College student who buys and sells cars needs your help! TL DR

T

tjohnsonr10

New member
So the title pretty much says it all. Am a college student and I buy and sell used cars to pay the bills.

I buy cars at auctions and fix them up to sell. The cars are always daily drivers and range from 8-15 years old.

Mechanic work is easy for me, but I have recently become interested in investing more in the detail side of my business.

The cars I get can be pretty beat up. Tons of scratches and extremely dirty interiors. People got rid of these cars for a reason. That being said, the cars are dent free the interiors don't have big rips or anything.

So... I would love some help for the pros with a good game plan for proceeding.

Exterior

I currently have a GG DA and the Meg's Microfiber correction system. I get pretty solid results with this, but am unable to remove severe defects (not talking about deep scratches here).

I use MF washing mits and Meg's car wash soap and dry with a MF waffle towel so I am covered there. I have a speedy prep towel for contaminant removal. All the nice wheel brushes and cleaners so I am good on that.

My current plan's include;

Exterior

1) HF rotary buffer to learn with. Would like to learn with an inexpensive rotary and upgrade when I grow more confident.
2) M105/M205 combo. This seems to be the go to for serious paint correction.
3) Meg's D151. Will have this for cars that don't need a whole lot of attention, but stand to be improved with some sort of polish/wax.
4) Am going to use HF pads... they seem to be half decent and there is a store about a mile down the road so I can always replace them easily.
5) HF wool pad. I am very interesting in learning to use the rotary with the wool because it seems to be the quickest way to correct severe defects. My research suggests that although DA technology is catching up, a rotary and wool pad can correct more serious defects quicker.
6) Have some Griots 3" pads, 3" plate, and 3" wool bonnet for the hard to reach places.
7) LC Foamed wool. It seems like these are more aggressive than foam pads, but less than wool. I am interested to see what I can do with these.

I have all of these items in my Amazon shopping cart. I know all of these won't be needed/used on every job, but want to be prepared. Am waiting to hear back from you guys with any suggestions before I buy.

Interior

Right now I have Optimum Power Clean as my APC. This stuff rocks. Also have a million MF rags, applicators, adhesive removers etc... I use chemical guys interior dressing.

For carpet and floors I generally rent a Rug Doctor from Home Depot and try and do 3 cars in a day. In a full 10 hour day I can do 3 cars pretty well. I just purchased the McCulloch steamer and have started using that on my interiors as well.

My cloth/carpet method is steam, treat (I used to use Folex, but gave it up in favor of Greased Lightning), brush, extract. With a lot of elbow grease I can product some excellent results with this method.

Am planning on buying a Mytee HP-100 shortly. Am also looking at the VX 5000 as a steamer upgrade (the McCulloch is weak).

Really for interiors I would love to hear from the pros with any suggestions. I am not opposed to spending money up front on quality equipment/products if it will make my life easier.

Any suggestions on how to improve my operation would be most appreciated!

Cheers!
 
You're forgetting one of the most important parts of a used car that everyone sees and can be a make it or break it section too??????n:inspector:

Also, look into doing some basic brush touch up of the chips/deep scratches.

Also, I'd ditch the Mytee & VX5000 unless you're planning on moving a ton of vehicles. Youo can get as good (or better results) doing things manually if you know what you're doing. For the expense of these machines, it's not worth it.
 
Replace M105 with M101. I haven't personally used them, but I haven't heard a ton of love for the harbor freight pads.
 
Yea brush touch up is something I have been doing research on. Still figuring that part out, but I think it has the potential to add a lot of value.

I sold 45 cars last year so I am not worried about investing in the Mytee & VX5000 (or whatever equipment I end up getting). Especially considering I can sell them for a decent price if I ever need to.
 
You desperately need a carpet brush attachment for your DA polisher. You also should consider using the rotary and wool for cleaning cloth seats - I can't remember the name of the guy or the thread, but it is on here somewhere.

I wouldn't worry about getting perfect paint correction on 8-15 year old cars. I would likely stick with D151 unless you get one that can't be made to look nice. Most people just want to see shiny paint and a spotless interior. For car sales, I'd focus on the interior and headlights. Get the engine bay halfway clean and dressed and the paint shiny, but not swirl free.

To me, this should minimize your effort and maximize added value (and in-turn, profit).
 
I don't think steam is much of a time saver if you're already using chemicals. I'd go for the extractor instead. But like David said, you can get interiors clean manually without wasting much time.

Folex sucks. It's only good for spot pretreating certain stains, not all. Maybe consider getting professional carpet/upholstery cleaning chemicals like matrix/pro chem. I use "pros choice" carpet chemicals (or something like that) bc I can pick them up locally.

