First time foam cannon user

[Accumulator]

Fishroes- That makes sense, I just wouldn`t want you to knock yourself out over something that`s not a real issue.

And yeah...I hear you on the trees! We live in a woods with a lot of trees that`re up close to the house (we keep our fingers crossed and take down any that look iffy).

[kevk]

I think the truck looks soapy enough. The shaving cream foam that you can see never touches the truck anyway.
Your soap is dwelling on the surface, so you should be good to go.

Just my opinion.

[SWETM]

That sure sounds like a lot more work than actually washing a car, old school style. I can certainly see a pre-wash foam being effective for a really dirty vehicle, all this foaming, rinsing, switching things around for a regular wash? I guess if you have super soft paint it might make sense? I wash, dry, and QD/spray wax a car in <30 minutes.

The touchless wash with an effective PW and depending on the drying method. But say I drive it dry as it`s just a thing to get dust or pollen or a slight dirty car cleaner. This take me around 15-20 minutes and ad an extra 5min to fill the foamcannon bottle if even necessary as I have concentrate in it and just adjust the chemical mix setting on the foamcannon and to take out the PW is included in this. So not so time consuming as it sounds to be. With a touchless wash it`s also a big difference if you only rinse off the car or clean with the water pressure from the PW IME. Know it also depends on why you do the touchless washes. If only to get some pollen off an already clean car and doing it more than once a week. The need of the cleaning ability is not so important and you could use just a hose to do that. In the situation I do a touchless wash is instead of doing a full wash weekly. During summertime I can do this once a week and after the second or third touchless wash I only feel like I would need to be doing a touching wash. Even on a very dirty winter car many would be satisfied with the results from a touchless wash or prewash I useally do. There is just the slightly little dirt left that only a touching wash do get rid off. But for the naked eyes and takeing a step back the car looks clean. Then I also use different prewash foam for summer and winter as it`s not needed with the stronger one during the summer.

Even before I got the foamcannon I did some kind of prewash treatment depending on the amount of dirt and what time of the year it was. The foam is just an easy way to be getting the prewash on the car for me. I always use a PW when washing so that`s no extra time in take that out. The second thing is the longer dwell time you get when foaming on the prewash. In the beginning I used the same product I used to apply with the pump sprayer bottle as prewash foam. Just added a little car soap to make it foam a little extra. But most products will foam when it`s used in a foam gun or foamcannon. Just a little different of how much foam it does.

As for the traditional wash and why I use the prewash. I feel if I can get as much of dirt of the car before I touch it. The risk of getting something in the wash mitt is very much redused. And the wash it self and the aggitations needed is also minimized. The less you touch your car the less is the risk of marring and scratches even if you have a hard clearcoat or a soft clearcoat. If you have a LSP that is not so sensetive to chemicals you also get a longer longevity from it if touching it less. The extra time it takes for me to foam the prewash on is not more than 5 minutes. As I always use a PW when washing and does clean the the car the same before I wash it to take off any loose dirt. So in my situation and how I do when wash a car it`s not so much time consuming to do a prewash foam. I can note that I have never done a full waterless wash or rinseless wash LOL. 1 is cause this has not reached here with the products offerings you have. 2 if you trust the waterless wash or rinseless wash to incapsulate the dirt if not any prerinse is done that`s great. But I feel like the rinse as much of dirt off as possible is something that is well digged in my thoughts of safe washing. 3 The water restrictions has not been a problem. But the last 2 years it has been problem with the amount of water available here too. So for my situation I have don`t have the need to be looking at the waterless wash or rinseless wash. And during the winter months I can see a benefit with it. But without a prerinse on even a week old since last wash in the winter months here in Sweden it`s not even to think about touching the car with it. And if haveing access to running water I would just do the traditional wash I can do then.

So this is so much of personal preferences and how we prefer doing. The environment we live in is also very different and has it`s special need to be looking extra for how to do. While the next person have a whole other problem to take into account. Man would it be nice during the winter months to be living in Florida or California or where you don`t get frost in your beared LOL. So what works for me is not a necessary method to do for someone else. We have a lot of gravel roads around the bigger roads here. That takes this gravel with it in the tires and releases when coming on to the asphalt roads and spreads it there. This gets a mess with much of tiny sand particals trapped in the dirt that goes on the car. Since started to use the PW and prewash these sand or gravel is very redused in the rinse bucket. I rinse the mitt in the rinse bucket before put it away in the dirty mitt bucket LOL. So the amount of dirt in the rinse bucket you hardly ever seen any in there. Not even the rinse water in the bucket is dirty. And I wait to long before you would wash a car. As I have a physical disability that makes me not be doing full washes every week. So this method helps me a lot to do a wash or a touchless wash that is as gentle as possible on my body.

[Accumulator]

When conditions allow, I too drive the car for a bit to complete the drying and to knock the rust off the brake rotors.

SWETM- I too let our vehicles get pretty dirty between washes, at least by Autopian standards I agree 100% about how much the prewash/pressure washing, and IMO that "is there dirt in the Rinse Bucket" is indeed a good way to evaluate your wash technique.