How To Clean Your Car Properly!

There are lots of ways to clean your car and revive its sparkling finish after the long winter months. In this blog we’re going to cover the basics of a good clean for a vehicle that spends its life outside. It is important to note that you should avoid washing your car in direct sunlight as this will heat up the paintwork and allow both water and chemicals to evaporate, leaving streaks

• The first step to clean your car should always be the wheels. This is especially true if you have alloy wheels that you’d like to bring back to their former glory. If your alloys are particularly dirty you may want to remove them from the vehicle in order to remove all the dirt.
• To remove all the dirt; you want to use a good rim cleaner and possibly a soft bristled brush to help lift all the caked on dirt. Then rinse off the rims and replace on the vehicle.

Work Top To Bottom

Whether you’re using a powerful jet spray or a simple garden hose; you should always clean your car, both rinse and wash, from top to bottom. This is because the dirt will always be tougher the lower down the car you go. Once you’ve foamed up the car, the suds will work their way down helping to release any stubborn dirt towards the bottom of the car.

The two bucket method is very simple, get two buckets (make sure they are clean by rinsing them to remove any dirt), fill one with clean water and the other bucket with your preferred car washing solution. Once you’ve dipped your microfibre wash mitt in the washing bucket proceed to clean your car one section at a time (remember to work top to bottom). Before dunking the wash mitt back into the soapy bucket give it a good dunk in the clean water bucket.
This helps to remove any grit that may have been captured in the mitt and helps to avoid scratching the cars paintwork. Try to avoid dipping the mitt right down to the bottom of the bucket as this is where all the grit will be, ideally you should have a grit guard to prevent you from reaching the bottom.

Drying Your Car

To dry your car you should use a fresh, clean microfibre drying towel or chamois leather. Gently move the towel along the body of the car and ring out the water when you feel it getting too wet. As with all other processes in cleaning your car you should work from the top to the bottom.

When you get to drying the door sills you should use a different drying towel.

Wax On Wax Off

There are a wide variety of car waxes available for this stage, however the process is pretty much the same for all of them. Apply a small amount of wax to the applicator (if one was provided, if not a clean microfiber cloth), and work it into the surface of the car using small circular motions. Most waxes take about 5-10 minutes to dry. Once dried use a fresh microfiber cloth to buff off the wax, remember to turn the cloth regularly. Ideally you should use a second microfiber cloth for the final buff.

At this point you can stand back and gawp over how much better your car looks.