How to correctly fold and use a Microfiber Towel

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

How to correctly fold and use a Microfiber Towel


People Watching
Most of my life and even just recently while working on an expensive car with a nice finish, I observe people and the techniques they use for any and all aspects of detailing cars. The goal is to help them tweak their technique if anything they're doing could use some improvement. Most pros would agree, when it comes to taking a car's finish to it's maximum potential, that even more important than pad, product and tool selection is technique.


Technique is everything...


Basic Technique but Vitally Important
One common procedure that is as basic as you can get is also one of the most important procedures involved with creating a true show car shine and that's correctly folding and using a microfiber towel to remove a coating of polish, wax, paint sealant, spray-on-wax or spray detailer.

• Good Technique - Used correctly, your hand and a microfiber towel will create and eye-dazzling finish that that will hold up under intense scrutiny under bright light conditions like full overhead sunlight or while on display at an indoor car show.

• Wrong Technique - Used in-correctly and you can easily instill swirls and scratches into the paint not only ruining the finish but requiring machine polishing to remove them and then you're back to wiping the polish off without instilling swirls all over again... catch 22

How To Fold and Use a Microfiber Towel
Here's the basics on how to correctly use a microfiber towel.

Start with a clean, microfiber towel. If the towel has been washed and dried, I will usually inspect each side to make sure there are no contaminants on the towel. Microfiber acts like a magnet and can easily attract and hold all kinds of things to itself that you don't want to rub against your car's paint... so take a moment to visually inspect your polishing towels.

If you're working on a show car finish, even if the show car finish is on your daily driver, make it a "Best Practice" to visually inspect the face of each towel before folding and using.

Clean, laundered Cobra Indigo Microfiber Towel

Fold the microfiber towel in half...

Then in half again...

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

Continued...

Control over the towel
By folding your microfiber towels into quarters, you will now have 8, dedicated sides to wipe with and you have control over all 8 sides of the entire microfiber towel. When you simply lay a microfiber towel flat or scrunch it up into a wad, you don't have any control over the towel because it's too hard to gauge and remember how much of the towel has already been used.


Cushion to spread out the pressure from your hand
Folding your microfiber towel like shown above provides cushion to spread out the pressure from your hand, this provide two benefits,

1) Helps reduce the potential for fingermarks caused by excess pressure from your fingertips.
​

2) Helps to maintain even contact between the working face of the folded microfiber towel and the surface of the paint. This is important at all time but especially whenever you're working on any panel that is not flat.
​

Folding your microfiber towel provides cushion to spread out the pressure of your hand plus gives you 8 dedicated sides to wipe with.

Not folding means less cushion and only two sides to wipe with...

Correct Technique
Folded towels provide cushion, cushion enables you to work more carefully on your pride and joy plus even contact of a folded, flat microfiber towel against the paint helps you to remove product residues more effectively...

Incorrect Technique - Unfolded Microfiber Towel
Simply laying the towel flat against the paint increases the potential for swirls and scratches due to pressure points against the towel. Using a towel flat and unfolded offers little to no cushion and reduces even pressure between the cloth and the paint. I cringe when I see someone wiping a nice finish by simply placing the towel down flat on the paint and then placing their hand flat on the towel.

Incorrect Techniques - Scrunched-up Microfiber Towel
Here's another common method, or actually lack of method, for wiping product residue off paint and that's to simply scrunch up a microfiber towel into a wad of cloth and wipe using this wadded up towel. Not only do you have zero control over the surface of the towel but you now are introducing folds and edges of towel directly to the finish... under pressure!

Argh!
There's nothing gentle about wiping paint with a wadded up towel...

Inspect and Fold
Make it a "Best Practice" to inspect the working face of your wiping cloths before using and adopt another "Best Practice" and that is to fold your microfiber towels 4-ways to give you 8 dedicated sides to wipe with and plenty of cushion to spread out the pressure from you hand while being gentle to your car's finish.

It should look like this...

Product Showcased
Cobra Indigo Microfiber Towel



Further Resources
The Final Wipe – Tips for creating a streak-free, show car finish

 

[Pristine Image]

Thanks Mike, this is another informative post. I'm guilty of using two incorrect techniques in the past mentioned above; the wad and laying the towel flat on a surface. But since I've found AG a few months ago I've adopted many new techniques including folding MF towels as you just described. You have to start somewhere and make mistakes along the way to better yourself (and in this case your techniques).

