Most liked posts in thread: SCD Foam Cannon for the Ultimate MINI Wash...

The main reason for the tarp is to contain the water. I'm going to be adding berms to contain it further. Ultimately I want to be able to vacuum up the water so that I can wash the cars, and collect the run off for disposal instead of putting them out into the environment.

But you're right, it does get pretty slippery when wet, lol.

Richard

 

You are welcome and thank you!

There are two kinds of foamers as mentioned in the article. A foam gun, which attaches to the end of a hose like a Gilmour Gun and a foam cannon, as mentioned in the article which requires a pressure washer.

The difference in foam density is night and day. With a foam gun, the foam is runny and requires more water than a foam cannon.

The thicker foam from a cannon lets it's dwell longer on the paint such that you shoot it, and for 10 minutes or so, it works on its own. So like on my Clubman, I had dust buildup from sitting in my garage for 2 weeks while I was out of the country, and a week of being parked outside near the freeway. It took me less than 5 minutes to foam it, spent the next 20 minutes walking to lunch, came back talked to customer, looked at the Clubbie which most of the foam had run off, then I rinsed it with the pressure washer, had to do a demo, so I didn't hand dry it at all. I pulled the Clubbie outside, and began working on the customers car.

Later on I checked the paint after it air dried and it was completely clean. No dust, no dirt, no residue.

A regular hose couldn't shot out distilled water and it couldn't build up sufficient foam for this sort of cleaning ability. The big advantage of using a PW is that my water source can be controlled as well as the flow rate (to a certain degree).

On the truck example, I foam cannoned it twice, and still had to come back by hand as there was a thin layer of film left behind. Is it worth it to use the foam cannon when you still have to work by hand? It depends. In some cases, a foam cannon is all you need, and other cases, it's a fast prewash that gets rid of 80 to 90% of the most swirl inducing grit on the paint so that when you do hand wash it, your chances of scratching, swirling, or marring it is further greatly reduced.

Richard

 

Just a curious question...are you seeing the pictures in the thread? The second picture is this...

 

Aww ok, cool.

 

Today I took some measurements for your pleasure, lol.

Dipping the TDS meter probe into my 60 gallons of shop generated distilled water


Now I filled a small cup with tap water


The meter now reads 402PPM of Total Dissolved Solids! That's sure to guarantee spots on your car!

 

Yep, those work fine for a few washes and then need to replaced. The cost per wash is kind of high and there is no way to know how well it's working without a meter but they do work as advertised. The Mr. Clean soap isn't that great however. Spot free washing is the best!

 

Good to see that you got a foam cannon! What soap are you using? That makes all the difference. Also, remember the drawback of the pre-rinse. Once the paint is wet, the foam won't dwell as long, which is important to loosening and cleaning the paint. So you'll have to weigh the pros and cons of whether to pre-rinse or just foam, possibly twice.

I'm now using a product called Poly's Detailing Fluid along with the foam cannon on super dirty cars. I will spray Poly's on the worst of the spots, including the wheels. Then foam right over it. Again for absolutely the worst of the cars...I had one car that hadn't been washed in 3 months and it sat outside the whole time...touchless foaming and Poly's wasn't enough, but after doing the process, a few squirts of Poly's let me wipe it down easily enough. I could have done the two bucket method instead of the Poly's wipe down.

The point is, since you are washing your own car...you can now wash your car weekly or every two weeks, and keeping it maintained like that, it should respond to the foam much better.

I'm using about 2oz of Hyper Wash in a 32oz bottle of distilled water. I might mix-in 2 to 3 oz of Mystique if I want extra gloss just after the wash.

Richard

Richard