Car Wash Horror Stories
Discussion
I've always washed my own cars, and even used to wash other people's cars from when I was 15, so was fairly used to getting the ol' jetwash and bucket out. When I got my first car I used to wash it fairly consistently throughout the year, however, on the cold winter days there were occasions whereby I would take it down to the local hand car wash. At this stage I wasn't familiar with detailing and whilst they did an average job for £5, it never matched what I used to do myself, even in my uneducated days. I have to say, however, that sitting in the car whilst someone else was washing it did give me quite a nice feeling inside haha. Can never really describe it, but I used to rather enjoy it! Fast forward a couple of years and I spent a long weekend with a DA removing the paint imperfections they no doubt contributed to. Now, none of the family cars get washed by anyone else other than me; I've started training Dad on the safe washing techniques and he is certainly getting better, but only allowed to wash his own car at this point.
One of the family cars was in for a service today, it went in with two signs attached, one facing inwards and on facing outwards saying "Please do not wash me", along with informing the service team the car is not to go anywhere near their " Valeters". We have owned this car from new and when it was delivered I requested it was handed over still covered in its protective shipping stickers and not to touch the paintwork at all. Suffice to say, after two years it is still looking flawless. Even if I do say so myself :P
One of the family cars was in for a service today, it went in with two signs attached, one facing inwards and on facing outwards saying "Please do not wash me", along with informing the service team the car is not to go anywhere near their " Valeters". We have owned this car from new and when it was delivered I requested it was handed over still covered in its protective shipping stickers and not to touch the paintwork at all. Suffice to say, after two years it is still looking flawless. Even if I do say so myself :P
I recall using one of those American Car Wash places back in about 2004. Well before I realised that I should be washing my own cars.
So in I go in my Clio 172, they give it a nice pre wash and then it goes into the machine. This had a little track for your driver side wheels to go into, you left the handbrake off and it moved your car through. It worked fairly well and I was happy with my three colour foam and brushes doing their thing. (F*cking the paint up basically).
They put the next car in behind me but rather than space the cars out, they just let the machine pull his car through about a foot behind mine. All was going well until the end where the roller for the wheels pushes the front ones clear and then there's a pause while it catches up wit the rear wheels to push your free and under the blower which was as much use as farting the car dry.
In the mean time I've watched the panic come of the drivers face in the car behind as his car keeps moving forward, edging closer and closer to my rear bumper. Trying to look down the bonnet to see how close he was getting. Then I could see him braking but the machine just kept on pushing. Fortunately before we had the worlds slowest car accident, I was able to start the car and move out of the way.
Thankfully in 2006 I bought a brand new car which I vowed to wash myself and got into detailing not long afterwards. Looking back I do cringe but ignorance is bliss it would seem.
So in I go in my Clio 172, they give it a nice pre wash and then it goes into the machine. This had a little track for your driver side wheels to go into, you left the handbrake off and it moved your car through. It worked fairly well and I was happy with my three colour foam and brushes doing their thing. (F*cking the paint up basically).
They put the next car in behind me but rather than space the cars out, they just let the machine pull his car through about a foot behind mine. All was going well until the end where the roller for the wheels pushes the front ones clear and then there's a pause while it catches up wit the rear wheels to push your free and under the blower which was as much use as farting the car dry.
In the mean time I've watched the panic come of the drivers face in the car behind as his car keeps moving forward, edging closer and closer to my rear bumper. Trying to look down the bonnet to see how close he was getting. Then I could see him braking but the machine just kept on pushing. Fortunately before we had the worlds slowest car accident, I was able to start the car and move out of the way.
Thankfully in 2006 I bought a brand new car which I vowed to wash myself and got into detailing not long afterwards. Looking back I do cringe but ignorance is bliss it would seem.
Got my Volvo 850 machine polished years ago, it was looking amazing. Mirror type black. Then it broke down and spent a couple of months in the local garage's yard. Finally got it running, went in to pick it up and they'd dropped it at my flat. Wandered home to find it washed instead of under the inch thick of dust I'd last seen it under. Even as I walked up I had the fear, washed using the broom that lies about the yard without taking the dust off first. Worse than pre-machine polish.
My neighbour got a brand new polo last year, he's been telling me how good this waterless car cleaner is he got from the local discount store, every time I leave my drive on a sunny day I see the horror that is his paintwork. Don't know whether to say or not as he's so pleased with it.
Flip side, my local wash the guys couldn't be nicer and have tackled my Jeep even straight from off-roading days when others wave me away before I even stop!
My neighbour got a brand new polo last year, he's been telling me how good this waterless car cleaner is he got from the local discount store, every time I leave my drive on a sunny day I see the horror that is his paintwork. Don't know whether to say or not as he's so pleased with it.
Flip side, my local wash the guys couldn't be nicer and have tackled my Jeep even straight from off-roading days when others wave me away before I even stop!