I've noticed when I have a MF folded 4-ways sometimes I experience the top half of the towel trying to "pass" the bottom half during a wipe. Essentially it's like the towel is trying to unfold while wiping. Is there any way to minimize this or is this just something that happens and you need to be attentive to it?

 

[IID]

I've noticed when I have a MF folded 4-ways sometimes I experience the top half of the towel trying to "pass" the bottom half during a wipe. Essentially it's like the towel is trying to unfold while wiping. Is there any way to minimize this or is this just something that happens and you need to be attentive to it?

I think as the MF pick's product up,it wants to roll itself over.Like the product in the MF and the product on your surface want to bond with each other,in hence you get resistance?

 

[Kurt_s]

Thanks Mike!
I can attest to the value of using an MF towel correctly. I've had to remove a few fine scratches when I was not careful with MF towel use. More recently, my son helped me remove Fuzion from my car and I have a few new linear scratches to remove next time I polish.

What the idiom, "...there's always enough time to do it right the second time."

 

[Rob T]

While I have always used a MF (or even in the days before MF with a terry cloth) towel this way, these techniques are important for those newer to detailing to see and understand.

 

[BillyJack]

Thanks, Mike.
Very informative as usual, but I do have a question. When I'm vigorously pounding in larger than usual quantities of M07 into a weathered lacquer finish, I find it difficult to keep the MF folded with the extra drag of the material. I folded it one more time, making a 4" X 8" size. I can use thumb and little finger to pinch the sides slightly, leaving three fingers and palm flat on the surface and polish just as hard as I want, while still keeping the cloth flat on the panel. Does that sound OK to you?

Bill

 

[dougaross]

Mike

Is there something wrong with folding the towel one more time, getting extra sides to work as well as softer/thicker cushioning

 

[DARK HORSE]

I see you guys... C, C, and D

 

[CEE DOG]

i see you guys... C, c, and d :d

lol!

 

[Dubbin1]

I see you guys... C, C, and D

You see nothing

 

[Erik Mejia]

There was a lot of common sense in this article.:dblthumb2:

Sometimes the basics make all the difference... good show.

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

I've noticed when I have a MF folded 4-ways sometimes I experience the top half of the towel trying to "pass" the bottom half during a wipe.

Essentially it's like the towel is trying to unfold while wiping.

Is there any way to minimize this or is this just something that happens and you need to be attentive to it?

I know exactly what you're talking about and this is just a guess but this will happen when you try to take too much product off at one time.

I recently wrote an article that discusses this...

How to break open a coating of wax and remove it by creeping out...


Here's an excerpt but the entire article is worth a read-through...

The most important factor for removing any wax or paint sealant is to apply a thin, uniform coating, this usually takes a little practice and in my opinion is best done using a DA Polisher.

Once you have a thin coating of whatever it is you're applying, for example a pure polish or glaze, or a wax or paint sealant, the job is to remove it without struggling and without inducing toweling marks back into the paint.

The words toweling marks are a nice way of saying light or shallow swirls and scratches from pushing too hard with your wiping cloth or in other words struggling with your wiping cloth against the paint as you're trying to remove something that's not coming off easily.

Let me share with you the technique I call

Breaking open a coat of wax and then creeping out...

Kind of a weird title but it's all I can come up with that describes what you do using this technique.

First let me share the problem, most people try to wipe off large or huge swaths of product with each wipe and for some products this works well because the product is very easy to wipe off no matter how you wipe. But for a lot of products, wipe off requires a little more work because of the product itself.

From TheFreeDictionary.com

Swath: the width of one sweep of a scythe or of the blade of a mowing machine

In the context of this article and topic it's the width of one sweep of your hand on a microfiber polishing towel.

When a product wipes off hard, trying to take huge chunks of it off in a single stroke doesn't work very well and usually what happens is you place your polishing towel on a panel, push on the towel and try to move it forward to remove the coating of product in that area; what usually happens is the towel stays in place and your hand moves forward emptyhand... so to speak... :laughing:

The reason for this is because when you try to take off huge amounts of product, the surface tension between the layer of glaze, wax or paint sealant is greater by the shear volume of surface area as compared to what your hand and a wiping cloth can convince to release and pull away.

