Winter Car Washing - Ten 'Cool' Tips

Hi there and welcome to the first Car Cleaning Guru video of 2016. Here I'll be taking advantage of the frozen January weather to go through some of my top winter washing tips that should hopefully help you keep on top of your car cleaning duties through the colder months using this late 2005 Aston Martin DB9 Volante as subject matter. Despite the sub-zero temperatures being experienced here, it has actually been one of the mildest winters on record in the UK so I was more than happy to get out there and take advantage of the temporary cold snap for the sake of a new video. To begin with, before attempting to clean a car in cold weather, I'll always fire it up, turn on the hot blowers as well as the window defrosters and let it tick over for a good few minutes while I get my equipment ready as this allows some heat to be gently breathed into the exterior of the car, providing a welcome jumpstart to the de-icing process. If possible, you should also try and park the car in direct sunlight, or at least somewhere you know it can be exposed to a few rays should the sun show itself. Although this may sound counter-intuitive, as you should ideally always wash in the shade, low-lying winter sun shouldn't be strong enough to bait cleaning chemicals onto the surface but should be warm enough to prevent water and product residue from freezing up on the cold body panels. This should run parallel to washing a car at around midday to take advantage of the sun being at its highest point even if it's hidden behind the clouds as just a single degrees increase in temperature can mean the difference between things freezing and not. Venturing out first thing, because that's what you usually do on a Sunday morning, is a surefire way to quickly encounter frustrating and potentially damaging issues in the freezing winter weather. If you're planning on washing your car in the cold weather, try and keep outside taps turned off and hose pipes disconnected to prevent them from freezing up overnight, which will help to get things moving quicker with the cleaning process instead of having to wait for them to thaw out, which I unfortunately had to do here. Probably the most obvious piece of advice when attempting to clean your car in cold conditions is to use hot water in your wash buckets, and while this may be something you already do year-round, spare a thought for us mobile guys who generally have to wash with cold water, and to whom a warm bucket of suds in the winter is a massive luxury. Aside from retaining the feeling in your fingers, the hot water will warm up the body panels slightly, delaying the freezing process for a few mandatory minutes, as well as quickly melting away any icy residue that may be present after the initial pre-rinse. And because I live life on the edge, I generally go with a bucket of piping hot water straight from the tap as it stays warmer for longer on the frozen ground outside, but you may want to top yours off with a little cold to prevent any scorching surprises. Wrapping up warm is another obvious tip, yet with car cleaning being a fairly labour-intensive process, it's not necessary to pile on the layers as this will impede your natural movement when washing. A flexible, well-insulated water-repellent jacket, perhaps some thermal-lined water-repellent trousers, waterproof shoes or boots instead of the usual trainers or flip-flops, and the obligatory colour-coded beanie will all help to conserve precious body heat during winter detailing duties. The jacket I've picked up here to see me through the winter also features some nifty little thumb loops, and while these alone are hardly going to fend off frostbite, the slightly extended coverage can provide some temporary relief for the backs of your hands when gloves can't be worn. And speaking of gloves, whether you're washing with hot water or not, hands will inevitably still get cold, and so certain types of protection can be worn to help keep them feeling toasty. These tight-fitting Sealskins UltraGrip gloves are completely waterproof and so give you the means to wash your car in the cold without losing the sensation in your fingers. I tend to reserve them for interior winter cleaning duties, however, as the rubberised grips on the palms, while practical, could easily mar the paintwork, and when dipping into buckets, washing with a mitt or wringing out towels, I find that water will always eventually make its way in around the cuff area. Definitely a product worthy of consideration, though. My poor protection of choice for winter car washing is the humble Nitrile Disposable, which permits complete dexterity while providing a bit of a barrier from the elements. Also, when dipping into wash buckets, you don't have to worry about water ingression like you do with a thicker pair of waterproof items, as a trapped layer of warm water inside these tight-fitting gloves can actually serve to keep hands warmer than when they're bone-dry. Although many people either don't own or believe pressure washers damage the paintwork, when attempting to wash a frosty or ice-covered car, there's no denying they're great for quickly cutting through this frozen material prior to washing, which a hosepipe alone would struggle to do. Also, despite how they may look and sound, pressure washers use considerably less water than hosepipes, so using one in chilly conditions ensures there's less cold water being dumped on the surface of the car, meaning if rinse water does freeze over, it will only be a very thin layer instead of the potentially thick pulls and heavy drips the use of a hosepipe could easily result in. Washing a panel at a time can help to prevent surface suds from freezing before you get a chance to rinse them off, and also means that even if the rinse water does subsequently freeze, signaling that's as far as you can go with the wash, you at least know that the car is clean, residue and contaminant-free underneath that fresh ice. The last thing you want to have to try and do is simultaneously rinse and remove suds and encapsulated dirt, as this wasn't how car shampoos are designed to work, and could easily result in dirt being left on the car. This isn't always necessary, however, and largely depends on the temperature. Here, for example, I got away with washing the entire body from top to bottom with the warm suds without them freezing before rinsing off, which was ideal considering I also had to factor in the filming. Trial and error, as well as experience with winter car cleaning in your part of the world, will give you the best idea of which route to take with the contact washing. Once you've rinsed off the car, instead of emptying buckets, rolling up hosepipes or chatting with the Joneses, go on to immediately drying it off with a plush absorbent microfibre towel to quickly pull as much water from the surface as possible before it has a chance to freeze over. Also, you really don't want to be wringing out inadequate towels in the cold weather, so use only decent quality thick drying towels which will save you and your hands some precious time. To conclude then, washing a car in cold winter weather, while not particularly pleasant, is definitely possible so long as you plan ahead and employ some common sense. You certainly shouldn't rush, as this is when mistakes are made, but you should try and get things done in a timely manner and remain mindful of the conditions, accepting that severe cold may mean that you have to either omit certain parts of the cleaning process or settle for a slightly lower standard of clean. The goal should simply be to remove the majority of winter contaminants from the various surfaces of the car, until a more thorough clean can be performed in the spring, and this is why decent protection details should ideally be undertaken prior to the arrival of any freezing winter weather, which then allows you to adequately maintain your vehicle in a basic manner throughout the winter. As always, thanks for watching, look out for more car cleaning videos coming soon, and to help warm you up after all that freezing footage, I'll leave you with the sizzling sounds of this 6.0L V12.