Waterless Wash Use it on a really dirty car

Would you use a waterless wash in New England winters?

  • Total voters
    19
C

ccarney

New member
I drive on New England roads and get salt and sand all over my car. I prefer using the two bucket method, but its sometimes too cold. I have used ONR with warm water in the garage before and that works pretty well. I have a bottle of Eco-Smart and it doesn't seems to do the job, dirt is left on the car and it doesn't "flash" in the cold. Would you guys use a waterless wash on your car for these conditions?
 
Living in Northern Minnesota I tried waterless wash on a dirty car and it doesn't work very well. I tries DP waterless and BlackFire and neither work very well and left streaks. Last winter I did it different. I talk my car either a self service on warmer days (closer to freezing) and just drive it home and finish with the waterless then dry. I don't dry it at the car wash because there is still a film of road grime to remove. On the colder days (5F to about 20F) I take it to an automatic touchless wash and get the undercarraige wash with the dry cycle and take it home and finish With touchless or quick detail to get the film of road grime off. This time of the year I only wash the car once every 2 weeks and when we hit sub zero I usually don't bother with washing it until it gets above zero. I like to get the undercarraige wash about every second to third wash or about 4 times through the long winter. Hope this helps you out.

Also to mention I do have a garage to work in so I can warm it up to work on it. If you don't have a garage to work in you might want to try a self ser e carwash that is open 24 hours and just bring your stuff there and work in the stall. I live in a small town and they are not open 24 hours. As long as no one is waiting I have dried my car in the stall.
 
Regulars here can guess how I voted!

The only time I use a rinseless (let alone something waterless, which I don't believe I've ever tried) is after doing at least a thorough first-step wash with the BHB/foamgun combo.

IME, which apparently differs from that of some other Autopians, it's just *SO* easy to mar paint with nonconventional washes, even quite hard paint.

Yeah, I have a heated garage. But then I even ran heaters in the garages I rented/leased as a kid; having a heated garage has always been a priority for me.
 
I always pressure wash it off at the coin-opp first when they are real dirty before doing rinse-less or waterless.
 
RaskyR1 said:
I always pressure wash it off at the coin-opp first when they are real dirty before doing rinse-less or waterless.
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I agree. My main concern is to get the salt.ice chunks off. Clean wheel wells and under-carriage. Once you get rid of these and spray vehicle down, there is less work.
Welcome to Northern Winter. Please no southern warm weather jokes !!!
 
I always did after hitting coin op/touchless first to get heavy stuff off

Don;t have to worry bout that no more
 
Coin-Op pre-rinse works great. I just see waterless washes as "marketing hype" that in reality will put swirl marks in paint. Some area details are advertising waterless washes and multiple manufactures swear by their product. Then again every car wash tunnel claims it's a scratch less wash too... I just cant get on the bandwagon.
 
ccarney said:
Coin-Op pre-rinse works great. I just see waterless washes as "marketing hype" that in reality will put swirl marks in paint. Some area details are advertising waterless washes and multiple manufactures swear by their product. Then again every car wash tunnel claims it's a scratch less wash too... I just cant get on the bandwagon.
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I used to think the same.

One winter finally tried it out on my JB BMW
not a scratch nor swirl
SOLD
 
There are so many variables at play. The condition of your car and the LSP condition/type, paint hardness, quantity of dirt, type of dirt, Waterless product used, your towels, your technique, your own tolerance for micro-marring, your access to water depending on cold or apartment living, and the environmental tradeoffs.

I don't think anyone on the forum can tell you what is best for you unless they have your car and use the products you use with your technique.

Some pros and gurus might say never use Waterless, and they'd be doing us a favor because it IS the most risky choice. Why take a risk?

With all of MY variables taken into account, no, I cannot use Waterless Wash on a really dirty car. Can you? Try it and see!
 
It really depends on how dirty the vehicle is? The more solid dirt the greater the chances are to inflict marring. People think road salt is some super hard thing to remove when in fact it's not. One of the easiest to flush from a surface.

If you have a extra dirty vehicle and are forced to do a low water wash, try pre-soaking the panel with the WW. The proceed with a rinseless or waterless workflow.
 
It must be my tolerance for marring. When I use Eco-Smart and there is visible dirt in grime that will not come off the paint, I am unwilling to buff that area. Looks like the tradition wash method stands for me.
 
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