DetailZeus

Looks safe to me BUT I've been playing around with a hybrid method where I (pressure) rinse the car off then pull into the garage for a waterless wash. I find it just a tad quicker than a normal (no hose) rinseless if I set up the pressure washer before I leave work then rinse the car down upon returning. Thought I'd mention it since it seems like you've got access to water

Of course, and that's my go-to method for the hottest days of summer and the *just above* freezing days of winter: Wheels with soap, rinse paint, garage, gdwm with 1:16 presoak, done. But I've got a whole gallon of New Blue and I feel guilty just using it wheels!

I know what you're thinking: this guy's nuts! But bear with me... My foam gun finally gave out (it's not an Adams, it's an old busted up gilmore...I plan on replacing it with the Adam's on my next order...) I used to foam the entire car for lubrication and to prevent water spots before 2 bucket washing. Any reason I couldn't spray some diluted rinseless 1:16 for the same purpose? Will it play nice with Adam's soap? Just to be clear, my procedure would be this: Rinse, spray entire car with 1:16 rinseless, 2 bucket wash with Adams soap, rinse, dry. Thanks! -DZ

Ricky's posts have been a fantastic resource for honing my rinseless technique over the past few years. One of my favorite tricks was using a garden sprayer with a strong dilution of rinseless and soaking the panel until it is dripping. You'll be surprised at what will just slide off your paint.

Depends on how involved you want to get. I've done a car where I finished up the paint, poured the remaining solution into my dedicated wheel bucket, and topped up the bucket with another gallon of mix. I then sprayed down the wheel and well with my garden sprayer, went to town with my usual wheel tools, and dried with my dedicated wheel microfiber. Lots of work, but I was pleasantly surprised how they turned out considering I had no access to a hose at the time. Realistically I would just add a couple of (clean!) dedicated wheel microfibers to your rinseless bucket (if doing the one bucket Garry Dean method) and wipe down the wheel faces at the end. Any more effort than that and it's worth getting out the hose and soap IMO.

Thanks Ricky My old foam gun is on its last leg and I was thinking about picking up a pressure washer this spring instead. If it's not freezing outside I prefer just to bring out the hose because I do wheels with soap and water anyways. If the hose isn't an option I presoak with the garden sprayer. I ALWAYS try to presoak with something when doing a rinseless, whether that be a hose, garden sprayer, or even saturate the panel with qd strength rinseless. I'm trying to consolidate all my products and techniques; I've just got way too much stuff. I'm finding between a Liquid Paint Sealant base and regular touch ups with h2o g&g, the paint rarely reaches the point where I wouldn't be comfortable doing a rinseless wash, especially with a hose down first.

What's the current consensus on foaming as a first step before rinsing? I've tried it with adam's red soap (foam, dwell, rinse, then rinseless wash) and didn't really see an improvement over just rinsing. Is the blue stuff the same in that it works best with some agitation?

Oddly enough my rinseless washes have little to do with saving water. In the winter I like to wash inside the garage out of the cold. In the middle of summer I do the same, because our water is very hard and spots will show in an instant. 9 times out of 10 that I do a rinseless wash, I will do wheels traditionally with soap and a hose, rinse the whole car off, then pull it inside for the rinseless. I still like the GDWM and I have plenty of towels to do so. I just wanted to try something new and was pleased with the results. I will advise if you're going to use 2 buckets and a mitt for a rinseless wash, dunk the mitt in your rinse bucket more frequently than you would using soap. For example, if you normally rinse your mitt after a single panel, rinse it after a half panel instead. I do believe rinseless is made to transfer dirt onto your wash media more so than soap. Soap I feel just releases dirt from the car under agitation, and much of it sits there until it is rinsed away. Whether this is more of an attribute of the wool mitt I use with soap vs the microfiber mitt I used with rinseless, I'm not sure. But I do know I'm more comfortable blasting through a couple of panels before rinsing the mit using soap, especially if I'm spraying the panel with my foam gun while I wash.

