AirForceGeorge

I've had my GT for about 3 weeks now. Now I love my car but I simply don't have the time to baby it right now. My wife is pregnant and has very rough pregnancies. She throws up all day every day about a dozen times a day. That leaves me to take care of the house, my daughter, and go deal with a high tempo phase at work right now. Needless to say as much as I want to spend time washing and waxing my car I just can't right now. Also, while I take care of my car, I'm one who tends to not want to fret about it to the point where it takes away from my enjoyment of it. In other words, I don't mind getting a french fry dropped in an impossible to reach place once in awhile or, say, getting a shoe scuff now and again on the door panel. The second day I owned it I had the top down and was transporting half a dozen pieces of 12" moulding in it with the top down.

I've washed it 3 times since I've had it. Twice at a touchless and once at a regular one. Now I know there's a conensus that the regular car washes are a no-no. To my horror I noticed a few swirl marks when I put her away in the garage until the mirrors finished getting painted. 3 weeks old!

Should I stick to the touchless or does it make no difference? Because if it doesn't I'll stick to the regular as it's closer to home. Also, although it's minor, I get some annoying seepage through the vert top on the touchless. It is pretty darn high pressure.

Does waxing generally take care of swirls? And if so for how long? I could see myself waxing once in the spring and once mid summer but not much more often. My last Mustang was a black 2000 and it had pretty bad swirls. I didn't care too much though since I bought it used with 70k miles for 8 grand. I'm a little more picky with this one.

Any advice is appreciated.

Tik_Tok

STAY AWAY FROM ANY AUTOMATIC CAR WASH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

If you have to, do the touchless, but bewarned that water is recycled and could contain something you don't want on your car.

Wax won't do it, you'll need to polish it. I recently used the Mcguires 3-step thing, it worked quite well, didn't get all the swirls out (swirls from the dealer before I ever bought the car) but it did get rid of a lot of them.

Obviously you don't have a whole lot of time on your hands, so maybe if you have the money, take it to a detailer and let the pro's do their work. Otherwise join a detailing forum (or read up on the one here) and take the time do do it yourself.

hottymustang

There was a thread similar to this a little while ago....here it is....hope this helps a bit.

Carwash

BLACK06GT4ME

Car washes are for regular cars, you own a new Mustang GT. More is expected of you because of this, you have ascended to a higher plane of existence. The Meguiars 3 step will probably get rid of most of the swirls but since you have work, house, daughter and pregnant wife, I'd opt for the professional detailer to get you back to square one. If not, then get use to the swirls cause they will be with you for a long time. It takes alot of money, time and effort to keep something looking beautiful ....... that's what mose wives say, right.

AirForceGeorge

Thanks for the link. Not much came up on a thread search. The swirls are barely there now. I have on 05 Durango in red and that has swirls. What I see on my car is the begiinings of a prob I wanna nip in the bud. I think I'll do touchless once a week and find tim once every 2 weeks to do it myself.

VaporDude

I guess the touchless isn't so touchless after all. I don't go near any car wash instead I go to one of those that uses a high pressure hose and it does a great job. So far I have no swirls on mine. It may take a few more minutes but you prevent the swirls.

6xStang

I have used 3m "fill n' Glaze" and also the meguiars's #7 seal n' glaze (or something like that) to take care of swirl marks.

of course now I only buy light color cars (I have had my LAST black car), so swirl marks are much less of a problem.....

nospeedlimit143

glazes are kind of like 'makeup' for your car's finish. its not a permanent fix for swirl marks, but does hide them well. the downside is that it doesn't last very long. first time it rains, its pretty much gone. nothing better than getting up early on a saturday morning and washing and glazing the car for a day of cruising in the sun. back when i ran show cars, i'd swear by 3M's imperial hand glaze.