[Mark]

25 degrees out Sunday morning going to 50 in the afternoon but I couldn't wait to wash the cars so I decided to try ProtectAll QEW after hearing good things about it onThread at Autopia Forum. No hose just a double bucket with 2 gallons of hot water in each side. In the one side I mixed in 2 ounces of QEW and 1 ounce of my QD the other side was for rinsing my mitt. Did the S2000 first and was scared as hell since it was pretty dirty and you don't rinse it off but it worked great so I did The 968 as well. I could actually do this in the garage but I did use a fair amount of the water on the wheels. I would have taken pictures before and after but batteries were dead in the camera. Battery got enough of a charge part way through the 968 to snap a couple of pics. Here is a shot where you can see a clean vs dirty section of the 968 and a couple of after shots of the 2 cars.





Yes I know I need ot replace the yellowed protective strip. <img src="/forum/images/smilies/968/biggrin.gif" class="smilie" alt="" />









Mark

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[Anchorman]

Beautiful - and inspirational. Can you provide a little more information about the products you used? The car wash lines here in NJ are too long to tolerate, and the extremely dirty 968 is too dirty to tolerate - so, something's got to give. You may have given me the answer. Thanks.

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[Mark]

You can follow the links from the post above

ProtectAll QEW IS the product I used.

Thread at Autopia Forum will give you all of the info on few different methods.



I used a bucket that is divided in two. On one side I put two ounces of the QEW and an ounce or two of the Quick Detailer I use which is Griot's Speed Shine and added 2 gallons of hot water. The other side I put 1 ounce of QEW (makes it easier to clean the bucket) and 2 gallons of water for rinsing my wash mitt and chenille covered sponge I used for the wheels. I also mixed a spray bottle with the same ratios as the first side for pretreating but used it only on the wheels If it is really dirty I would spray the panels first.



You wipe a small section with the mitt or whatever washing material you are using (I prefer the lambs wool mitt but use a MicroFibre towel on the ragtop so there is no linting)and rinse it in the rinse side of the bucket. Then you grab your microfibre towel or waffle weave towel and dry the section. You don't use much pressure in either the wash or dry swipe as you don't want to push anything into the paint. I used a damp microfibre for the first drying pass and then used a dry one for a second final drying swipe. Once done you can do a quick detail on the car for a little extra pop or if there are any streaks from the wash/dry process. I skipped that step as the cars seemed to look pretty good to me after the wash/dry.



The wheels and tires I sprayed them with the QEW mixture and scrubbed the tires with a brush and used a chenille covered sponged dunked in the wash side of the bucket and the brake dust wiped right off ( I do have several coats of Klasse AIO on the wheels which makes them real easy to clean normally). Rinsing off the wheels I just splashed water out of the rinse side with my brush and wiped the wheels down with one of my old microfibre towels to dry them off. This is the only time I really got water on the ground during the wash.



I may wash my car this way from now on even the summer as it uses less water and I stay dry as well. For some reason I always get fairly wet when washing my car.



You should definitely check the link for autopia above as those guys know what they are doing and some go into a lot of detail (no pun intended). I tried this on the back of my S2000 first since it was the dirtiest spot and the silver hides scratches well. I looked closely and didn't see anything so I continued with the rest of the car and the 968. I will try it out on my pickup and 4runner next as they are both dark colors and really dirty. I will probably try the 4 Runner first as the paint sucks and it has 130K on it.



Wow that was a really long post.

Mark

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