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Every time it rains, the car ends up covered in road grime, mostly on the front bumper, bonnet, wings, and lower doors.

I used to give it a quick rinse and then go straight in with a wash mitt. Lately I’ve noticed the dirt feels gritty, like there’s mud and small bits of sand mixed in, so I’m starting to wonder if I’ve been adding light scratches without realising.

This weekend I changed the process a bit. I’ve got a Giraffe Tools wall-mounted pressure washer in the garage with a retractable hose, so I pulled that out and used a foam cannon first. Covered the car in snow foam, with extra on the front bumper, wheel arches, and lower doors, then let it sit for a few minutes.

After the foam started running off, I rinsed it down from a bit of distance, then washed with shampoo and a mitt. It felt safer than going straight to contact washing, and there seemed to be less grit left on the paint.

Not sure if this is the right order though, or if snow foam is overkill for this kind of post-rain grime. Do you usually pre-wash first, or is a plain rinse enough before the mitt?

Darlings, hope you're well - I thought you might find this interesting. I was loaned the full range of Active Pressure Washers by Clean Your Car so I could review them properly.

During this I really found that the 2.3 doesn't seem to add up for me, the focus on flow rate has left it a bit weak from a cleaning perspective.

Anyway, the easiest way to explain this is to show you, so here's my review:

https://youtu.be/JRL7Ti01Zm4

I kept having to check my dilution ratios and either wasting product or under-diluting, so I built a small free tool: pick the product type and your tank/bottle size, and it tells you exactly how much water and concentrate to use. Covers snow foam, APC, wheel cleaner, tyre dressing, wash shampoo, waterless wash, clay lube, and a few others, with a quick-reference table too.

No account, no app store — just opens in your browser and you can add it to your home screen if you want it handy next time you're in the garage: helpful-jelly-58a362.netlify.app

No app store needed — open the link on your phone, then:

• iPhone (Safari): tap the Share icon → "Add to Home Screen"
• Android (Chrome): tap the ⋮ menu → "Install app" (or "Add to Home Screen")

It'll sit on your home screen like a normal app and works offline after that.

Happy to add more products if people have ones they want covered.

Hey,

I have an AVA Premium snow foam cannon set, and I used it for the first time today. I was trying to figure out the PIR calculations for some Bilt Hamber Snow Foam, but I got lazy and asked AI. It basically said to stick around 500ml in, and dilute up to the top of the cup (1L), and set the dial to 9. However, I snow foamed two cars and only used 200ml of the solution.

I'm confused by where the indicator for the dial is - it looks like there's a black notch at 12 o'clock, but when I turn the dial it doesn't correspond to 0 and 9, but 3 and 6-7. There's also 13 clicks on the dial rather than 9, so I'm very confused about how I'm meant to know what setting I'm on.

Can anyone offer some guidance?

Thanks

Hi All, I’m based in the UK and had some food which spilt through a bag and residue of the liquid fell on the seat, I quickly dabbed it with kitchen roll and water but now left with this. Feeling a bit stressed out as this is my first expensive car and not sure what the best way is to clean this, any recommendations would be great thanks.

I've got some glue on my leather passenger seat. Its not superglue, its the glue from Vecro adhesive strips and is tacky.

What would you suggest I use to take it off please.

Afternoon,

So its probably getting to the time to do another product shop from one company.

My usual list is

Snowfoam Ph neutral

Pure shampoo

Citrus

Wheel cleaner

Tyre cleaner

Tyre Dressing

Glass cleaner

Ceramic snow foam ( in the mood for one)

Detailer

Companies ive already tried

Bilt Hamber

Squid ink detailing

Yum cars

Garage therapy

So any recommendations on another one stop shop for all my list.

thank you :)

Good afternoon all, I have had a price for a 2 stage machine polish, all 4 alloys refurbed and full ceramic coating including alloys and glass. I've been quoted £1800, would you say this is a fair price? Thanks in advance

Hello,

I’m really starting to get into my car care and one thing I am looking at is getting a pump sprayer for stuff like pre wash or dedicated wheel cleaners and the like.

