of wax) and dry out of the sun. Finish Kare 425 and Supreme Guzzler. For me, drying is a pleasure with these.
 
A4 1.8tqm said:
Use the sheeting method to remove most of the water from the car (works best when car has a good coat of wax) and dry out of the sun. Finish Kare 425 and Supreme Guzzler. For me, drying is a pleasure with these.
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I totally agree I love using FK425 while drying. It leaves the paint feeling so slippery and shiny. It is the only way I dry my cars.
 
i think the best filtration would be a reverse osmosis system
 
I just tried the "wash the whole car without rinsing" method yesterday. I was surprised to find out that it worked amazingly good..I find that water spots occur for me after rinsing while washing the rest of the car (Wash panel, rinse panel, wash panel, etc.). With this new method, I wash the whole car then rinse the whole car then dry the whole car. The only area I would think that could possibly have problems is the windows in hotter weather, as they spot easily. I am going to have to try adding some FK 425 to my drying technique because of all the positive reviews!
 
killrwheels@autogeek said:
outside of direct sunlight is always a good choice .... I also use a detail spray to add lubrication while drying and trying to avoid scratches. Several nice green guzzler MF towels help too.
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I can't believe I never thought of this... spray detailer WHILE drying! It will avoid streaking, water spots, and like you said decrease the likelihood of any scratches from drying with a towel because of the lubrication. I'm not an expert by ANY means, but after years of detailing my own cars and others, I have never thought of this, thanks for the awesome tip! :)

Also, since I have a powerful shop-vac, would it be best to blow the car dry since it can also get water from the crevices; or do you believe using a quality guzzler MF towel will alleviate the chances of scratching enough with a QD to make it the optimal choice for drying?

PS: Back when my car was new, and I was totally obsessed... I would actually buy distilled water gallons, since they were only .50 cents at the time, and slowly pour from top-to-bottom to leave the car spot free. Sure beat spending a million dollars on a filtration system ;)
 
QD for drying is great, I've been doing this for a while since one of my cars is black. FK425 is nice, but in my case I've noticed it streaks a little bit, what I do now is use it 1:1 with distilled water and works great as drying assistant . My other great choice is ONR (and DP RW&G) at QD strength because is cheaper. Using QDs and a blower for drying door frames and others where water can accumulate and spot, so finally I can get a spot-free in my black car. I love those things
 
Poe85 said:
QD for drying is great, I've been doing this for a while since one of my cars is black. FK425 is nice, but in my case I've noticed it streaks a little bit, what I do now is use it 1:1 with distilled water and works great as drying assistant . My other great choice is ONR (and DP RW&G) at QD strength because is cheaper. Using QDs and a blower for drying door frames and others where water can accumulate and spot, so finally I can get a spot-free in my black car. I love those things
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I wash the whole car, then rinse the whole car. After using the free flow method I blow the majority of the water off the paint and out of the cracks with a leaf blower (such as you do). Once again, this is only for PH balanced soap, I have not tried it with something like Dawn. Then when MOST of the water is gone, I spray on ONR (diluted to QD strength with water out of my refrigerator-filtered). You would be surprised, when using a PH-balanced soap, how easily it washes off even when completely dry. I just did it today on my white cobalt SS. Windows spot a little, but paint comes almost completely clean after ONLY rinsing with hard water out of the hose. The few water spots on the window come off very easily with ONR. See pictures below of paint ONLY RINSED:
ref1.jpg

ref3.jpg

ref4.jpg

And of windows, you can see the minor spots at the top:
ref2.jpg


Sorry for the crappy iPhone pic quality. I focused on the reflection of the tree instead of the water spots, the little blurs up top.

I acquired this method, in part, from this video. Except, I don't use a quick detailer on the hard water, partially because I don't have a large waffle weave right now.. * Note for mods, I am not endorsing his products, and I don't use his products. I just want people to see the technique used in this video of washing the whole car before rinsing anything that I haven't seen on this site before:
 
cobalt9123 said:
I wash the whole car, then rinse the whole car. After using the free flow method I blow the majority of the water off the paint and out of the cracks with a leaf blower (such as you do). Once again, this is only for PH balanced soap, I have not tried it with something like Dawn. Then when MOST of the water is gone, I spray on ONR (diluted to QD strength with water out of my refrigerator-filtered). You would be surprised, when using a PH-balanced soap, how easily it washes off even when completely dry. I just did it today on my white cobalt SS. Windows spot a little, but paint comes almost completely clean after ONLY rinsing with hard water out of the hose. The few water spots on the window come off very easily with ONR. See pictures below of paint ONLY RINSED:


Sorry for the crappy iPhone pic quality. I focused on the reflection of the tree instead of the water spots, the little blurs up top.

I acquired this method, in part, from this video. Except, I don't use a quick detailer on the hard water, partially because I don't have a large waffle weave right now.. * Note for mods, I am not endorsing his products, and I don't use his products. I just want people to see the technique used in this video of washing the whole car before rinsing anything that I haven't seen on this site before:
YouTube - Adam's Polishes Video Vol. 6 - Chapter 05
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Oh that method sounds awesome, I'll need to try it tomorrow. At the moment I only have DG901, 3M car wash and CG Maxi suds, I think I'll try this method with DG901.

Thanks for sharing!!
 
Poe85 said:
Oh that method sounds awesome, I'll need to try it tomorrow. At the moment I only have DG901, 3M car wash and CG Maxi suds, I think I'll try this method with DG901.

Thanks for sharing!!
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DG901, 3M car wash, and CG Maxi Suds all SHOULD work with that method, IIRC they are all PH neutral when diluted properly. I have used this method and it has worked for me with Pinnacle Bodywork, Finish Kare Shampoo, and DP Auto Bathe. It has worked for me on both waxed and stripped finishes. I have not tried it in the sun but I imagine it wouldn't make that much of a difference. Good luck, hope it works out! I know that I was astonished that I had never thought of doing something like that..you will be kind of freaked out when you're finishing up washing, because you will see soap spots all over your paint and windows, but a quick spray down will get rid of them Im the MAN
 
Quick question, would you use the QD with the blower and only use a towel to touch up some of the water the blower doesn't get. Or would that be over kill?
 
kids_gone said:
Quick question, would you use the QD with the blower and only use a towel to touch up some of the water the blower doesn't get. Or would that be over kill?
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I reckon you could, and nothing is overkill when it comes to detailing cars :props:
 
kids_gone said:
Quick question, would you use the QD with the blower and only use a towel to touch up some of the water the blower doesn't get. Or would that be over kill?
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Na, you can't ever go overkill! :D

Really, I think it's pretty common around here to use the sheeting method followed by a blower to remove the water from places like mirrors, jambs, wiper cowl, license plate etc. than dry with a QD and a WW. If you use a blower don't bother trying to dry the paint perfectly and chase every bead off, IMO, just hit all the creases and get the rest with the QD and WW.
 
A4 1.8tqm said:
... If you use a blower don't bother trying to dry the paint perfectly and chase every bead off, IMO, just hit all the creases and get the rest with the QD and WW.
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This was my problem when I first started using a blower to dry my car. I thought I could dry the whole thing with it and leave a spot-free rinse. Then I learned to only remove the majority and QD the spots I missed. Since then, I've had much less stress in my life. :xyxthumbs:
 
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