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2k2blackWRX
04-28-2002, 10:49 PM
Well today I decided I would detail the interior of my mom`s 97 chrysler sebring convertable.



I should have taken before and after pictures because WOW its a whole new car on the inside, I still have the paint to fix but it has been storm week here hehe.



Anyhow, her tan colored carpet had stains ranging from cofee spills to just plain old black stuff!! and her dash was so dusty and dirty I could barely look at it.



First thing I went after was the top of the dash, I used a little scrub brush with some suds of simple green to scrub all the dirt out. I followed that with a damp mf towel soaked in my diluted SG solution. After doing the top and drying it with a dry mf I used the other damn mf to do the rest of the vinyl and plastic parts in the car, the SG solution worked very well and cleaned all the deep dirt out of it and it was looking good after some scrubbing with a toothbrush in small spots and using my mf towel to scrub as well.



Some parts (her cupholder and little try thing to name) were so dirty and gunky from spills I had to use the toothbrush with sg on it to loosen up the gunk then use the SG dampened MF to wipe up. I ended up wiping up every part of vinyl and plastic witht he damn MF to clean it all.



Total time for that part was about an hour (lots of vinyl and lots of dirt)



The next thing I attacked was her carpets and floormats. The floormats were so thin and flimsy nothing could really be done about them unless I soaked them in a bathtub and scrubbed them because the edges of them has dirt embedded into it.



For the carpets I started by vacuming every inch of her car.



Because im just a novice I did not have any special cerpet shampoo (what should I use to shampoo the carpets using the sud method) I ended up spraying them with some left over spot cleaner I had from borrowing a friends steam cleaner, that was to loosed up the dirt in the stains.



After that I used some oxy clean ( yeah i know) mixed with water to scrub all the carpets using a carpet scrub brush. I really scrubbed them as hard as I could and then I used a damp terry to pick up the dirt I just agitated to the top.



After that I vacuumed all of her carpet to get some of the water from my oxy solution up and my next attack was with prestone carpet cleaner. I sprayed all the carpets down and scrubbed again then used a damp terry again and vacumed again.



After that I used the blower part of the vacuum to dry the carpets. WOW all that scrubbing payed off, what were black carpets turned out pretty good, some spots you couldnt even tell there was a stain I was proud of myself but wish I had a real carpet shampoo.



After drying I used my new bottle of vinylex and used it on all the plastic/vinyl parts, it turned out to look pretty damn good and I was impressed.



The last few things I did was attack her leather seats with some Lexol leather cleaner I just bought, I had never used it before and didn`t have the conditioner. It made the leather on the seats softer and nicer looking.



The last thing I did was clean her windows with some stoners IG and I was finished.



Total time was about 2.5-3 hours over half of it was spent cleaning her carpets. I was very impressed with my work for it bieng my first time detailing another car than my new WRX which has had 0 stains in the carpets ect ect.



A few questions:



1. can anyone reccomend a good carpet shampoo, my dad wants his car done before thurs when he takes people out to lunch for a business meeting.



2. Whats the best way to apply lexol leather cleaner/conditioner



3. What should I charge my mom for all the work I did. She is my mom so I don`t want to charge her alot but she did say she would pay me hehe. I am looking for a fair price.



Any suggestions tips and advice would be great!!



thanks



Bryan Mathews

Mindflux
04-28-2002, 10:53 PM
<blockquote class=`ipsBlockquote` >

<em class=`bbc`>Originally posted by 2k2blackWRX [/i]
<strong class=`bbc`>Well today I decided I would detail the interior of my mom`s 97 chrysler sebring convertable.

I should have taken before and after pictures because WOW its a whole new car on the inside, I still have the paint to fix but it has been storm week here hehe.

Anyhow, her tan colored carpet had stains ranging from cofee spills to just plain old black stuff!! and her dash was so dusty and dirty I could barely look at it.

First thing I went after was the top of the dash, I used a little scrub brush with some suds of simple green to scrub all the dirt out. I followed that with a damp mf towel soaked in my diluted SG solution. After doing the top and drying it with a dry mf I used the other damn mf to do the rest of the vinyl and plastic parts in the car, the SG solution worked very well and cleaned all the deep dirt out of it and it was looking good after some scrubbing with a toothbrush in small spots and using my mf towel to scrub as well.

Some parts (her cupholder and little try thing to name) were so dirty and gunky from spills I had to use the toothbrush with sg on it to loosen up the gunk then use the SG dampened MF to wipe up. I ended up wiping up every part of vinyl and plastic witht he damn MF to clean it all.

Total time for that part was about an hour (lots of vinyl and lots of dirt)

The next thing I attacked was her carpets and floormats. The floormats were so thin and flimsy nothing could really be done about them unless I soaked them in a bathtub and scrubbed them because the edges of them has dirt embedded into it.

