Touchless car wash or commercial hand wash?
 

Which method is the least damaging to the paint job? I plan to drive my car in the winter which means it will need to get a wash once a week. I just don't have that kind of free time on my hands so I plan to either use the Sunoco Touchless Eco car wash (no wax) or a local detailer who offers a "hand wash" and tire care. The detailer is only charging $10 CDN :cool: but I am concerned about them scratching the finish.

Which would you use?

Both are risky, I read someplace the touchless wash used detergentt that was not friendly to the paint.

But then the hand wash guys are scary too, especially if they get a piece of crap stuck in the mit......

I might be doing mine personally in the winter. Not sure where, maybe in my driveway? Dangerous though, it freezes or one of those powerwash places, you do it with the hose.

That's my problem with washing the car in winter. My new building doesn't have a car washing station. So I would be limited to those powerwash places and then if you haven't dried the car carefully you can't get in the car the next morning cause the damn doors have frozen shut. A couple of times I had to either clamber over the stick shift or thru the rear hatch to get in.

The advantage of the detailer is that they're supposed to dry the car thouroughly so that the car doesn't freeze shut, but $10 is the same as joe schmoe who washes cars in the dowtown underground parking garages. How diligent would they be about changing dirty mits?

Car detailers are pretty scary. Walk into one and just look at their mits and chamois. Scared the living daylights out of me.

I was looking at using touchless car washes for mine. I already took through one while on holidays. I'll have to check into what kind of "stuff" they use. I'm betting it's car friendly.

If you are going to have the same guy detailing your car everytime then just buy a washmit and a chamois and leave it in your trunk. Then work out a deal with him and have him use the mit and chamois you have supplied. Then when he finishes stick them back in the trunk. Or you might be able to find a kid in the neighborhood to come over and do yours in your driveway that way he can use all your stuff you use to baby it.... plus you can keep an eye on him and make sure he knows what he is doing.

It's really too bad that there hasn't been more info in this thread... I'm trying to figure out the same thing right now. We have a touchless car wash ($7) and a place called texas-shine that has some computerized soft cloth thing (~$20). Not taking the $ into consideration, which is better for the car?

I never let anyone clean my car but me--It's just like some guys wont let anyone do their engine work but them.

Touchfree....only if there's NO roadgrime on the car. This mainly pertains to driving the car in rain, standing water, etc where you get that nasty film on the paint. If that's the case....get a few bucks in quaters and goto the car wash...do not wash it by hand, especially if it's dark or black in color. Use a nice chamois or my fav synthetic..."The Absorber" to dry the car and wipe the road film off. Just make sure you rinse and squeeze it out often...do this and you'll minimze scratches/and or swirl marks. Just my .02