When I was about 5-ish I decided to give my father a surprise treat by washing his Toyota Corona (back in the '70s when owning a Toyota was still quite rare and avant-garde). I didn't ask anyone, just got on with it. I found a bucket, a sponge, and some Flash floor cleaner - the old powdery stuff, not the liquid. I got the car thoroughly clean, but left swirl marks all over it.
My father was a saint for pretending to be grateful, while gently explaining that I must NEVER do that again.
My father was a saint for pretending to be grateful, while gently explaining that I must NEVER do that again.
blueg33 said:
When my daughter was about 3, I was washing my 1 week old car, she was watching me, what I didn't realise is that she was copying me by cleaning the other side of the car. She was dipping a rough stone in a puddle and rubbing it up and down the side of the car.
Deep scratches in both doors and the rear quarter
I'm told that I did something similar to my Dad's car with a handful of gravel when I was about that age tooDeep scratches in both doors and the rear quarter
Personally I try to avoid carwashes, as when i've previously been to them with company cars, the car is still usually pretty dirty when they finish with it.
However now we've got a little'un, it's almost impossible to find a spare 3-4 hours that I used to spend properly washing the car. The wife would go mental if I did. But I'd rather spend 2 hours doing a quick job of it myself, than pay someone £10 to do it in 15 mins.
Edited by InsolentMinx on Friday 21st April 11:16
I like to clean my own cars, and hate automatic car washes, or the petrol station forecourt ones!
We took our daughter through a car wash in my girlfriends old Meriva once when she was younger as she wanted to (I wasn't too fussed as the paintwork was ruined anyway) and she hated it, screamed the place down, I had to climb into the back mid cycle, unstrap her from the car seat and cuddle her! Did the job though, she wont go through one again!
I stopped cleaning our cars when the children were born due to lack of time (so they just didnt get washed, or a quick but thorough 2 bucket wash but nothing else), but recently stocked up on kit again and did a full decontamination and hand polish of our cars over the BH weekend.
Mine came up rather well for a free car - http://www.detailingworld.co.uk/forum/showthread.p...
Hers looks good from a distance but close up it's awful, I need a DA next year I think. Still, not bad for a £250 car - http://www.detailingworld.co.uk/forum/showthread.p...
My mates Mazda5 (in the Zafira thread) came up well too, although his wheels were fun*. He paid £2.5k for it though so I'd expect it to not be too bad.
We took our daughter through a car wash in my girlfriends old Meriva once when she was younger as she wanted to (I wasn't too fussed as the paintwork was ruined anyway) and she hated it, screamed the place down, I had to climb into the back mid cycle, unstrap her from the car seat and cuddle her! Did the job though, she wont go through one again!
I stopped cleaning our cars when the children were born due to lack of time (so they just didnt get washed, or a quick but thorough 2 bucket wash but nothing else), but recently stocked up on kit again and did a full decontamination and hand polish of our cars over the BH weekend.
Mine came up rather well for a free car - http://www.detailingworld.co.uk/forum/showthread.p...
Hers looks good from a distance but close up it's awful, I need a DA next year I think. Still, not bad for a £250 car - http://www.detailingworld.co.uk/forum/showthread.p...
My mates Mazda5 (in the Zafira thread) came up well too, although his wheels were fun*. He paid £2.5k for it though so I'd expect it to not be too bad.
Trabi601 said:
InsolentMinx said:
3-4 hours
Even without kids, 3-4 hours to wash a depreciating asset.
Sod that. Life is far too short.
It's not worth any more than one that has been washed by Communists for the last decade...
It's not even a mint condition Subaru Legacy estate, but it's a car that I'm generally proud of, and don't want to be seen in something that looks like it was driven through a hedge.
3-4 hours is relatively quick for a pre-wash, snowfoam, wash, clay, polish & wax.
I'm convinced many of the tales of woe from 'rollover' type washes are made up and / or internet / pub legends.
I work in the forecourt industry, so have lots of customers with rollover washes.
Because forecourts are branded according to the fuel supplied, the oil company gets all the complaints about car washes etc.
I currently have over 60 independent customers. I maybe see one complaint about a car wash a month. And that won't be about damage, it'll be about the wash not cleaning some obscure part of the car.
If this thread were to be believed, I'd be seeing claims / complaints about written off cars every week.
Rollover washes actually create very few damage complaints as a proportion of people using them - and most complaints are about little things like snagged rear wipers or a wash caught on a spoiler (despite all the warnings about taking cars with spoilers through!)
When I had my Mk1 MX5, I'd happily take it through a rollover, despite the warnings... nothing ever got broken.
Generally they're 'fail safe', so if a sensor gives a dodgy reading, it shuts down the whole wash before it damages a car.
(and, as for the stories of nuts and bolts... has anyone ever looked at a modern rollover? - if they're nylon brushes, you'd have a job tying a knot in them as they're very thick and relatively stiff along the length, but soft at the tips... and the 'soft' washes are foam strips, so you cannot really tie anything to them anyway!)
