So how safe is it on our paint if I take it through the auto touchless washes at petro canada gas station? I want to get the season pass (3 months/unlimited washes) and looking to wash twice a week. all the salt build-up on the road has really gotten me paranoid about rust on the undercarriage and on those chips in the paint.

the season pass gets me their top tier wash so it has under-body spray as well, which is great, but it also includes the triple foam stuff which looks like to be harsh chemicals...

 

WOW!!!! A season pass for a car wash....I wish places around me did that. (NY)
anyway, I think you'll be safe, better going to the car wash then just letting all that salt and dirt sit there for months at a time waiting for a nice day when you can do it yourself. I went to one of those do-it-yourself carwash places last week and the water was turning into slush as i was washing the car oh well, gotta keep it clean.

 

If it is touch less you will be fine

 

It should be fine. I will say though that I've never used one that did a sufficient job for my tastes. They don't cover the wheel well and they don't do a stellar job of clearing salt/debris deposits at the bottom 1/3 of the car.

When my car is filthy with winter road grime I usually go to a wash bay that has good pressure and do a thorough cleaning. A week later if my car isn't that bad I will take it through the touchless.

 

As long as it's touchless you'll be fine. As HeavyD said you should take it through one of the manual bays and rinse her off good with one of the handheld pressure washers every once in awhile though.

 

Petro Canada has a season pass? I should look into this....


Any "touchless" car wash would be fine.

 

Touchless car washes are really bad for paint, some of the chemicals they use are very unfriendly to the clear coat.

This information comes from numerous car magazines.

 

how come we cant take our cars to a regular car wash with brushes ... just wondering lol....
i have taken it to touchless and that SHlT sucks!!!

 

You must have been at a ****ty location, because few places i know that are "Touchless" are amazing, car comes out spotless.

You can take your car through the regular brushes but they scratch your clear coat, very minimal, but you'll notice overtime after you clean your car and the sun is shinning, you'll be able to tell all the swirl marks, etc.

There's a real nice video on youtube by this guy that washes high end exotic cars, and he charges like 10,000$ for a wash or something stupid. He pretty much uses a microscope lol to measure the thickness of blah blah, its a long video in huge detail.

Anyway, what im trying to get to is, he did tests and even said himself, "touchless" is probably the best from any other "drive thru wash" since it doesn't touch your paint and create swirls.

If i find the video, ill post link.

 

thats awesome , its so cold i dont even wanna wash it..evos so dirty..the way she was meant to be : P

 

Touchless car washes never leave a car coming out of it, spotless. I personally would NOT recommend taking your car through a regular car wash with brushes (any time of the year). It will definately screw up your paint. Sure, it will clean your car (better than a touchless car wash), but you're left with damages to the paint. What's happening, is that during the winter time, you'll most likely have bits of sand stuck on your car and other things. When the brushes rubs against your car, it will also cause the sand that's stuck to your car to rub along the paint in the direction where the brushes are spinning, leaving scratches on your paint. Since Evo's have very thin paint and scratches easily, you don't want that! After winter is over, you'll undoubtly wash & wax your car again and you'll notice the paint scratches/marks on your car.

If you use a completely touchless car wash during the winter, get the one that also does an underbody wash as well. After the automated process, let the hot air dryer, dry your car as good as it can and then just leave it. Do not wipe off the excess water off the paint of the car, in case the touchless car wash didn't completely remove all the residue off your car's paint. Otherwise, you'll be rubbing the leftover residue into your car's paint that could possibly still have bits & pieces of sand still stuck on your car.

 

I'm at a local car wash for 28/month for their "best" wash w/ no contract (m2m) which is usually $17/wash. i'd rather have a clean car w/ a few swirls then my usual dirty car lol

 

I noticed an unlimited pass the other day too.. how much were they charging. Im in winnipeg but i'm sure their prices are pretty comparable.

 

$149 for the superwash (local one is touchless and $189 for the glide (touchless and brush option). the glide is supposed to be better and if car's still dirty after it goes through you get to do it again i think. i'm going to get the $189 deal, simply because I have 3 cars and family can use it on theirs too.

 

My cars are always hand washed or brought through a touchless car wash. Non touchless car washes scratch the hell out of ur clear coat. I got done bringing it through a car wash with brushes and you can see how it scratched the paint In the summer time, I wash the Evo every other day, having a black car is not fun to clean