New car winter prep - what to do?

[Accumulator]

If I bought a new car I would..[lots of stuff]...

OK for a new-to-[new owner] car, but most of that shouldn't be necessary on a showroom-new vehicle like camhabib was getting

IMO any showroom-new vehicle oughta get by with just a decontamination and LSPing/coating, otherwise I'd refuse delivery and get one that doesn't have issues.

 

[4u2nvinmtl]

OK for a new-to-[new owner] car, but most of that shouldn't be necessary on a showroom-new vehicle like camhabib was getting

IMO any showroom-new vehicle oughta get by with just a decontamination and LSPing/coating, otherwise I'd refuse delivery and get one that doesn't have issues.

I guess it depends on the dealership, and area/region...

In my region, I'd expect all the dealership cars to have some minor swirls and RIDS because of the way the bulk of cars are stored (off a highway or train tracks in a huge snowy lot with guard dogs).

The only cars I notice that aren't stored that way are the Lamborghini's and Ferrari's.

 

[Accumulator]

4u2nvinmtl- I sure agree about dealership cars being marred up quite often! Guess I forgot that people don't insist on getting an undamaged one the way I always do (not that I've bought a new vehicle since forever!). Heh heh, and here *I* am the guy who once posted that "I can count on one hand the unmarred vehicles I've seen in showrooms over the last 40 years".

But there shouldn't be any need to clean up the engine compartment/etc. (guess that's what I was thinking about when I posted) and I really would refuse anything that needed wetsanding. But then I've refused new vehicles over really minor stuff...I'm, uhm....well.... me

 

[4u2nvinmtl]

4u2nvinmtl- I sure agree about dealership cars being marred up quite often! Guess I forgot that people don't insist on getting an undamaged one the way I always do (not that I've bought a new vehicle since forever!). Heh heh, and here *I* am the guy who once posted that "I can count on one hand the unmarred vehicles I've seen in showrooms over the last 40 years".

But there shouldn't be any need to clean up the engine compartment/etc. (guess that's what I was thinking about when I posted) and I really would refuse anything that needed wetsanding. But then I've refused new vehicles over really minor stuff...I'm, uhm....well.... me

My Jeep STR8 came all marked up with blue (maybe a grease pen) under the hood. I think it was there to see if I remove any of the bolts to modify my SRT. Even my coolant had a blue line painted to indicate the level of coolant when I took ownership. All and all under the hook was fairly clean, and it can definitely be skipped but that's the first place I want to get familiar with on my new cars.

I also had to remove the dealership emblem on the rear (refused to do it for me) - this is fairly typical.

As for the wet sanding that's because the rear hatch was replaced and painted by a body shop painted due to a hit and run accident last year. Regardless Jeeps in general come with terrible Orange Peel (worse than just about every other manufacturer I compared my paint to). The body shop told me they couldn't match the hatch with the other panels in terms of flatness (lack of Orange Peel) but they offered to make the clear a little thicker so I could level the paint by wet sanding. Note: they offered to wet sand it to but the guy was honest and said they couldn't do it as well as I did because of the amount of time involved in achieving a matching finish (I rather honesty over incompetence).

So yeah I totally agree new cars shouldn't need an engine bay detail unless you want to coat the plastics for easy clean up the next time. I also will never accept a car with this amount of Orange Peel again (almost as bad as a sloppy body shop).

 

[Accumulator]

4u2nvinmtl- Heh heh, just to show how people differ, I try to *maintain* the OE grease pencil marks, even doing so on bare metal items that I end up painting!

And I hear you on orangepeel, it's simply *AWFUL* on our A8/S8 Audis despite their fancy robotic-painting factory. But, well...you know how you and I differ on the whole wetsanding topic ^_^

Thanks for explaining about the hit & run/etc. and that's good how the bodyshop did the extra clear so you could level it to your satisfaction. I sure agree with DIYing that rather then letting them do it.

That's really [crappy] about the dealer refusing to remove their emblem! This is another one of those threads that make me truly appreciate the dealerships I do business with, and it reminds me of the kind of stuff that makes me *not* do business with some other dealerships.

You ever gonna do anything major on the roof, like wetsanding that panel too? If you can keep avoiding the "stuff from the trees/critters" now I bet you're thinking about it