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Two Bucket Grit Guard Wash on Vacation


BRZN

Question

My wife and I had the opportunity to get away for a week to celebrate out 26th wedding anniversary. We're on Hilton Head Island, SC, 750 miles south from home. The first 275 miles of the trip down were white knuckled, dark and rain; rain from a slight drizzle to torrential down pours. We left home at 3:00am last Saturday morning to make check in at 4:00pm same day.

Needless to say, the car was a mess by the time we arrived, plus nasty thunderstorms Tuesday night, the Magnum needed a good bath.

I recalled there was a small car wash within a couple/few miles of our condo; my wife's a late morning riser, while I'm an early morning riser. Thursday early morning I'd planned to take care of the vehicle. When I loaded the car for the trip I'd put two grit guard buckets in as well as my Travel Bag. One bucket was full of towels and applicators, one was full of wash pads and a pot of Americana, and the Travel Bag held all the product I was going to need.

 

Monday evening, on our way to dinner, I checked out the car wash, yep, still there, three bays, change machine, everything appeared in working order. I was all set.

Thursday morning I'm up at 5:00, figure I'll plan to be there at 7:00am as the sun's breaking the horizon.

 

I start to get my supplies ready

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Clear water for the rinse bucket pre-filled with warm water in the Hot Tub

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Wash mitt with two ounces Car Shampoo pre-filled same way

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Ready

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Car loaded

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and unloaded, gotta' love the gamma seal lids to keep from spilling anything on the way over, and to help keep my stuff off the ground.

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In each of the three bays there were four lights, one in each corner. One bay the lights were out, in another only two were on, and in the third three of the four were lit. At 7:00am it's still pretty dark, so I pulled into the bay with the best lighting. Just as I pulled in, the lights that were obviously on a timer, all went out! Great. Oh well, it was 7:00 the dark wasn't going to last much longer. On I continued.

 

Before I finished getting all set up I saturated the front end of the car with Waterless Wash to help soften and lift all the dead bugs from the, previously applied, Quick Sealant on the bumper and leading edges of the fenders.

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Out to the Change machine for a handful of quarters

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Notice the little red light, out, in the upper right corner? It states, "out of order when lit". Well, I guess that'd be so if there was power to the stupid thing. Off on foot to the nearest convenience store to ask/beg for change. The neighborhood looked pretty good, lots of traffic, with high end cars-I left all my supplies sitting right where I'd unloaded them. Whew, still there when I returned.

I rotated the knob on the control panel to High Pressure Rinse, lined all my quarters up for quick and easy access, had the required $1.25's worth in my hand to start the water flow, dropped in my first quarter...

Jambed!

By this time the sun was up, over to the next bay. Moved all my supplies over, moved the car. Let's try this again.

Bingo, this one works

Nice rinse with the high pressure wand

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I used the high pressure water from the wand to build up an awesome mount of suds in the wash bucket

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I had three wash mitts/pads along. One was used for the top of the car down to the side beltline, one from the beltline down to the rockers/side skirts, and the last one for the wheels(read hubcaps in this case)/tires and exhaust tip.

The entire car was washed

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Then another handful of quarters into the machine and rinsed off

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I started the rinse with the High Pressure Rinse, then finished with the Spot Free Low Pressure Rinse. The water is terribly hard down here and I didn't really want to replace dirt and bugs with water spots.

 

After the rinse I pulled the car out of the bay and proceeded to dry her off with two Great White Drying towels using Detail Spray as a drying agent.

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With the Waterless Wash and a few Utility towels I cleaned/dried all the door jambs

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Nice!

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At this point it was 9:00, the cell phone rings, it's my wife, she's up. "Where are you?" she asks, I said just finished, I'll be back in ten minutes.

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Cleanest vehicle in the lot!

Edited by BRZN
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You have to pick your battles Fred. She learned early on in the relationship there are some things it's just better to accept from me than fight over. I too have found those battles in her best not to fight over.

Seems to have worked, 26 years and still going strong!

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Excellent job Dave and happy anniversary to you and the wife!

 

Sounds eerily similar to us, last week, I went to Cary, NC last weekend with the wife, then a couple days spent on the Crystal Coast of the Outer Banks early this week, and took your approach but modified it.

 

I packed one bucket with a grit guard, a bottle of Rinseless, a bottle of diluted Rinseless (pre-soak), and 10 all purpose microfiber towels and a bottle of Glass Cleaner.

 

Did the high pressure soap (to loosen grime) and rinse at the self wash, then with 2 gallons of distilled water in my bucket and 2 oz. of Rinseless I went to town in the wash bay with a GDWM Rinseless wash on the pre-soaked wife's car.  Saved 2 towels for the wheels/tires and did them last.  Worked great, and I only used half my normal supplies!  Note that in normal circumstances I'd probably only have pre-rinsed the car because of the storms, but since her car hadn't been washed in almost a month I figure a little soap would only help to break up the grime more.

 

You're right, gotta love those lids man, they are a life saver!

Edited by Ricky Bobby
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Jason, I'd given the Rinseless Wash method thought. However, after 750 miles, and past experience, I knew the vehicle was going to be past the safe use of Rinseless wash, and brought my two bucket wash supplies. I'd just polished the entire vehicle over the Labor Day weekend early last month and didn't want to take the chance of inducing any new swirls or washing marks/scratches since it's 105,000 mile finish was darn near perfect.

If we get no rain on the way home tomorrow and the temperatures stay low to minimize bugs, I may try to Rinseless wash it Sunday after we return.

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No worries man I would probably feel the same!  Always nice to have some time to detail on vacation though, my wife thinks I'm crazy!

 

"Why are you washing the car on vacation we just have to turn around and drive home anyway"

 

"Hunny I like to have a clean car whether its on a road trip or at home, who wants to be the dirtiest car at the rest stop?  Not me!"

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