NHTSA: Wash your vehicle!

[SwampSurvivor]

Originally Posted By: MNgopher
Is it that difficult to go through an automatic car wash every now and then? We go months without seeing above freezing temps here, and car washes do big business all winter long. That alone helps...


The car washes around here recycle the water and just spray your car with saltwater ...


Originally Posted By: Traction
Pretty clear. QUIT USING SO MUCH SALT! Plow the roads, make winter tires manatory, or stay home. I have not driven in winter without winter tires for 20 years. Salt always ruins the fun of driving in the winter.


Woah, woah, woah. Slow it down a notch. You can't except the local governments to actually plow ... Instead, they just salt the living daylights out of the road and don't touch them for 2 days after a storm.

And asking people to be responsible and equip their cars properly for winter?!!?!? That's crazytalk!


Originally Posted By: supton
If it is below freezing, is rust occuring?


Not as bad. If it's -20 out ... your car isn't going to rust. Heat (or lack of ) acts as a catalyst (or lack of).

 

[HangFire]

As usual the government oversimplifies and thus gets it wrong. After reading this thread I was in the carwash line with my wife's car, watching the car ahead of me get the best carwash offered, including undercarriage rinse and drive-by rocker blaster.

I thought to myself, "that amount of water will do little more than catalyze the salt/iron reaction".

At home I got out the garden hose and gave the underneath a good thorough soaking. You'll never see the government recommending this due to oil runoff and water shortages and lower reliance on taxable, regulate-able industries, but keeping a modern, emissions controlled, well-maintained vehicle on the road a few more years outweighs the energy and pollution costs of the manufacturing another one to replace it.

 

[eljefino]

^ If the carwash had warm water and your hose was cold, it could have done a pretty decent job, as warm dissolves salt while cold just blasts it as loose grit.

 

[SHOZ]

On my '97 Ford Taurus the lines rusted back behind the gas tank and up where you could not wash them off or treat them without taking the gas tank down. They used a poly cover near the breaks for some reason, that piece would stay good as new. Another bad place was under the drivers floor where the lines were covered with a plastic stone protector. It was a terrible car for brake lines.

No car wash undercarriage rinse would help either spot.

 

[HangFire]

Originally Posted By: eljefino
^ If the carwash had warm water and your hose was cold, it could have done a pretty decent job, as warm dissolves salt while cold just blasts it as loose grit.

If there was enough of it, maybe... but there just wasn't enough water. The undercarriage spray was just a couple of moving wands waving as the car drove over it. The result was a quick double Z pattern under the car. Many people drive quickly over that spot as they need a little momentum to get over the drain right in front of it.

Mind you, this is the best car wash in the area. Most don't do zip to the undercarriage.

 

[MNgopher]

I'm just going to put it this way: If I live in Minnesota, and can wash my car reliably down to about zero to 5 degrees, and not have issues with frozen doors, I'm sure the rest of the country can do the same.

As to winter road maintenance, well, I covered that back a page or two. Not as easy as its always made out to be.

 

[Garak]

If I can wash my undercarriage in my G37 by getting close to or onto the ground and using a pressure washer wand, it can't be that hard for other vehicles.

 

[SHOZ]

On the '97 Taurus/Sable the area between the gas tank and rear cross member would not get washed unless you had the car in the air and used a spray wand. No way could you get to that sitting on the ground or an undercarriage car wash.

 

[Garak]

Certainly there are exceptions, but how far does one wish to go? No matter what you do, short of disassembling the car and putting everything in the dishwasher, you're never going to get it perfect.