For the carpets I started by vacuming every inch of her car.

Because im just a novice I did not have any special cerpet shampoo (what should I use to shampoo the carpets using the sud method) I ended up spraying them with some left over spot cleaner I had from borrowing a friends steam cleaner, that was to loosed up the dirt in the stains.

After that I used some oxy clean ( yeah i know) mixed with water to scrub all the carpets using a carpet scrub brush. I really scrubbed them as hard as I could and then I used a damp terry to pick up the dirt I just agitated to the top.

After that I vacuumed all of her carpet to get some of the water from my oxy solution up and my next attack was with prestone carpet cleaner. I sprayed all the carpets down and scrubbed again then used a damp terry again and vacumed again.

After that I used the blower part of the vacuum to dry the carpets. WOW all that scrubbing payed off, what were black carpets turned out pretty good, some spots you couldnt even tell there was a stain I was proud of myself but wish I had a real carpet shampoo.

After drying I used my new bottle of vinylex and used it on all the plastic/vinyl parts, it turned out to look pretty damn good and I was impressed.

The last few things I did was attack her leather seats with some Lexol leather cleaner I just bought, I had never used it before and didn`t have the conditioner. It made the leather on the seats softer and nicer looking.

The last thing I did was clean her windows with some stoners IG and I was finished.

Total time was about 2.5-3 hours over half of it was spent cleaning her carpets. I was very impressed with my work for it bieng my first time detailing another car than my new WRX which has had 0 stains in the carpets ect ect.

A few questions:

1. can anyone reccomend a good carpet shampoo, my dad wants his car done before thurs when he takes people out to lunch for a business meeting.

2. Whats the best way to apply lexol leather cleaner/conditioner

3. What should I charge my mom for all the work I did. She is my mom so I don`t want to charge her alot but she did say she would pay me hehe. I am looking for a fair price.

Any suggestions tips and advice would be great!!

thanks

Bryan Mathews [/b]</blockquote>
1) No idea...


2) Lexol says right on the bottle the best way to use it.. "RTFM"

3) It`s your mom, you shouldn`t charge.. did she charge you for helping you all those years?

JasonC8301
04-28-2002, 10:59 PM
Welcome back MindFlux!!!!!! Where have you been, how is the condition of your car?!?!



Anyway, great work on the inside of the carpets WRX. i think your Mother was extemely proud of the new interior you presented her with.



Now comes the exterior.....

Scottwax
04-28-2002, 11:03 PM
<strong class=`bbc`>1. can anyone reccomend a good carpet shampoo, my dad wants his car done before thurs when he takes people out to lunch for a business meeting.[/b]

I don`t know if you can get it that fast, but Magnum Carpet Shampoo is great. Try Barry at Wash Solutions. barry@wash-solutions.com (``)

They are in Dallas and ship anywhere.

You can also make your own. Get some Woolite (in the laundry aisle at the grocery store and mix it with water (6 parts water to 1 part Woolite) and put it in a spray bottle. Works great on carpet, farbic and leather-yes, leather. It`s very gentle, but cleans great!

Mindflux
04-28-2002, 11:04 PM
<blockquote class=`ipsBlockquote` >

<em class=`bbc`>Originally posted by JasonC8301 [/i]
<strong class=`bbc`>Welcome back MindFlux!!!!!! Where have you been, how is the condition of your car?!?!

Anyway, great work on the inside of the carpets WRX. i think your Mother was extemely proud of the new interior you presented her with.

Now comes the exterior..... [/b]</blockquote>

Jason@#)(

My car hasn`t been TOUCHED since December (cleaning wise)... I just moved to Texas in January and havn`t worked up the nerve to try klasse again (my first experience was horrid and it took AGES to buff all the klasse out and I was using as little as possible.

2k2blackWRX
04-28-2002, 11:20 PM
I know it says on the lexol bottle, I was just wondering if there were any other ways, it claimed on the bottle that it would start to foam in some way but I never eneded up seeing that.



Ok, then in your case what would you charge a friend if you were doing thier car, I need some kind of baseline, my whole family wants thier cars done and they want to pay me for it. I need some kind of price





Thanks for the advice so far!!



Bryan

Mindflux
04-28-2002, 11:24 PM
<blockquote class=`ipsBlockquote` >

<em class=`bbc`>Originally posted by 2k2blackWRX [/i]
<strong class=`bbc`>I know it says on the lexol bottle, I was just wondering if there were any other ways, it claimed on the bottle that it would start to foam in some way but I never eneded up seeing that.

Ok, then in your case what would you charge a friend if you were doing thier car, I need some kind of baseline, my whole family wants thier cars done and they want to pay me for it. I need some kind of price


Thanks for the advice so far!!