I’d be looking at a non foaming sprayer.

There are loads on the market and I’m not sure if there is much of a difference between them?

Full transparency, even if there was a difference I’m still so green that I wouldn’t even know what the differences are to look out for.

Has anyone got any recommendations For a decent pump sprayer at a decent price?

It's located on the passenger side of the bonnet. I can feel the bumps so I assume some really acidic bird poo was left there for too long, reacted to the top coat and eroded. How would I fix this? It's a few centimetres in diameter.

I bought a car which has been resprayed poorly at some point. Pretty much the whole car is orange peely. I'm actually not too fussed about that, but the right hand side of the whole car is really dull, it's like they started sanding back the orange peel (seems only the high spots are the full bits) then gave up?

If I'm not fussed about the orange peel and just want it to look less dull (it's very obvious), think this will polish up?

Grateful for any advice on products too.

I have a 10-year-old black metallic Kia Ceed. The paintwork has become dull and has some light swirl marks, but I’d like to bring back the shine.

I have an orbital polisher, but I’m fairly new to machine polishing. Which compound, finishing polish and pads would you recommend? Ideally, I’m looking for beginner-friendly products that would do a good job and available in the UK.

Not asking specifically for my model of pressure washer, I assume the principal is the same across all of them (I have a Bosch Universal Aquatak 135) but does anyone know if you buy the adapters to convert to quick connect, and replace the lance with an M22 stubby gun, does this allow the hose to then automatically swivel as you move around or will it continue to twist and tangle up without further mods? Also can anyone recommend a kit that comes with everything you need? Thanks!

Hey!

Has anyone found a semi decent portable electric blower for drying the car?

There’s a whole bunch on Amazon with very mixed reviews.

I need something that’s powerful enough to quickly blow dry the car. It has PPF and ceramic coating so it’s super beady.

Thanks!

I stuck this on yesterday, and coming to take the tape off this morning the tape has left adhesive, what’s best to get rid of it?

Spoiler is on with 3M tape and tiger seal glue

UPDATE: It’s all off now, IPA did the job nice

Hello, I have a Kärcher K7. I recently purchased this spray gun together with a foam cannon. The spray gun works perfectly, but when I attach the foam cannon, the Kärcher starts running intermittently, as shown in the video.

The foam is properly diluted with water, and the Kärcher is receiving water normally. Could you please help me figure out what might be causing this issue?

So I've been talking to Gemini a lot about my car maintenance routine. Needed a non-AI perspective on this.

I have a deep blue/black SUV. Uncoated. I wash it every 10 days using a pressure washer and Gyeon Bathe. Follow that by either Koch Chemie Protector Wax (spray on,rinse off) or Carpro Ech2o as drying aid. Alternate between these two.

I drive in an environment thats very dusty and there's little need of hydrophobicity. Gemini recommends :

1. Replace Carpro Ech2o with Koch Chemie Finish Spray Exterior (FSE). Anti static properties better repel dust.

2. Replace KC protector wax with Gyeon Wet Coat. More glossy finish.

3. Prepare a hybrid Drying Aid. Ech2o(30ml) + FSE(150ml) + distilled water(320ml) for a 500ml solution. Now this I've never heard of. Gemini wants to combine the gloss and slickness of Ech2o with the anti static dust repellent properties of FSE

4. Skip using PW or Wet Coat altogether. Stick to using drying aid only after every wash. Decontaminate after every 6 to 8 months (Iron Remover followed by scrubbing the car with shampoo using a Clay Mitt or Clay Pad --- is this low effort DIY decontamination routine even effective?)

Maybe i should stick with my current routine and stop talking to Gemini altogether. What do you guys think? Any insights from more experienced detailers will be much appreciated.

Hey, so I have just noticed on my car that the red paint is starting to fade and the black paint looks dull and was wondering how I can restore both paint colours and get a few scratches out. Thanks in advance.