Trashed 206cc Cleaned For Free!

You know you're deep in the car cleaning content creation game when you get weirdly excited about finding random manky ones at the side of the road, but I know you enjoy them being featured on the channel so stick around to see me get to grips with a particularly sorry little 206cc which for the last 12 months have been left under a tree to fend for itself. So while this 15 year old pug might not have looked too dirty from a distance, once up close and personal the neglect was apparent for all to see. Having been sat under a tree for months while the campervan conversion in the background took priority, the little 60,000 mile 206 was now sporting a combination of crusty bare cack, some of which had irreversibly damaged the paintwork, heavy deciduous fallout which was definitely going to affect winter wipability, and various types of vegetation rooted to the rubber seals. And if that lot wasn't enough, the brake dust embedded wheels were also in dire need of a heavy chemical soak, but despite the challenge it posed couldn't resist getting my hands on a Frenchie with such crusty cracks, so endeavoured to at least give the old girl a pressure rinse, wheel clean and single bucket scrub. Now to do that I'd be using the same bunch of products I successfully tidied my uncle's golf up with recently, minus the auto bright ceramic snow foam which I'd substituted for some auto finesse stuff here just to see if there was anything between them, so stay tuned to see me crack the caps, prime the pumps and hopefully despair some heavy dirt. Before even thinking about wetting the car with water or wash product however, I had to get hands on with it to remove as much of the loose debris as possible, as it's one thing washing over a bit of bird poo residue, but another altogether battling with clumps of loose leaves and twigs. I then vacuumed the areas underneath to quickly and effectively remove the more ingrained mulch which despite looking a bit bizarre, found to actually be a pretty satisfying affair. Being a working convertible, the roof shuts also needed to be vacuumed out to prevent the decaying matter that had also accumulated in them providing a constant stream of bits when rinsing, and while this is okay to do, just make sure you remember to replace the bag in your machine afterwards to prevent it from sprouting shoots. While the body was obviously going to be the main concern here, the tired old multi-spoke wheels and their surrounding arches couldn't be left untouched, so were first thoroughly rinsed out and off to remove any loose dirt and brake dust. The face of the wheels were then liberally sprayed over with some super active Biltamber also wheel before being left to soak for a couple of minutes, and because I wouldn't be tending to the rears of them here, mostly because I didn't have the time, but also because they would have almost certainly been beyond a straightforward clean due to their years worth of neglect and corrosion, could afford to be extra generous with the product, which I was both on camera and off. The active formula was then quite aggressively worked in with a generic detailed brush, as pampering neglected wheels like these that haven't been properly cleaned for years will only get you a one-way ticket to frustrationville, so go hard or go home when it comes to cleaning examples like these, I say. They were then washed over by hand with a shampoo primed wheel mitt to help neutralise the previously applied active cleaner, and just because it makes sense to get hands on with wheels you've never tended to before, and once I'd spent a good minute doing that, moved on to scrubbing the tyres with a soft bristled general purpose vikon brush to ensure they were acceptably clean and ready for dressing later on. Before treating the multi spokes to a final rinse and to give them another minute or so to soak, the arches were sprayed over with some dodo juice crudzilla citrus traffic film remover and given a good going over with an easy detailed bog brush, as again they likely hadn't seen a contact clean in years if ever, so made sense to give them a scrub to prevent them from letting their side down, and only once I felt they wouldn't, thoroughly rinsed them and the freshly cleaned wheels off to leave them in a far from perfect state but still looking a damn sighting better than they did 5 minutes before. While pre-cleaning products generally work better when applied to a dry car, the surfaces of this 206cc were so manky that a straight pressure rinse was in order before chemical decontamination to remove as much of the loose dirt and debris as possible, so got to work blasting it off from top to bottom with a 25 degree nozzle, paying particular attention to the cracks, crevices, seals and anywhere else stubborn and unsightly dirt had heavily accumulated. With an initial rinse out the way I then decanted some crudzilla into a pump spray to see if my trigger fingers, despite being the fastest in the west, can still get strained, and while I did have 5 litres of the stuff on the way just in case, it hadn't yet arrived so just had to hope that what I had here would be enough. The cool damp weather meant that for a nice change I didn't have to worry about chemicals drying on the surface, so took advantage of the overcast autumn skies and let this particular one soak for a fair few minutes to soften up whatever remained following the initial pre-rinse, and while watching snow foam soak is all well and good, there's just something about seeing a transparent film of traditional pre-cleaner on the surface that you know is going to make the next pressure rinse so much more effective, and while I didn't pull the camera in close again for a repeat performance in terms of shots, can assure you it was indeed far more effective than the first thanks to the penetrative power of the citrus crudzilla. Once thoroughly pre-rinsed and