A wide variety of different products are produced for car body and interior care, adding shine and luster to both old and new cars. In movies and television shows, you can often see good-natured Americans or Europeans carefully polishing their pets until they shine like mirrors.
With the dirt on our roads, especially in the off-season, it would seem unreasonable to spend money on special shampoos and polishes to make them shine, only to get the car dirty again five minutes later. Let's try to prove that we need car cosmetics no less, and even more, than in other countries. If only because it's not just sparkling cleanliness, it's also protection from external harmful influences, of which there are plenty in our climate: large temperature fluctuations, a "salt cocktail" in winter, dust and sand that scratch paint like sandpaper in summer, and stones that leave tiny cracks in the enamel. Add to this the now-present reality of acid rain, ultraviolet radiation that burns color pigments from paintwork and leaves your car looking dull and dingy, and the poor quality of paint on domestically produced cars.
No one doubts the need for anti-corrosion treatment of the bottom and sills. If you want to keep the exterior and interior looking pristine, you can't do without car cosmetics. This is especially true for new foreign cars. The enamel on some of them is water-based, which makes the composition less harmful in production (environmental requirement). However, they are not as durable as regular synthetic ones, and therefore more vulnerable. Car treatment begins with washing. Clean water alone is unlikely to remove all ingrained dirt, oil stains, or traces of tree sap, although rinsing with water is still worth it to wash away small stones and sand that can scratch the paint. What should I clean it with? Never use washing powder, baking soda, or household cleaners, such as those used for cleaning tiles or dishes. They "eat" dirt perfectly, but at the same time they are no less active in destroying paint and, penetrating through cracks, causing corrosion of the metal. So, you should only "bathe" your pet with car shampoo and a special fine-pored sponge that traps sand particles, preventing scratches on the car's surface.
Remember, gentlemen, remember.
Car shampoos sold on the market can be roughly divided into two groups: those with low and high wax content. The first ones contain dissolved surfactants that "pull out" (extracting) dirt from the surface. The shampoo is easily washed off with water, leaving a thin layer of wax. The second type contains a solvent in its cleaning composition, and the wax and polymer content is an order of magnitude higher. Essentially, it's a shampoo and polish in one. These products are very popular in Scandinavian countries, and are especially convenient to use in late fall, winter, and early spring, when low temperatures make it difficult to apply thickened polish—you wash the car and the bodywork is already treated. However, ease of use inevitably affects the price – such shampoo is usually 2-5 times more expensive than regular shampoo.
(The article is based on website data: MAZBOOK.ru)
To prevent stains from forming due to uneven drying and to polish out the wax, it is recommended to wipe the body with a soft cloth, or preferably with artificial suede, which is sold separately in a plastic case. It will serve you for many years. After washing, you can begin processing the paintwork. If the car has not been treated for several years or never at all, then it probably makes sense to use a so-called color restorer. The fact is that as the enamel ages, the top unprotected layer of paint softens and becomes dull under the influence of the external environment. Color restorers contain a finely dispersed abrasive powder with a cleaning compound that gently removes the outer "dead" layer and at the same time slightly smooths the surface, helping to remove old stains of ingrained dirt.
If, after finally washing your car's body, you suddenly discover signs of incipient corrosion, don't despair: small stains can be easily removed with rust converters. They react with rust, leaving a film that is resistant to further corrosion, passivate the metal and, as a rule, do not require special surface preparation. Although the transformation process occurs right before your eyes, everything depends on the size of the stain and the depth of corrosion penetration. For large stains, the treatment will have to be repeated several times with short breaks. After treatment, the damaged area will need to be touched up.
Now that the body is fully prepared, you can apply polish to give the car more shine, and most importantly, to protect the body from aggressive external environments. What to polish with? The question is quite complex, as this type of car care is the most widely available. Polishes for car bodies, plastic trims and bumpers, chrome and wheel rims, clear and with a coloring effect, liquid and paste, with or without abrasives – to suit every taste and budget. There are, of course, universal polishes that add shine to painted panels, bumpers, chrome parts, glass and even tires. They are more likely to interest people who care primarily about the appearance of the car and their image. However, the protective properties of such preparations cannot be very high, since the surface properties of different materials vary greatly. For ideal protection, each material requires treatment with its own specific composition.
So, the bodywork. For new or nearly new cars, clear polishes are ideal; they're relatively inexpensive and easy to use. Some of them contain Teflon and super-slip polymers, which form very smooth surfaces after polishing, preventing dirt from sticking. If the car has been driven a lot and its paint is covered with scratches from sand and stones or improper washing, colored polishes are preferable. They are thicker and a little more difficult to apply than clear ones, but they fill well and mask small scratches and abrasions on the enamel. However, it is important to remember that polish is not paint and cannot replace it in the case of deep and wide scratches. Polishes react electrochemically with the paintwork, and it takes about a day for them to fully harden, so they are applied in a garage or outdoors in warm weather, and, of course, not in the rain.
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And more about the usefulness of cosmetics in our harsh conditions. You'll agree that dirty, foggy, and wiper-scratched windows look like an eyesore against a shiny car body. Moreover, driving with such windows is unsafe: it's difficult to see the road through them, especially at night or when driving into the sun. A thorough wash alone will not remove the countless scratches left by sand, windshield wipers, and when raising and lowering the side windows. Waxes and silicones found in regular polishes can cause clouding, so it's best to use a special glass cleaner with a polishing and protective effect. It cleans the surface well and at the same time smooths out small scratches, making the glass more transparent. But if you treat the exterior surface with a product from the "anti-rain" series, and splash an all-season cleaner into the washer reservoir, the world around you from the inside of the car will appear in a completely different light.