i am going to try and sand it down and repolish it!!

the lip on the wheel is stainless, so wish me lucK!

 

Wow..that blows. The new touchless wash they put in near me doesn't have those wheel guides...it's like a garage w/ two doors. You pull in the front, park you car & sit there for 5 minutes while this machine goes up, down & around your car, washing it w/ a high pressure spray.

 

most car washes have plastic rails... this one was a steel bar. i pulled on top of that button that the front tire sits in. and it kicked the wheel sideways a bit and aparently wasnt paying attention when driving out

 

during the winter, like right now, i take my car to the car wash. i dont plan on getting sick washing a car. for like 13 bucks, cleans everything outside, i just clean the interior when i get home. after every carwash, i go to some empty parking lot near by and use those microfiber towels, sprays, etc to detail everything. i dont mind people staring, since i noticed a lot of people started doing the same thing. i was planning on doing that tomorrow but it might snow from what i saw in the forecast..eh

 

There is always a risk having someone else drive your car, and having someone else wash it. Sure, if it a decent place they will take extra care, they don't want to deal with lawsuits, etc. but in general they will not clean as well as you do. And if you have a nice polish or wax finish built up underneath all that dirt, you might have to kiss it good bye when they get done.
But if it is not practical to do otherwise, it's better than letting dirt build up your car which will only hurt the paint finish over time.

 

Sorry, I have been too busy to check this post. Anyway, see the link above to go to autopia.net and get more info. How long does it take? If the car is just normally dirty, it takes me about 20-30 minutes to completely clean the exterior. If it has huge amounts of road salt, it takes about 45 minutes. I had to do do the process twice the other morning because the salt was just CAKED on. Total time - 45 minutes, wheels and everything. Timewise, it is pretty much the same as a normal wash.

Undercarriage is pretty much impossible to do this way. Many people spray the car at the local hand-held wash when they want to get a heavily dirty car clean and then they do the QEW/ONR process at home. Personally, I don't think that an undercarriage wash does much in the winter since we drive over salt and crap right after we wash the car anyway.