Sorta urgent - Do I need to wash after claying, or can I go straight to polish+wax?

J

JUNNIEIV

New member
It's already 8:30, only around 36 F outside (about 60 in my garage) and I just got done claying the damn car. Now, my first reaction would be to wash it again, since I used a lot of the claymagic lubricant and it made the car smell, but the sun set 3 hours ago and it would be sort of a hassle to wash it again in my garage...though I guess not impossible. Anyhow, is it ok to go straight to polishing and waxing? The car is completely dry.
 
I would wash the car again personally. I know people who use QD and wipe the whole car down after claying. If you have any stray pieces of clay on the car then washing or QDing will get them off. Wash it real quick and you'll be fine. At the very least it will get off any dust or fingerprints on your car before polishing. If you are going straight to a paint cleaner step or SMR of some kind then I would skip the washing. That step will clean off whatever streaks claying left behind. Its up to you. If you have some QD and some time and you are really concerned, then QD will do the job just as well as washing at this point.
 
Nagchampa said:
Is it necessary to dry the car before applying the clay if you are just going to rewash?
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not really, becasue you are basically using a lubricant (soapy water) with the clay, but I do dry it some becasue too much water seems to make the clay mushy



plus, it prevents the chance of waterspots setting in - the wash/polish after claying will usually take off those spots without trouble, but why take the risk.



mage, can you just wash the car tomorrow and continue or do you need to drive it out? personally, I'd just qd it and get to polishing
 
I'm with medic on that one. The last time I clayed my car I didn't even worry about drying it. I figured it didn't really matter if it was dry since I was lubing it anyway. The extra water on my car helped save on the QD that I was using too. I wouldn't suggest it if you had large pools of standing water on your car, but if its just a few beads here and there then you should be fine.
 
Yeah I stupidly learned just how liquidy that lubricant is (first time claying) otherwise I wouldn't have spent so much effort drying the car only to make each part just as wet while I was claying... But I already dried it rather extensively using microfiber towels. There are no stray pieces of clay unless they're so small they're not visible to the eye. I assume QD = quick dry? I don't know what those are... I think I'll just polish and then wax (meguiar's show car glaze #7 and s100)... not enough time or energy (or even microfiber towels) to wash + dry again. I mainly asked this question because after waxing, anything left on the paint will be sealed in, and since I didn't rinse the lubricant off with water, I thought maybe it would be bad to wax
 
QD stands for "Quick Detailer". Its sort of a generic term for any kind of detailing spray. The stuff you were using as Clay lube could be called QD probably.
 
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