If that makes sense...


Now if you try to take the same product off but instead just take little bites of product off using a gentle, circular motion with your hand and polishing towel, then taking off any product is easy. This is because when you only try to remove a small amount of product at one time your wiping cloth has more removing or lifting-off power than the product has grip strength onto the paint.

Little Bites
With little bites any wax or paint sealant is easy to remove and you reduce the potential for inflicting any toweling marks...

Try taking smaller bites when removing product and you're folded towel will stay folded better...

 

[Pristine Image]

I know exactly what you're talking about and this is just a guess but this will happen when you try to take too much product off at one time.

I recently wrote an article that discusses this...

How to break open a coating of wax and remove it by creeping out...


Here's an excerpt but the entire article is worth a read-through...




Try taking smaller bites when removing product and you're folded towel will stay folded better...

Haha, that makes complete sense AND on top of that I remember reading that article when you published it. It just didn't retain in my head... Thanks Mike!

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

Thanks, Mike.
Very informative as usual, but I do have a question.

When I'm vigorously pounding in larger than usual quantities of M07 into a weathered lacquer finish, I find it difficult to keep the MF folded with the extra drag of the material.

I folded it one more time, making a 4" X 8" size. I can use thumb and little finger to pinch the sides slightly, leaving three fingers and palm flat on the surface and polish just as hard as I want, while still keeping the cloth flat on the panel. Does that sound OK to you?

Bill

Hi Bill,

M07 is very oily as you know and actually wipes off easier with a stout but soft terry cloth towel with a large nap.

The nap, which is the little cotton loops, they will slice into the layer of #7 and break it up making it easier to wipe off.

The drawback is most common terry cloth towels are not as gentle as microfiber, but you ca find some pretty nice specialty 100% cotton terry cloth towels with a little searching.

But if you want to use microfiber then follow the tips and techniques I include in this article,

How to break open a coating of wax and remove it by creeping out...


:xyxthumbs:

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

Mike

Is there something wrong with folding the towel one more time, getting extra sides to work as well as softer/thicker cushioning

Not if it works for you!

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

While this tip/technique is a fairly simple technique it's very important. I wrote this article right after we polished out this 1954 Corvette as I watched the owner use this technique to try to wipe-off the wax while I cringed and stopped him...


Video: A Show Car Wax for a Show Car Finish at Show Car Garage


As you can see I switched him over to Microfiber Gloves and using correct technique on his baby...

As for the 1959 Cadillac used in this article, this is just one of many Cadillacs you'll see in future threads including an article on how to restore the original lacquer paint on a Pink 1959 Cadillac.

If you scroll through this thread you'll see more Cadillacs including the upcoming pink Cadillac and the Coupe de Ville used in this article.

The Caddy King's Hidden Collection of 1959 Cadillacs!


All these Cadillacs have less than 40,000 miles on them.

Here's a genuine "Pink Cadillac" with the original paint.

This 1959 has a newer basecoat/clearcoat finish and is in dire need of a thorough polishing to restore a finish worthy of the Cadillac marque...


This is a new paint job, basecoat/clear coat but this is a factory color...

:xyxthumbs:

 

[nirmaljusdoit]

Thanks Mike !

I used to try holding 2 Mf's at the same time to speedup the process of buffing & used to find it difficult to manage both at the same time, now i know what i was doing wrong !

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

Thanks Mike !

I used to try holding 2 Mf's at the same time to speedup the process of buffing & used to find it difficult to manage both at the same time, now i know what i was doing wrong !

Actually, after edging a car I'll use two microfibers, one in each hand and with microfiber gloves on and this does make removing the wax fast as well as a breeze...


I love the glove...

For edging however, I only use one glove and I always do this first. Major on the minors and then major on the majors.


:dblthumb2:

 

[silverfox]

I've also adopted the simple rule to never wipe a dry MF towel on the paint, whether its wiping off wax, drying after a wash, or applying a spray wax or detail spray.

I always spray something on the clean, dry MF towel (usually detail spray or waterless wash) before wiping...just in case the clean MF towel picked up something that could scratch the paint. Small particles of dust or dirt are not always visible.

In other words I want some type of lubrication between the dry MF towel and the paint.