So now I have a Black Car with a Fresh Paint Job..

How to wash it ? How to dry it ?

I have heard never use a sponge.

Hi Tom,

You painted the Monte? Must look nice.

What I do is use a new wash mit / shamois for the body and a seperate mit / shamois for the wheels & tires. I always clean /dry the wheels tires last also. I guess the idea is to keep the armor all (silicon) off of the paint.

I always use a soft soap such as a mild dish soap.

As for the sponge thing I guess cause they are from the rock family they say they can scratch. Not sure though.

You are right....NEVER use a sponge. The grains of dirt hide in the pores of the sponge and work like sand paper on the paint.

I just use a terry towel and lots of SUDSY water on mine (it's black, too) And if you don't drive in the rain you should not have to wash the car hardly at all. I have only washed mine twice all summer, I have mostly just used the California Duster and Meguire's Quick Detail and some micro fiber towels.

If you do get bugs or the like on it you can use plain old Windex, works great.

Now get ready for the next statement...,
YOU WILL NEVER KEEP IT CLEAN!!!!!!!!


LOL!!!!!!
It seems like as soon as I get done cleaning the BLACK car from hell some little spec of dust lands on it...Damn the luck...but it sure looks PRETTY when it is clean..

Take care and have fun

Mike

Thanks Guys..

I have a wash mit, just bought it. Terry towels too.

Hey Chris,

no paint on the Monte yet, but here is the link to my most recent project..a '72 Skylark.

http://www.chevelles.com/forum/ultimatebb.php/topic/2/25691.html

Meguiars says to use only US made (has to do with the grade of cotton) 100% cotton terry cloth towels to dry a nice paint job. Makes sense the same would apply for washing it. Their reason being the dirt has a place to escape up between the tufts rather than being continually dragged across the paint.

Black paint secret: Corn starch powder + plain tap water = no more spider web. Use soap only when you have to.

I would also recommend using soap...a car washing soap simply for it's lubricant properties. Washing dirt off a car using friction(cloth or mit) is going to "scratch" the finish to a certain extent, so the soap introduces a small amount of lubricant to help lessen the scratching.

Whatever you do, do NOT use dishwashing soap. It isn't soft. It strips the wax off. If you don't want wax on your car, go ahead and use it.

100% cotton is exactly correct with a capful of car wash soap for every 1 gallon of water. the only time dishsoap should be used is before you put a new wax on the car (dishsoap removes wax from paint which is great if your putting a new layer on when finished)lemon type soaps work great for stripping waxes. my 2 cents

Don't use dish soap at all, it's not good for the paint. The grease disolvers can actually dry out the paint. When I say dry out I don't mean water, they suck the life out of the paint.
Check out the California water blade. For soft silicon type squeege. Really makes drying the car quick and easy. That's the worst thing about black, trying to get it dry before it water spots.

The only thing negative about the water blade is if you are not careful it will scratch your paint. I reccomend using the absorber, it is like a chamois only better and works really really well. I use to work at a bodyshop and part of my job was washing cars before the owners picked them up and I've had lots of practice of trying different techniques on washing and drying cars and can definately say the absorber works great. As for which soap to use at the bodyshop I have no idea what brand soap we used but it was in a white barell and green, I use Mothers california gold car wash on my cars and it does a great job of cleaning the dirt and grime off and leaves no water spots, after that I use the absorber to dry and the final result is a clean shiny car with no streaks or water spots. Just my opinion from my experiences.

On my black 68 SS I have found that in order to get the best results you need to use a good quality cotton towel to dry the car off. Use only towels made in the US, other towels even if they are cotton are sew together with a fiber that will scratch the paint.

Make sure you have a couple of towels to work with, a towel once it gets a little damp will leave water marks..on black that is!

Last thing, make sure you wash and dry the car in the shade!

Good luck.

On my black 68 SS I have found that in order to get the best results you need to use a good quality cotton towel to dry the car off. Use only towels made in the US, other towels even if they are cotton are sew together with a fiber that will scratch the paint.

Make sure you have a couple of towels to work with, a towel once it gets a little damp will leave water marks..on black that is!

Last thing, make sure you wash and dry the car in the shade!

Good luck.

Tom..If your married be prepared for the wife bitchin about using "MY GOOD TOWELS"

I suppose you can scratch the car with the water blade, I haven't had a problem yet. I do use an absorber as well. We have well water so if any water starts to dry on the car, you have spots. Re-washing the car won't even remove them. So for me getting it dry as quickly as possible is important and the water blade helps a lot.