When I sold my Porsche boxer, I had it detailed inside and out, top to bottom.\u00a0 I paid the detailer $450 to make the Porsche look brand new, or at leas tas new as an ’05 Boxter can look.\u00a0 With this experience and the joy I felt getting into a car all clean and shiny, I became interested in detailing cars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Like all good stories, it started with drinking to the past tense, drunk. Not the fun, TV commercial, football, spring break, clubbing, drunk. The sitting on the couch, YouTube surfing at two in the morning drunk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Watching in the middle of the night I found myself watching YouTubers clean up old cars to look brand new.\u00a0I was entranced by cars going from barn finds to concourse. After watching video after video I wanted to do detail my other cars. Then I found Chemical Guys.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Chemical Guys have a tutorial for everything. Interior, exterior, carpets, leather seats, windows, rain spots, instrument clusters, wheels, tires, etc.\u00a0 I watched about 10 of their videos and then felt confident I could detail a car.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Somehow my iPad ended up in my lap, on the Chemical Guys<\/a> website, hand crafting the perfect starter kit. It only took me an hour to figure out they had their own kits. I figured I could buy $450 in chemicals and supplies and still be money ahead. I own 4 cars. My 6th grade math skills told me that 450 x 4 is a whole lot of savings. For the price of one car I could do 4 myself. <\/p>\n\n\n\n With this drunken logic and another beer in hand, off I went to Amazon, knowing in my heart of hearts my wife would be proud of me for saving us so much money.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The regret showed up the next morning. Well, the hangover showed up the next morning. The regret showed up that afternoon, around the time my wife logged into Amazon, and found the purchases. Not my best moment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The supplies showed up. Big boxes of buckets & brushes. detail brushes, wheel brushes, carpet brushes, applicators for leather. Towels, oh the towels!\u00a0 Plush microfiber in 5 different colors and three different styles.\u00a0 Regular microfiber, fine knit microfiber for the exterior polish and big blanket sized drying towels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Don’t forget the chemicals Pre-soap wash, soap wash, wax & sealant for the exterior.\u00a0 Carpet cleaner, leather cleaner & conditioner, general purpose cleaner and three types of protection, each with their own scent.\u00a0 Supplies for tires and wheels.\u00a0 Products for rubber mats and trim. I was ready to go!<\/p>\n\n\n\n I started with the the cleanest of the bunch, mine. A nice little 2016 Mazda x5 Miata ND.\u00a0 I spent about 5 hours doing the interior\u00a0 and exterior of my silica grey convertible.\u00a0 It looked perfect! The car looked so clean, it looked ready to be on a car lot waiting to be purchased. Luckily, I enjoyed cleaning the car.\u00a0 I zoned out, filling the air with different sweet smelling chemicals and my favorite hits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I went through the other cars, my wife’s 05 Honda mini-van, our 2016 VW Passat and my daughters beat up 2005 Pontiac Grand Am. All and all about 20 hours of fun. I enjoyed it so much I detailed my mom’s Fiat 500, which hadn’t been cleaned since they bought it nearly 5 years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What’s funny is after a year I still enjoy keeping the cars up.\u00a0 I learned new techniques like rinse-less car wash, a product that lets you wash cars without a hose and water. I was able to wash my car during the winter, in my garage without a drain!<\/p>\n\n\n\n I’ve evolved since then.\u00a0 I have my techniques and the way I like to detail.\u00a0 I now use other products, edging out the entry level Chemical Guys.\u00a0 DYI Detail<\/a>‘s rinseless car wash, iron remover, decontamination cloth and ceramic gloss are fantastic.\u00a0 I washed, decontaminated, polished and ceramic coated my Miata using DYI Detailer products.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I now have an arsenal of tools. 4 pressure washing bottles. A pressure washer. A stool that rolls around for me to sit on when doing tires and a rolling rack to hold it all. A holder for my bucket on wheels. I do a single bucket method, not the two bucket method, check it out on DYI Detailers on youtube<\/a> to learn more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I don’t want to know what I’ve spent. I bet I’ve spent almost <\/em>what it would cost to pay to detail those 4 cars, inside and out.\u00a0 But there are two things I know about hobbies:<\/p>\n\n\n\n The chemical guys are sort of the entry level products, but really good. The DYI Detailers are the next up.\u00a0 Then there is expensive detailer professional but because of the price I’ve stayed away from P&S, Adams and Koch Chemie. For plain brand recognition Turtle Wax and Maguaris are also great.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.\u00a0 I love detailing cars in side and out, my next challenge:\u00a0 wash, decontaminate, polished and ceramic coated my wife’s 19 year old minivan using DYI Detailer products.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Reference Materials<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Chemical Guys, a good place to start and fantastic tutorials. It’s because of the tutorials I started by buying their stuff<\/p>\n\n\n\n https:\/\/www.chemicalguys.com<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n DYI Detail<\/strong> Really nice and ernest. I’ve loved every product I’ve tried, and the ceramics are fantastic for the home enthusist, Yvan says he’s been in the biz 40 years and I believe him before he started his own company, he popped up all over the place on you tube. Rag Company, Pan the organizer, etc.<\/p>\n\n\n\n DIY Detail<\/a> Other YouTubers I follow:<\/strong> When I sold my Porsche boxer, I had it detailed inside and out, top to bottom.\u00a0 I paid the detailer $450 to make the Porsche look brand new, or at leas tas new as an ’05 Boxter can look.\u00a0 With this experience and the joy I felt getting into a car all clean and shiny,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-71","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-essays"],"yoast_head":"\n\n
DIY Detail YouTube<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Pan the Organizer<\/a>
The Rag Company<\/a> – in my home town Boise, Idaho
Chrisfix<\/a> does detailing form time to time
Attention 2 Detail with Chelsea
<\/a>Wilson Auto Detailing<\/a>
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"