I definitely suggest picking up a big air compressor if you don't have one.
 
Here's my process when doing dealer cars (aka, get the car cleanish without wasting time)
Total time: around 3 hours. But I haven't been doing dealer cars lately, and I've been getting rid of some of my "hack" techniques

Quickly dry brush carpet and upholstery
Air purge interior, blow out vents crevices
Vacuum
Pretreat stains
Prespray engine bay, door jambs, gas door with gallon pump sprayer of apc - then agitate and rinse
Prespray wheels, tires, and wheel wells - then agitate and rinse
Rinse car, quick wash, Prespray apc on bugs and tar, use bug sponge, rinse
(Insert clay here if you're going to clay)
Dry car (with water blade if car needs polishing anyway)
Fill up bucket with foaming carpet shampoo and water
Spread shampoo over carpet and upholstery, agitate and extract with wet vac
Spray fiber rinse and back brush and blot into carpet
Clean headliner
Pre Clean nasty leather with heavy apc and brushes
Pre Clean nasty plastic panels with heavy apc
Clean/dress all plastic panels and clean leather with apc/dressing mixture
Clean all glass
Dress tires, engine and trim
(Insert headlight restoration here - damp sand, polish)
(Insert heavy compound step here if necessary)
Use all in one polish/wax on exterior via rotary or da
Clean exterior windows


Timesavers for me
-not worrying about every imperfection
-all in one via rotary and 8" foam = 30 mins
-apc/dressing mixture from renny Doyle's book
-gallon pump sprayers
-meguiars wheel brightener
 
House of Wax said:
Replace M105 with M101. I haven't personally used them, but I haven't heard a ton of love for the harbor freight pads.
Click to expand...

Did a bunch of reading on M101 vs M105 (and everything else) and ordered some. Seems be be pretty freakin awesome so am very excited about this.

Audios S6 said:
You desperately need a carpet brush attachment for your DA polisher. You also should consider using the rotary and wool for cleaning cloth seats - I can't remember the name of the guy or the thread, but it is on here somewhere.

I wouldn't worry about getting perfect paint correction on 8-15 year old cars. I would likely stick with D151 unless you get one that can't be made to look nice. Most people just want to see shiny paint and a spotless interior. For car sales, I'd focus on the interior and headlights. Get the engine bay halfway clean and dressed and the paint shiny, but not swirl free.

To me, this should minimize your effort and maximize added value (and in-turn, profit).
Click to expand...

Found the rotary and wool for seat cleaning. Do you think that is better than a nice carpet extractor? I know that even with a cheap carpet doctor rental from Home Depot I can pull A LOT of crud out of carpets and seats. I question the actual crud removal ability of the rotary and wool.

Have a carpet brush for my drill and can say it is a life saver. Have got some crub out of carpets that might not have come out by hand scrubbing.

I like your thoughts on not worrying about "perfect paint correction". I ALWAYS struggle with wasting more time than its worth to make things look top notch. Probably hurts my bottom line...

gogreen said:
I don't think steam is much of a time saver if you're already using chemicals. I'd go for the extractor instead. But like David said, you can get interiors clean manually without wasting much time.

Folex sucks. It's only good for spot pretreating certain stains, not all. Maybe consider getting professional carpet/upholstery cleaning chemicals like matrix/pro chem. I use "pros choice" carpet chemicals (or something like that) bc I can pick them up locally.

I definitely suggest picking up a big air compressor if you don't have one.
Click to expand...

I am just getting used to the steam, but I think the real value in it is to get the first round of dirt off without wasting chems. Also am seeing it is useful for hard to reach places like cracks cupholders.

Glad to hear somebody else not think Folex is all its cracked up to be! I read a lot about it and used it, but it wasn't really that great. Greased lightning as a pre-treatment for carpet extracting is proving to be pretty lethal. Can't beat the price.

gogreen said:
Here's my process when doing dealer cars (aka, get the car cleanish without wasting time)
Total time: around 3 hours. But I haven't been doing dealer cars lately, and I've been getting rid of some of my "hack" techniques

