Waterless carwashes

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00GREENMACHINE

New member
have noticed more and more compaines that have come up with these car wash in a bottle. I have consider using this due to more people wanting me to detail there cars. I am starting out very small. I dont have a pressure washer or even a water tank. I normally just do peoples cars at there house and use there water hose or if they live close drive there car to my house.

Couls this be used as a alternative to bucket washing. I know this will not help on cars that are extremely dirty as they will require a bucket wash.

I have heard good reviews on the Poorboy's wipe and shine and have seen eagles in the auto zone
 
I use Poorboys Spray and Whipe regularly. I haven't used a hose for a detail in almost a year now. If the car is dirty it gets a good clay/polish, so what's the point in getting everything wet? I think it saves time, saves hassle, saves agrivation, and above all leaves a great end result. It is true however that a very dirty car needs the bucket....
 
I don't understand how its possible to detail a car without water? Ok so you can clean the paint off i guess. How do you clean the motor, jambs, wheel tires and wells? I never got into this waterless wash stuff. I guess i'm old fashioned.
 
S+W is good for lightly dirty car washes, or right before doing a polish/wax. You get the car done quickly, yet don't have those annoying water drips coming out of the crevices, mirror housing, gas flap, etc.

The Eagle One product you mentioned still requires a rinse... just no bucket. You're basically rinsing, applying the soap to the car, wiping with your mitt (Where do you rinse your mitt? Only option I see is spraying it off with the hose.), then rinsing the soap off. I can't see this being anywhere near economical for a pro.

One option you may want to consider is using QEW (Quick and Easy Wash) by Protectall. The way it works is you have a bucket of water (2 is better, but you can do it with just one), add the proper amount of QEW, apply it to the car, then wipe it off with a towel. No rinsing. It may seem a little less disconcerting to a customer watching you than seeing you misting a product on the car and wiping it off. And you'd be able to do a car without having access to a hose. I've used it, and it works well. (haven't used it on any "crusted over" cars.)

Depending on the job, I would think either QEW or S+W would work well. Just make sure your customers are put at ease/educate them before you start! They may think they can use some ZipWax the same way!!
 
I have spray and wipe and I like it a lot; however, if the car is too dirty I wont hesitate to grab the bucket. I have yet to try QEW, but I really don't see it saving *me* any time (and I just love my firehouse nozzle :D). I do plan on having some around for when the inevitable water ban hits us this summer, and the ride is too dirty for S&W.
 
Koop said:
I use Poorboys Spray and Whipe regularly. I haven't used a hose for a detail in almost a year now.
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Can I ask how are you cleaning the wheel wells, with out water? I find it impossible to do this with some of the cars that I clean

Thanks :shift
 
Big ups to Spray and Wipe! :mohawk

I use this regularily as well. As mentioned, I would never use it for caked on dirt or heavy grime. It works awesome for dust, pollen, water spots and light dirt. As beemer said, wheel wells you'd still be best off with a hose and your brush.

If you do go waterless, use a BUNCH of MF's! Keep them clean and you won't marr your paint and you'll love it!
 
s&w has been in my sraenal for a bit now. its awesome. i prefer it more than a hose and bucket for lightly dirty cars for the fact that i hate water dripping.

anything more than light grime i go for QEW. now with QEW i can hit every aprt of the car. easily. its very convenient even when i have a hose and water. ive washed my family members cars at 3am in the garage only to thank "protect all" for such an awesome product.

as for the EAGLE ONE bucketless wash, dilutte it , and use it as a pre rinse before a bucket hose wash.
 
Beemerboy said:
Can I ask how are you cleaning the wheel wells, with out water? I find it impossible to do this with some of the cars that I clean

Thanks :shift
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I get megs apc+ VERY cheep! lol. Seriously apc+ and terry cloth towels. Works a lot better than a hose on wheels tires and wells IMO. I don't like to use water in the engine bay at all for TONS of reasons. I use steam or just old fassioned elbo grease with brushes towels and cleaners. The jams are no different than paint are they? I still just use S&W and either PP and UPP or AIO. Cracks sometimes need a soft brush, but that's about it. Water makes such a mess and dry time is a loss in profits and a loss in time for better things. On top of that you can see what your doing very well and everything is far more controlled. Your not dragging a dirty mit across the car all the time and you're never going to get water spots cause your not using water! what joy is that! I think it's the best way to keep a car clean. Now I've taken my truck off roading and yes then I use a hose, but it's just to get the mud off. Not to clean the car. I just hose off and still pull out the S&W to clean the car.
 
just like beemerboy said everyone has there own way and if it works then its all good. But as far as time saving i don't see it. I can detail a motor in 10 minutes. How long does it take with rags and this spray and wipe stuff???? I don't know,but I can prep a car for detail in 45 minutes motor,jambs,wheels,tires,wells,wash and clay,acid all chrome. How long does it take to do all this with rags and a bottle?
 