I like to rub my wash media against the grit guard. With a mitt on my hand this is no problem, but I find it clumsy to do with towels. Also my microfiber mitts *might* be a different construction of microfiber then my towels, which lets them release dirt easier. My washing machine right now has a 2+ hour "power wash" setting. Using that plus Microfiber Revitalizer will annihilate dirt from my rinseless towels. If I move and have to start using a laundromat again I doubt i'll want to take my car wash towels there every week, and I doubt even more that I'll want to wash them by hand.

I like this. I've also been incorporating the damp microfiber drying step with my regular soap washes too, even without Guard and Gloss. I just like the control the smaller towel gives me and the damp microfiber seems to pick up water very well. I know there's another detailer who swears by this method. One trick I found for applying H2O G&G during a rinseless wash is to use the "dry method" and spray the G&G onto the damp towel instead of the car. I always land up with some overspray on a part that's already been dried when i spray the car. If I don't notice it and it starts to dry, it's hard to rub in. Spraying the towel avoids this problem.

Anyone here do a 2 bucket rinseless wash? I'm very familiar with the popular "bucket of towels" method but that method was starting to become tedious so I gave the 2-bucket a shot. My setup was 2 buckets with grit guards, 3 gallons of warm rinseless mix in the wash bucket, warm water in the rinse bucket, and 2 inexpensive microfiber mitts. I first presoaked the whole car with wash-strength rinseless out of a garden sprayer. I prefer to run through the pay and spray in these Midwest winters but a thorough soak down with the garden sprayer works surprisingly well. I'm of the school of thought that you want to remove as many contaminates before touching the paint regardless of what wash method you use. I then washed from roof down, using a short, rolling swipe with one side of the wash mitt, going back over the same area with the other side of the mitt. Then a quick agitate and squeeze out of the rinse bucket, dip in the wash bucket, and repeat. I did a couple of panels before wiping up the residual liquid with a damp microfiber towel and final buff with a waffle weave. The second mitt was used for the side skirts of the car. I thought this method worked great. Adam's Rinseless released dirt very well into the rinse bucket, and the wash mitts were grit free the couple times I inspected them. There was very minimal dirt at the bottom of my wash bucket when I was done, no more than what I see with a normal 2 bucket soap wash. I think this method lends itself to washing more panels before drying; I may try to wash the whole car next time before mopping up with the damp microfiber. After doing this, I feel your wash technique is far, far more important than the chance of "cross contamination" from using the 2 bucket method. How much dirt you can remove before touching the paint, how much pressure you're wiping with, and how far you wipe before rinsing your mitt (2 bucket) or switching to a new side of your towel (one bucket) will really determine if you are going to put in swirls. All that being said, both methods are great and anyone on the fence about trying rinseless because they like washing with 2 buckets and a mitt should give this a shot.

Oh and check this out: I was able to wash, clay, and seal my car in record time, in my garage. Start with a bucket rinseless filled with plush towels. Pre soak with qd dilution rinseless, wash panel, clay while panel is still wet using qd rinseless as lubricant. Grab a fresh towel from the bucket and do another wash pass to get rid of the residue. Spray newly wet panel with h2o gg, spread with damp towel, buff with waffle weave. I did this for six sections of my little coupe. The only downside is it used a lot of towels, but the efficiency was superb. All the towels get thrown in the washing machine anyways. Since I don't need my grit guards anymore they've made nice little stands for my drying towels.

First post! 3 towels is how I do it. Pre soak with qd dilution, wash panel with saturated plush microfiber, 2-3 hits of h2o gg right on the wet panel, spread and dry with wrung out plush microfiber, buff with waffle weave. One thing though, you have to move FAST between the drying and buffing if you're doing this in the sun or you will get streaks. I'm thinking about picking up the little waterless waffle weaves so I can dry with one hand and follow right behind it with the waffle weave in the other.