I always hand wash my car. When I can't spare 2 hours to wash her, I want to run her through Mikes. After installing Milli's, I have not used any auto washes.

Q is:
If I were to use Mikes with Milli's on, will they get scratched? My friend uses Mikes, and the 18" OEM wheels on his A-4 do not have any scratches or rash on them...

 

Its not a touchless wash I take it?

 

I didn't know that water scratches rims? If you're talking about car washes that use brushes what the hell are you doing using those anyway. They both are really pathetic though as the brushless ones are really weak and don't get rid of dirt and the ones with brushes scratch your car up like crazy.

 

Mike's has soft cloth washes. It does not scratch the paint at all.

 

I either wash my car at home or use touch free.

 

I only use touchless washes on the rare occasion I don't hand wash. I have gotten scratches from the cloth washes as well as a newer one in town that uses foam strips. I talked to the owner of the foam strip wash and he said they wouldn't scratch, so I tried it. He was wrong....literally thousands of faint scratches. They polished out, but I was not happy.

 

Scratches in your paint or scratches on the face of your rims?

 

Probably on both. The thing with the soft brush carwashes is not so much the brushes scratch but whats in them. Most of them do not let go of the debris and rocks that are pulled from other people's cars. SO when you go in with your ride, its like a million pins going over and over and over and over across your wheels and paint. (products such as S&N Diamond Luster wax gets all of it out permenantly.)

 

so what do you guys do in cold weather?

 

I get a two buckets of warm water and go to work.

 

I wouldn't use the drive through, no matter what kind. The tracks alone would f my rims up.

 

I've used a brushless system once and it was okay. Other than that, my car has never seen a car wash. We have generally mild (very wet, tho) winters, so if winters were severe, I might use brushless. About the wheels, I've heard that the detergents and what not are not good for the finish on the wheels. Might be okay a couple times a year, but not on a regular basis. Just my .02.

 

If I don't have the time for a few minutes work with a bucket of warm soapy water, the time to drive to and from the car wash plus that wasted waiting in line certainly isn't there either. Having access to hot water for my hose off the faucet to the laundry room sink only makes the decision to DIY easier.

Norm

 

get $3 in quarters and goto the carwashes that have hot water rinse.

 

Scratches were on the paint. At the time, I had my factory rims on. They came through ok. If I had my EVO's back then, I'm pretty sure they would have had gotten scratches, too.

 

Put on a jacket, wash it yourself, go home and warm up with a clean car and unscratched rims.

 

I get touchless every week, and it cleans my car well. When the water doesn't sheet off, I use Eagle-1 Wax-as-you-dry afterwords. When I have a show coming up, I use Z Best Car Wax.

For rims, I use Meguiar's Gold Class Instant Wheel Cleaner. Spray on, wipe off.

Jae