I work in the forecourt industry, so have lots of customers with rollover washes.
Because forecourts are branded according to the fuel supplied, the oil company gets all the complaints about car washes etc.
I currently have over 60 independent customers. I maybe see one complaint about a car wash a month. And that won't be about damage, it'll be about the wash not cleaning some obscure part of the car.
If this thread were to be believed, I'd be seeing claims / complaints about written off cars every week.
Rollover washes actually create very few damage complaints as a proportion of people using them - and most complaints are about little things like snagged rear wipers or a wash caught on a spoiler (despite all the warnings about taking cars with spoilers through!)
When I had my Mk1 MX5, I'd happily take it through a rollover, despite the warnings... nothing ever got broken.
Generally they're 'fail safe', so if a sensor gives a dodgy reading, it shuts down the whole wash before it damages a car.
(and, as for the stories of nuts and bolts... has anyone ever looked at a modern rollover? - if they're nylon brushes, you'd have a job tying a knot in them as they're very thick and relatively stiff along the length, but soft at the tips... and the 'soft' washes are foam strips, so you cannot really tie anything to them anyway!)
My situation with hand car washes was that I went through one with my pride and joy at the time a six series BMW convertible. When crawling through the young guy decided to lift the wiper and managed to tear off the blade in his hand. Complained to the staff all of them saying that I have to wait until the owner gets there I parked in the entrance and closed the car wash one of them said they had been on the phone to the owner who was agreeing to pay for my wiper. Offered me a tenner told them no let's go to BMW and get new wipers fitted cost £50 approximately. Never used them again and they still wanted me to pay for the wash after all that - told them they was lucky I was not charging them for my time....
Car wash horror stories- my local car wash were doing amazing work for me , full valet including interior wet Vax shampoo for only £40 they'd even run me back to the house when I dropped a car off with them.
Horror story was when a team from the department of immigration turned up supported by several police cars and arrested half of them and sent them back home never to be seen again!
Place was never the same again, and prices went up I had to find another car wash. It was horrific!
Horror story was when a team from the department of immigration turned up supported by several police cars and arrested half of them and sent them back home never to be seen again!
Place was never the same again, and prices went up I had to find another car wash. It was horrific!
[quote=Trabi601]I'm convinced many of the tales of woe from 'rollover' type washes are made up and / or internet / pub legends.
I worked for a large diy chain who went into autocentres. Every site had a "California" conveyor car wash installed and we had every sort of issue there could be. Punched out flat screens, wipers ripping off, hub caps alleged paint damage etc.
Many were down to halfwit employees not checking cars before sending them in, but we had complaints every week, without fail and paid out, but they were real money makers but this was before the Polish hand wash sites everywhere.
I worked for a large diy chain who went into autocentres. Every site had a "California" conveyor car wash installed and we had every sort of issue there could be. Punched out flat screens, wipers ripping off, hub caps alleged paint damage etc.
Many were down to halfwit employees not checking cars before sending them in, but we had complaints every week, without fail and paid out, but they were real money makers but this was before the Polish hand wash sites everywhere.
I worked for an Audi/VW main dealer as a valeter many moons ago. Just starting out, knew almost nothing.
Had a brand new Audi RS4 Avant brought in for it's pre-delivery clean and polish before the customer picked it up. As I was new, and young, the garage wouldn't let me drive it so i had someone else put in the pressure wash bay.
Looking over it I noticed what looked like a big lump of dirt on the chrome front grills. Proceeded to pressure wash it to death.
Finished spraying it over and got back round to the grill. Now the whole chrome grill looked like dirt.
It was then i realised the grill was chipped on the transporter, and I had actually just blasted off the entire chrome coating and left it with the bare, rusty looking undercoat.
Practically presented myself with my own P45.
Far more attentive now at least. Feel sorry for the customer who had to delay the delivery of his RS4 for another week though.
Had a brand new Audi RS4 Avant brought in for it's pre-delivery clean and polish before the customer picked it up. As I was new, and young, the garage wouldn't let me drive it so i had someone else put in the pressure wash bay.
Looking over it I noticed what looked like a big lump of dirt on the chrome front grills. Proceeded to pressure wash it to death.
Finished spraying it over and got back round to the grill. Now the whole chrome grill looked like dirt.
It was then i realised the grill was chipped on the transporter, and I had actually just blasted off the entire chrome coating and left it with the bare, rusty looking undercoat.
Practically presented myself with my own P45.
Far more attentive now at least. Feel sorry for the customer who had to delay the delivery of his RS4 for another week though.
InsolentMinx said:
3-4 hours is relatively quick for a pre-wash, snowfoam, wash, clay, polish & wax.
Agreed, that's pretty efficient going for getting the clay and protection in! I'd have no problem with detailing the car and spending an entire day doing so. It's not about the value of the car it's about making it mint.
I don't blame people for using car washes but my cars get my attention, regardless of value.
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