Official Detail Thread

Havent found a thread about washing, cleaning, and detailing tips and tricks.

Basically I am trying to get my truck as clean as possible without paying hundreds of dollars to take it to get professionally detailed.

If yall have any tips on what works for you, share em!!

My girlfriends dad just gave me this 10" polisher and im not 100% sure on the best way to use it. Just picked up a couple microfiber pads for it though.

 

Clay bar and the clay bar spray.

 

Any particular clay bar? Brand specific? How do you clay bar ive never done that before?

 

I use the turtle wax wash and wax every wash, then about every 3 months I use carnauba wax. It's held up pretty good so far.

 

Mother's is what I use.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oeTfU_aUaJk

 

I use surf city garage products here.


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Started using Killer Wax last year. Have to say, I love the **** out of it. More than the tons of other products i've used. It's pricey tho, but being I dont wax the trucks twice a week anymore, it'll last.

 

ive been detailing my truck for years and years along with some friends and families vehicles.

before waxing you want to make sure you've got a good auto soap that suds really good, you always want to wash from the top of the car down.

how I do it is, start at the top. do the whole roof, windshield and tops of the doors, rinse the car off. from there I go to what I call the center of the vehicle. (from the windows down to the molding on the doors) rinse off and then I do the bottom and tires from there (tires always last and don't use the same mitt for the tires that you do to wash the vehicle). one very important step is to make sure you wash your wash mitt out every time you clean a section of the truck. dirt gets caught in the mitt and will scratch the paint, always wash the dirtiest parts of the vehicle last and remember to spray your mitt off before putting it back on the car.

washing the vehicle is one of the most important steps in keeping a nice clean shine on the truck, you cant always get rid of swirls but you can minimize scratches/swirls by following some simple steps.

couple more tips

-never spray a dirty car with a hard stream of water, that hard water can push the dirt around and scratch the car.
-never dry your vehicle off with a household towel, the fibers are too stiff and will cause swirls. I personally, don't wipe my truck off with any kind of towel, they make car drying towels that wont swirl but I let it air dry after running a free-flowing stream of water over it. (always try to park vehicle in shade when drying to minimize water spots)

if you've got a ton of deposits on your paint, clay barring is the way to go. just make sure you keep the surface well lubricated so you don't scratch the paint and make sure you flip the bar often to a clean area. clay barring really makes a huge difference in the shine and smoothness of the paint.

after your wash/clay bar, give her a good polish and wax with your choice of product, I use megs. hand waxing is great but can get tiring. I bought a megs DA buffer for $150, thing works really good, multiple speed settings. let your wax dry after applying and wipe clean with a good microfiber (when washing microfiber towels do not use fabric softener, they will lose their grabbing ability when cleaning wax and polishes off). always try to wax your vehicle in shade, sun light+ wash don't mix, youll have a hell of a time getting some wax/polish off after it sits in the sun.

after you've waxed it real good get your self a nice spray wax and give the car/truck a spray after every wash you do. keeps the paint shinning and water beading.

 

So yesterday I decided to shine her up. I went and got some Mother's synthetic wax for the buffer and went to town. Put some on the buffer pad, turned itn on and gently went across the whole truck. I think I reappplied about 2 more times to finish the truck. Then I switched to the clean pad and went over it all to get it off.

Turned out awesome!!! At this time I had my badges off and my side moldings off so it helped get rid of the blemish that was left. Im going back over it again to try to work the small details out but so far she is shining like she never has before.

Have some window polish in my garage im going to apply on the windows to see if i can get some deep water spots out with it.

 

normal wax works great on windows too, just don't do it in the sun or on a warm window, itll be a pain to clean the wax off.

I always wax my windows.