TrueDetailer said:
just like beemerboy said everyone has there own way and if it works then its all good. But as far as time saving i don't see it. I can detail a motor in 10 minutes. How long does it take with rags and this spray and wipe stuff???? I don't know,but I can prep a car for detail in 45 minutes motor,jambs,wheels,tires,wells,wash and clay,acid all chrome. How long does it take to do all this with rags and a bottle?
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a while. but a lot of cars are very sensitive and the slightest water drop might cause a glich with something electric (a lot of cars are becoming more and more electric making it harder to just cover certain areas) and send the car in for service. only to leave the customer thinking, "it wasnt liek that ebfore he cleaned the engine".
 
TrueDetailer said:
just like beemerboy said everyone has there own way and if it works then its all good. But as far as time saving i don't see it. I can detail a motor in 10 minutes. How long does it take with rags and this spray and wipe stuff???? I don't know,but I can prep a car for detail in 45 minutes motor,jambs,wheels,tires,wells,wash and clay,acid all chrome. How long does it take to do all this with rags and a bottle?
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If I was still production oriented I would probably still use a hose.... Sorry if I've gave the wrong impression. I longer detail for my primary job. The only cars I do are pretty high end, and when I used to use water on these jobs, I would take a blow gun and get every spec of water off/out of the car. This took forever. I'm just doing it on the side for good clients and fam and friends now. My average detail is probably 5 hrs..... So well I do see time saving when it comes to exteriors (no time with a blow gun) but engine time and otherwise sure it's a bit more time, but IMO worth the extra work when I don't do more than a couple cars in a week.)
 
I swaer buy the Poorboys spray and wipe. I use it every day to stay on top of my ride. I park outdoors and this is great on a well cared for vehicle. I wouldn't reccomend it as a primary wash on certain colored cars or extremely dirty ones. I had a silve pick up and just to see how well it worked i spraye down the whole side of the bed in the middle of winter with spray and wipe and let it soak in a bit. I wiped road salt off lightly and I swear there were no scratches at all not even fine ones. I did have several coats of past wax on it before it got all salty but it was still a pretty scary experiment. I won't be doing that test again anytime soon but it did prove to me that I am not going to ruin anything if i spray and wipe pollen and basic road dust off my ride daily. Plus it works great on glass, chrome, plastic and basically the whole interior.
 
TrueDetailer said:
I don't understand how its possible to detail a car without water? Ok so you can clean the paint off i guess. How do you clean the motor, jambs, wheel tires and wells? I never got into this waterless wash stuff. I guess i'm old fashioned.
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I don't see how you can clean door jambs and engines using water. You can't go spraying that pressure washer when the doors are open! You'll get the interior all wet! And with all the electronics under the hood of modern cars like MB's and BMW's, a high pressure washer is bound to cause problems. Car systems are meant to be waterproof when exposed to splashing rain water, not 500 psi's worth of water blast.

S&W is easy to use. You just spray it on what you want to clean. So if you can spray it into the motor or into the door jamb, you can wipe it off with a mf. But to be honest, I don't use S&W to clean the motors on my detail jobs, I use Simple Green or PB's APC.

SC~
 
I really want to use my spray and wash but I can't get by the feeling that I'm rubbing the dirt around on the paint! Like most people here at DC I'm very particular with my wash process (multiple buckets, mits etc.) and the S&W just seems to be the exact opposite of that process. I really doin't have a lot of confidence that the product will do what it says without marring my paint, and the one time that I used it, it left streaks. It may be that I need more experience with it to get it to work right, but I guess that will have to be on someone else's car cause I just can't do it to mine. :lmfao
 
pogo123 said:
I really want to use my spray and wash but I can't get by the feeling that I'm rubbing the dirt around on the paint! Like most people here at DC I'm very particular with my wash process (multiple buckets, mits etc.) and the S&W just seems to be the exact opposite of that process. I really doin't have a lot of confidence that the product will do what it says without marring my paint, and the one time that I used it, it left streaks. It may be that I need more experience with it to get it to work right, but I guess that will have to be on someone else's car cause I just can't do it to mine. :lmfao
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Thats how I feel. In the development I live in you can't wash your car here so I have to go to my in-laws house to wash and detail my car. Which is kinda good because here my car is always exposed to the burning sun and at their house I can pull it into the garage to detail. I wash my car every weekend so it doesn't get really dirty, but its BLACK.
 
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