pre-cleaned it was finally time to get properly hands-on with contact wash using the lightly abrasive Meguiars Wash Plus shampoo in a microfiber wash mitt, which the product was directly applied to before being thoroughly worked over the still somewhat manky surface in quite a heavy-handed fashion to ensure its micro abrasives were properly put to use, and while I'd usually be happy to let suds sit on the surface for a few minutes in these conditions, rinse them off straight away as per the instructions here, as this isn't your average shampoo and didn't want to risk potentially having to deal with stubborn streaks on top of everything else. Although this shampoo is intended to be applied to your wash mitt, I drizzled the lemon curd-like product directly onto the car in places just to ensure there was enough there to bite through what stubborn dirt remained, as less definitely isn't more when tending to seriously neglected and ingrained cars, plus I wouldn't be going on to decontaminate any further once this contact wash stage was completed, the day seemed to be flying by, so needed to ensure I got it as clean as I possibly could here. With a neglected car like this that's likely already covered in swirls, scratches and god knows what else, coddling the surfaces with a gentle swipe or two of your mitt just ain't gonna cut it. I think if you're gonna clean a dirty old car then just go for it, don't waste your time farting about trying to safeguard already abused and battered paintwork, as swirls and light scratches almost certainly won't be a concern at this point in the car's life, but if they are can always be tended to afterwards with a restorative polish if that tickles either yours or the other's fancy. After the car had been given a thorough scrub and rinsed panel by panel, I then blanketed it over with the Autofinesse lavish ceramic foam to hopefully add a nice uniform layer of slick and durable protection to every surface, and while this isn't really designed to clean like a normal snow foam, if it did happen to soften up any remaining bits of dirt in the minute or so it was on the surface, then great. So there was no dedicated soaking shots captured here as the ceramic foam is designed to be rinsed off as soon as it's been applied, so went on to do just that, keeping my fingers crossed for some obvious hints of hydrophobicity as I did. Now while the Autobrite Ceramic Magi used a few videos back seen to instantly bead water once rinsed, this lavish stuff appeared to be more of a steady sheeter which might not be as visually exciting, but was fine with me so long as there was less water on the surface than before. Ceramic snow foams like these are generally better suited for topping up protection already applied rather than being used as standalone products, however there's no denying they can be great for a quick fix on neglected cars like these, and it's not just the hydrophobic properties that appeal, but one quick blanket and rinse can also make the surface underneath feel much slicker and give it a nice crisp shine to boot. It was then obviously time to dry the car, so grabbed a large absorbent microfibre towel from Autobrite to quickly eliminate the bulk of the surface rinse water, which again thanks to the ceramic snow foam was a pretty straightforward affair, and it's at this point you really start to see and feel the fruits of your labour and breathe a bit of a sigh of relief that all that time and effort previously expended wasn't in vain. Although I didn't get a chance to properly treat the roof shuts to a dedicated clean with a soft brush and some flowing water which is what they ideally needed, did secretly pre-treat them with the crudzilla prior to closing them up at the start of the day in the hopes they'd self-clean a bit as I washed and rinsed the exterior, which they definitely had but still required a good wipe over with a general purpose towel or two to remove any remaining damp munch. The wheel faces were then towel dried to eliminate any standing rinse water and while blow drying them would have likely been easier in these damp conditions, because they hadn't been given a complete clean, thought it was best to run a towel over the surface instead to absorb any remaining light dirt and residue that may have I then finished up by quickly rejuvenating the tyres with a modern water-based ceramic dressing to bring them up to par with the fresh wheel faces, thoroughly working it in with a more retro flat tyre dressing brush before buffing over with a damp towel to knock back any excess once they'd been given a few minutes to soak and realistically that was all there was time for here as I'd spent the best part of eight hours on the car and still needed to show you how it looked overall before it got too dark and dingy so completed the tyres and called it a day. So while it hadn't been treated to the full works the little 206 CC had still likely been given one of if not the best exterior cleans of its life and certainly looked a lot better for it. The vast majority of organic dirt and greenery was now thankfully gone, its previously crusty cracks and crevices were as spic and span as they realistically could be and the faces at least of the silver wheels now looked relatively clean and presentable. Of course it would have been nice to have given it a good polish to knock back the multitude of sins on the surface but without spending two consecutive days on it which for a hey mister could-a-clean-your-car-for-youtube freebie wasn't a realistic proposition was never gonna happen but for the most part still think I'd succeeded in sorting the bulk of its dirty difficulties which led me on to finishing up with my own which included gathering my soiled goods, packing the car up off camera and heading home to thoroughly decontaminate myself. So as always thanks for watching and as the original french advert for the car once said, Shaboom Shaboom!