Bryan [/b]</blockquote>
That depends on the extent of the cleaning.. hah, I`d charge them for the work I did, like your moms car sounds like it was a complete PITA.. :)

2k2blackWRX
04-28-2002, 11:37 PM
Yes it was a PITA. I am extremely satisfied with the work I did tho.



Since shes my mom ill probably only charge her what its gonna cost me my next trip to the store to buy some more cleaning products.



My supply keeps growing and growing, I need to buy bins and labels, oh and more MF TOWELS!! I wanna try out yosteve, I got a bunch of neatitems.



Bryan



;) ;)

Mindflux
04-28-2002, 11:43 PM
<blockquote class=`ipsBlockquote` >

<em class=`bbc`>Originally posted by 2k2blackWRX [/i]
<strong class=`bbc`>Yes it was a PITA. I am extremely satisfied with the work I did tho.

Since shes my mom ill probably only charge her what its gonna cost me my next trip to the store to buy some more cleaning products.

My supply keeps growing and growing, I need to buy bins and labels, oh and more MF TOWELS!! I wanna try out yosteve, I got a bunch of neatitems.

Bryan

;) ;) [/b]</blockquote>
I have yosteve towels from ages ago I havn`t tried yet, they`re nice and plush... I havn`t heard from steve in a while (i even emailed him a while back)... sigh

TortoiseAWD
04-29-2002, 09:24 AM
<blockquote class=`ipsBlockquote` >

<em class=`bbc`>Originally posted by 2k2blackWRX [/i]
<strong class=`bbc`>1. can anyone reccomend a good carpet shampoo, my dad wants his car done before thurs when he takes people out to lunch for a business meeting.
[/b]</blockquote>Bryan,

I`ve had great luck with Eimann Fabrik Carpet & Upholstery Cleaner (`http://www.properautocare.com/cf-s32.html`) and Eimann Fabrik Spot Remover (`http://www.properautocare.com/ai-32.html`).

For carpet and seats, spray on the upholstery cleaner and agitate with a damp brush, then blot with a clean terry towel and allow to air dry. For tougher spots on fabric, you can use the spot remover in the same way. The spot remover also works as a plastic and vinyl cleaner (really did a job on a neglected dash/coffee-stained console in a Mustang I did recently).

Tort

imported_BretFraz
04-29-2002, 09:35 AM
I`ve used Eagle One Spot remover with good success but if I needed to do all the carpeting, I`d try one of the EF products mentioned by Tortoise.

A carpet extractor does absolute wonders but are a pain to use and you gotta rent them. however, if you have several cars lined up for a day then maybe renting an extractor would be worth it.

As for leather, I`ve found a small scrub brush used with leather cleaner works very well. Leather is tough stuff so it can handle some aggressive scrubbing. Click here to see what I`m describing (`http://www.properautocare.com/br-176.html`). Lexol`s cleaner is fine but a tad mild for me. I prefer Eagle One`s leather cleaner but that`s not a necessity.

I`d never charge my parents for detailing. If my mom wants to "pay" me for detailing her car, I`ll ask her to make my favorite dinner or dessert. As for everyone else, there have been some recent threads discussing what to charge for details. Do a search and join the conversation. Also search the net for pro detiailers websites; some of them have rates posted and that`ll give you an idea. Good luck.

Preachers Sheets
04-29-2002, 10:52 AM
Your mom? She won`t complain so charge her like 320.00



Come on now man, why are you gonna charge your mother? Maybe she wants to get re-paid for all of the food she gave to you and the clothes and your share of the rent and the gas etc....



You see where Im going with this, you can charge your family, but your mother? Jeepers creepers

YoSteve
04-29-2002, 11:45 AM
hey it`s mindflux :bounce



where abouts in texas?





well, I did get your e-mail, it was during a sale (not a good time ;))



hopefully, we`ll help you get through Klasse better this time.

2k2blackWRX
04-29-2002, 12:46 PM
In lieu of all your guys advice I wont charge my mom for my work.



The only charge I will charge her will be for the supplies I had to buy which is a very small charge.



I am going to go out and buy eagle 1 spot remover and some of those EF products.



My Dads interior isnt that big of a mess, hopefully some prestone will be able to clean up the carpets/floormats. I am still upset I didnt take pictures of my moms interior, oh well, I have her paint to do next week and she has some major scratch marks (ie: not feelable but very visable). It will be my first try using 3m SMR and other abraisives.



thanks for the advice guys!



Bryan

Preachers Sheets
04-29-2002, 02:06 PM
I use EF Hi Intensity Fabrik for my interior. With scrubbing from a really weak brush I was able to lift very very light grease spots. Just to let you know how strong it is.