For those who want to detail their own car and don’t quite know what to do, I’ll break it down for you. All in all this takes about 4 hours. This is the process I used when I worked for a detail shop here in San Diego. Every car should be fully detailed every 6 months.
Here is a list of what you will need for a good detail:
- Obviously a place to do the detail that is COMPLETELY shaded.
- A long hose
- A high pressure hose nozzle
- A REAL Chamois (sp?)
- Terry cloth towels
- Cloth nappies
- A high speed buffer (preferably NOT the orbital kind)
- Good/new buffer pads
- About 8 sponges (about the size of a 3X5 or 5X7 & not the ones with the scratchy side)
- Engine degreaser
- Car wash soap (NOT dish soap)
- Car wash glove
- Dressing (for vinyl, tyres etc)
- Wheel cleaner (optional)
- Wax (3 recommended: A Swirl Away type, a normal liquid wax and a paste wax to finish & Carnauba is good for the last 2)
- Shop Vac (one that blows air & vacuums)
- A bucket
- Carpet cleaner
- Huge sponge
- Lots of normal towels
- Window cleaner (I have found that a foam window cleaner works really well)
2 new small 1″ paintbrushes - Air freshener of your choice
- Long industrial extension cord (they are usually orange)
Ok The wash:
- Rinse the car down & pop the bonnet. Use high pressure and rinse the wheel arches and underbody thoroughly.
- Make sure the engine is cool; cover any part you do not want to get wet. For cars with a distributor, cover with a plastic grocery bag. Also cover any parts you do not want to get wet with a plastic bag.
- Spray/mist the engine, do not use high pressure, use a spray setting on the nozzle.
- Spray your engine degreaser. DO NOT get it on the paint outside the engine bay. It will eat the paint off your car. Leave on for about 10 minutes.
- Spray/mist off the engine degreaser.
- Spray Dressing on to the engine & soak well. This will give everything plastic a nice shine. I would not recommend 2001 or Armor All as they collect dirt very badly! It does not matter if you use the dressing on the engine itself as it will evaporate when the car gets warm.
- Close the bonnet & wash the car.
- Scrub the tyres & use wheel cleaner on the wheels if you wish.
- When you have finished washing, spray Dressing into the wheel arches. Leave to soak in well.
- Use Chamois to dry the car. Wring well. Top to bottom works best. Start with the roof, then the windscreen, side windows & rear window. Bonnet, boot. Sides then bumpers.
- Once the car is mostly dry, use the shop vac to blow out the water in all the cracks. Make sure you get the front upper & lower grilles, the mirrors. Just go over every crack you can see. Take the chamois with you so you can wipe up the water as you blow it out. Also remember to get the wheels where the lug nuts are.
- Once this is done, open the doors, boot and bonnet.
- Use a damp cloth to wipe all the door jambs, under the bonnet, around the boot and in the gas door. Do not use the chamois as you may get grease on it from the door hinges & that grease will get on your car the next time you wash it. The damp towel is so that any water that has dried & left a stain will not come up.
- Wipe the wheels as well.
- Once this is done, close all the doors, bonnet & boot.
- You are now finished with the wash.
Time for the interior:
- Pull out all the mats & shampoo them.
- Use the bucket with warm water & the carpet cleaner & the big sponge. Wring out the sponge well. Shampoo/scrub all the mats really well.
- After you have shampooed them, go back over them with a dry normal towel & scrub them again with the dry towel, flipping & refolding the towel frequently so that you do not scrub the dirt back into the mats.
- Lay them out in the sun to dry.
- Repeat for the carpet in the car.
- Use soap & water and a large sponge to clean any dirty panels/plastic parts. After washing, wipe with a dry towel.
- Use polish on anything you want to shine in the car as you would normally. Stay away from the pedals & steering wheel. I don’t think I need to explain why.
- Spray dressing on one of the 1″ brushes to get into the vents & hard to reach places.