Quickly dry brush carpet and upholstery
Air purge interior, blow out vents crevices
Vacuum
Pretreat stains
Prespray engine bay, door jambs, gas door with gallon pump sprayer of apc - then agitate and rinse
Prespray wheels, tires, and wheel wells - then agitate and rinse
Rinse car, quick wash, Prespray apc on bugs and tar, use bug sponge, rinse
(Insert clay here if you're going to clay)
Dry car (with water blade if car needs polishing anyway)
Fill up bucket with foaming carpet shampoo and water
Spread shampoo over carpet and upholstery, agitate and extract with wet vac
Spray fiber rinse and back brush and blot into carpet
Clean headliner
Pre Clean nasty leather with heavy apc and brushes
Pre Clean nasty plastic panels with heavy apc
Clean/dress all plastic panels and clean leather with apc/dressing mixture
Clean all glass
Dress tires, engine and trim
(Insert headlight restoration here - damp sand, polish)
(Insert heavy compound step here if necessary)
Use all in one polish/wax on exterior via rotary or da
Clean exterior windows


Timesavers for me
-not worrying about every imperfection
-all in one via rotary and 8" foam = 30 mins
-apc/dressing mixture from renny Doyle's book
-gallon pump sprayers
-meguiars wheel brightener
Click to expand...

Thank you thank you thank you. Really like your suggetion of the 8"foam and AIO. Agreed about large sprayers saving tons of time.
 
tjohnsonr10 said:
Did a bunch of reading on M101 vs M105 (and everything else) and ordered some. Seems be be pretty freakin awesome so am very excited about this.



Found the rotary and wool for seat cleaning. Do you think that is better than a nice carpet extractor? I know that even with a cheap carpet doctor rental from Home Depot I can pull A LOT of crud out of carpets and seats. I question the actual crud removal ability of the rotary and wool.

Have a carpet brush for my drill and can say it is a life saver. Have got some crub out of carpets that might not have come out by hand scrubbing.

I like your thoughts on not worrying about "perfect paint correction". I ALWAYS struggle with wasting more time than its worth to make things look top notch. Probably hurts my bottom line...
Click to expand...

I would not say rotary and wool is necessarily better than an extractor, but it's items that you will already have. I jump between rotary/wool, steam and extractor. I try not to use the extractor because it gets water much deeper into the seats and they stay wet longer (which is problematic if returning to a customer in a couple hours). Another issue I have with the extractor is wicking; as moisture wicks back up to the surface, it can carry a deeper stain with it. This means you may find yourself going over an area several times (probably something you've already experienced). I've never torn a seat apart to find out, but my guess is that the rotary/wool will remove stains in the upper 1/4" of the seat, which is less than an extractor, but likely not to introduce wicking immediately (at least it hasn't for me in the past year that I've done it.)

Combine the rotary/wool for seats and then, for carpets: a brush attachment for your drill, a few quality fabric cleaners and a wet/dry vac, and you can tackle a lot and it won't break your back or wallet. But I wouldn't expect this to tackle every job. I would develop 3 or 4 different processes (or just extra steps within a single process) to use for light, medium, heavy and hobo levels of dirt so you can ramp up without doing unneeded steps.

For instance:
1. Air purge, dry brush, vacuum, pretreat stains, fabric cleaner (maybe encapsulator if not too dirty) with brush attachment, final vacuum
2. Add steam, heavy duty carpet spotter and extra brushing at stains prior to final vacuum
3. Add multi-step spot cleaning with various chemicals and extraction
4. Add further steam treatment of additional chemicals during spotting prior to extraction
5. Carpet dye after work complete if color loss or failure to remove stain

So if you are able to get everything clean by step 2, you just saved a bunch of time with the other steps, rather than always going to an extractor right after pretreating stains. This may not work as well for you since you are renting the extractor to use on multiple vehicles at a time, but it hopefully gives you some ideas on efficiency. This should save you time in the long run. If you're always dealing with filthy interiors, then find the most efficient process for you, maybe it is an extractor.
 
I hear you about the wicking. I have slightly more wiggle room than you though just because I keep the cars. They are generally not put up for sale for at least several days after being readied.

Just ordered a bunch of stuff on amazon. Am going to try wool/rotary seat cleaning when my pads get here.

Also...

Never thought about it until I read here and started research other places, but is compressed air really worth it?

It seems that the people who do use it are in love with it. I am gathering it is useful for blowing dirt/crud out of tight places and also drying. Am I missing anything here and is it worth it?
 
Also...

To any of you guys who do this for profit, am looking for a good engine dressing.

After reading David F's comments I am inclined to agree that it something I need to invest more in.

Did some reading and it seems like Meg's Hyper dressing is good/cheap, but I am looking for something that you can just spray on and not have to wipe much.

I ordered a bottle of Griot's engine dressing, but it seems to be relatively expensive. About 3-5$ per car depending on how much you use.
 
Todd helme did a write up on a "15 minute engine detail" where he used Sonus Motor Kote at the end and it looked great
 
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