Coin Op horror stories and Entertainment

N

Neo62381

New member
My car got really filthy this week after sitting in the shop parking lot and going on a trip to the mountains, so this weekend before I done my usuall wash, I decided to take a small trip up the road to bring back some memories of what using a coin op. car wash was like, (ah the days before autopia when I had money and washed cars with rags)and to get the biggest part of the dirt and dust of my car before washing it by hand. Overall everything went OK, there was'nt much soap solution coming out of the nozzle, mostly just water, and when I decided to pressure wash my floor mats, I got a few looks. One guy said "that looks pretty neat, think I'll have to try that" as he proceed to spray on the super duper clear coat protectant/conditioner/wax, and rinse it all off. I then proceeded to go use thier vac to get all the water out of my pristine Dodge Motorsports edition floormats, where I saw a sticker for 50 cents, I said to myself "hey usually it's 75,good deal" I put in a couple quarters and the thing just didn't have hardly ANY suction at all, I guess I've gotten way to used to my rigid portable. I tried to lift water up into the vac, and as soon as I lifted the nozzle off the mat dirty water just went everywhere. :sadpace: As I walked back to my car I noticed someone taking the foam brush to thier truck, and said to myself "Those were the days"



Anyone else use a Coin Op recently?
 
Are coin op vacs designed to suck water? I've seem some vacs that have a secondary shampoo function built in, but yikes that could be bad.



I pretty much have to use the coin op until I can convince myself to buy some QEW. I keep my vehicle pretty clean overall, so I just go and spray it down and then run it through the air dryer. Works well, but I think I am reducing my wax's durability much quicker than hand washing.
 
Zoom, just get some QEW already. You'll love it once you try it. Spray some QD in the bucket too, and it's like washing and QDing in one step. :up Plus you get the added lubricity of the QD while you wash. I spray 5 squirts of S&G in my 1-gal wash bucket. Works terrific.
 
I THINK they work just like a regular wet dry not sure tho. I think the one I was using just had a lot lower suction then they usually have
 
Zoomie, if you are holding out on QEW, Scottwax let slip in another post that an Optimum "QEW" is coming out shortly, I think when he was giving us a teaser a few weeks ago about a new product like that, he said he liked this one he was sampling even better than QEW.
 
Just went yesterday.

Was only light dust and a bit of mud in the wheel wells so I just used the high pressure water to blast it all off (from a safe distance).

I don't use the 1-day wax, etc. and definitely no swirl brush.

I have QEW but don't find myself using it much. Doesn't seem to fit in my regimen.
 
I actually use to take mine to them (pre-autopia days) and I actually never got that bad of marring or anything...I only had light spider webbing @ about 45,000 miles when I started getting serious about detailing....not saying i would ever suggest it. :nixweiss
 
pre-autopia i used to use the auto 2$ car washes. one day a guy who actually worked in there yelled 'learn how to take care of your car buddy' to me.. i was like "***?" now i use the coin ops when i just need to clean off some light dust and ill hand dry it with my mf's there
 
Back in my pre-Autopian days I would use the coin-op with a wool mitt. Anyhow, I'm using the bay and watching the college girls come and go when this blonde sorority girl in a new Black Explorer starts to back out of the bay. Unbeknownst to her the hose, which came out of the ceiling on a swing arm, was stuck on her driver's mirror. Of course she's turned around to see where she's backing up and doesn't notice. Not two seconds later I hear a loud crack and a pop and I turn to see the mirror fly a good 10 feet into the air and fall to the ground in a couple of pieces. Sorority girl gets out and sheepishly picks up her mirror. She returns to her truck cradling the thing like a child and then leaves double-time. Yeah. That has to be my favorite coin-op story.
 
i still use coin-ops as it is my only option.



i bring my own bucket, soap, MF and other stuff, and just use their water.



i only go at night time when there are no people so i can be there for hours and people don't think im crazy.



i usually go at 11pm and come back home around 2am. (this is when im waxing and stuff)



i love my coin-op place. good place to just relax and talk to strangers about cars.
 
Why is it your only option? If you live in an apartment, can't you wash your car with QEW at home? I live in an apartment complex, and I wash my car with QEW every few days. The neighbors probably chuckle each time they see me hauling a 1gal bucket and a 5gal bucket to the parking lot/garage, but that's OK. The chuckling stops when I have the only clean car in the area! :dance
 
There is a coin-op right next to my bank's drive-thru, so I see weird stuff all the time. About the worst I have seen is some guy pull a brand new roll of paper towels out of his trunk, open the package and proceed to dry his car with paper towels.
 
I saw a lady using windex as a QD while she dried her car off.....



What was that movie where the guy used windex for everything, even a cold?



lol.
 
Scottwax said:
There is a coin-op right next to my bank's drive-thru, so I see weird stuff all the time. About the worst I have seen is some guy pull a brand new roll of paper towels out of his trunk, open the package and proceed to dry his car with paper towels.
Click to expand...





haha, I swear, someday I'm going to sit next to a coin-op and just read a book for a few hours, and watch all the people that come to wash their cars.

Maybe I could pull a few jobs in too. :)
 
Yeah, the good old days. I used to go to the coin-op wash during the winter. I even used the brush on my car. :nono When I got rid of that car it had the worst cob webbing you've ever seen and it was a white car. Since I'm not too keen on getting frost bite on my hands using QEW I go to the touchless wash bay on occasion just to get the salt off. It doesn't get the car terribly clean, but it's better than leaving the road salt on the paint.
 
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