- Once you have dressed everything, give it a final wipe with a dry towel.
- If you have leather seats, use leather cleaner to clean them.
- You can shampoo the roof liner, but if it is fabric I would not recommend this as the water will most likely ruin it.
DO NOT vacuum the car yet.
Time to go back to the outside of the car:
Get your buffer & a good buffer pad.
Some rules to follow when buffing with a high speed buffer:
- Do small sections at a time. About a 3′ x 3′ section is good. This is a must.
- DO NOT hold the buffer in one place for more than a second. Keep it moving all the time. Otherwise you will burn the paint off!
- DO NOT apply pressure to the buffer unless you know what you are doing. Let the weight of the buffer do the pressing.
- DO NOT run the buffer over unpainted plastic or the wiper nozzles. Also be careful around the rubber trim on the windows. It will burn the plastic!
- FOLLOW THE INSTRUCTIONS ON THE BACK OF THE BOTTLE OF WAX.
Use the buffer & swirl away/cleaner type wax & buff the whole car 1 section at a time.
- Use the 3X5 or 5X7 DAMP sponge to apply the wax to the car. Follow the directions on the back of the bottle.
- Take your time. Usually work in the same way as you dried the car, from top to bottom. Make sure you get a good amount of wax on the car as you buff. Again, follow the instructions on the back of the bottle.
- When this coat is finished, start the second coat. You will not need the buffer for this coat.
- Continue with the small sections. Work in the same order as before, top down. Avoid getting wax in the cracks of your car or on the unpainted plastic parts. Take your time!
- Remove the wax with a terry cloth towel. Change the towel often so that you are almost always using a clean surface on the towel to remove the wax.
- Now that the coat is done, its time to dress the outside of the car with a damp sponge & the dressing of your choice. Use your dressing on any plastic, vinyl, etc that you want it on, but try & be neat about it, but if you cant, its no big deal if you are sloppy with it. It will be more work later though if you are sloppy with it.
- Wipe your tyres with a separate damp sponge. Tyres are always dirty, so the sponge will turn black almost immediately.
Remember that when you spray the dressing, you are spraying the WHOLE CAR! Take great care by placing the nozzle in the sponge & spraying or holding it away from the car as low to the ground as possible without placing it on the ground itself. If you spray from any distance, the mist will end up on your car & if you don’t plan on waxing it after you’ve dressed it, you’ll have stains all over & it’ll look like crap.
- Wash your hands when you are done with the car. They will be greasy from the polish.
- Now grab your paste wax (carnauba) and start the 3rd & final coat.
- Apply with a new 3X5 or 5X7 damp sponge. Don’t use too much, but don’t use too little either.
- Work in smaller sections than the previous coats. This is the last coat so you want it to look its best.
- Allow to dry & buff with a cloth. TAKE YOUR TIME! Follow the same rules as above regarding wax on plastic, etc.
- Once this coat is complete, get a clean cloth nappy & wipe down the whole car.
- Use the other 1″ brush to get the wax out of all the cracks, emblems, around the wiper nozzles, etc. You get the picture.
- Now it is time for the windows.
- Crack all the windows that you can roll down about ½ inch to 1 inch.
- Now use 2 terry towels to clean the windows.
- Spray window cleaner onto the towel & clean the top edge of the window. Buff dry with the 2nd towel.
- When you have finished with all the edges of the windows, roll them up again.
- Clean the windows using the same process of spraying cleaner onto the window, cleaning the window and buffing dry with the 2nd terry cloth towel. Make sure you use an ammonia-free cleaner on tinted windows.
- To get all the streaks, look through the window at something dark from several angles. When you see the streaks, buff them out with the dry towel.
- Now vacuum the inside of the car. This is the last step as there are likely to be bits of fabric coming off the terry towels in the car. Also vacuum the floor mats when they are dry.
Finally, crack open your favourite beer, sit back and admire a job well done 🙂
