[boss2k]

Do you take your car through touchless washes , is that harmful for the paint?

[jkoral]

Originally Posted by boss2k

Do you take your car through touchless washes , is that harmful for the paint?

No, I have never taken one of my BMWs to a carwash.

Touchless may be safer than traditional car washes, but can still damage your paint:

Here's one particular article:
https://drivedetailed.com/touchless-car-washes/

(But almost all criticism center around the same thing: high pressure, water quality, harsher chemicals).

[nioh_lbbm2]

It's good enough for a quick rinse so that the car looks relatively clean but there's no way for it to be completely clean.

Not harmful to paint obviously but it may strip waxes if you have any on.

[jkoral]

Originally Posted by nioh_lbbm2

Not harmful to paint obviously...

I've heard the following argument from multiple sources -- quoting my link above:

"To make up for lack of friction, touchless car washes operate with a much higher force of pressure than your typical automated wash with brushes. This excessive force from the jets can send debris from a heavily soiled vehicle across the paintwork and end up leaving scratches on the paintwork."

Perhaps tough to prove - I guess you could take a perfect paint corrected and polished car into frequent touchless car washes and perform proper inspections of the paint.

[nioh_lbbm2]

Originally Posted by jkoral

I've heard the following argument from multiple sources -- quoting my link above:

"To make up for lack of friction, touchless car washes operate with a much higher force of pressure than your typical automated wash with brushes. This excessive force from the jets can send debris from a heavily soiled vehicle across the paintwork and end up leaving scratches on the paintwork."

Perhaps tough to prove - I guess you could take a perfect paint corrected and polished car into frequent touchless car washes and perform proper inspections of the paint.

Anecdotal but I occasionally use a touch less car wash when I'm too lazy to do a proper wash. My car is ceramic coated though. Maybe a couple times a year I use the car wash. No issues with swirls or scratches. Don't use it if you're going missing I guess.

[BMW 16 5-0]

Interesting. I take my cars through the touchless during winter months to get the salt and grime off.

I wouldn't consider leaving all the winter crud on until I could handwash.

[Nettles]

Find a self serve to use their pressure washer. Most seem to offer deionized water so you after you pressure wash the car you can use the deionized water and drive off. This is better than a touchless car wash as the chemicals they use are might more damaging to your lsp, but for a ceramic it probably can't do too much harm with how little people claim to be using them.

[3t3p]

I'd worry about water ingress with such application of high pressure water.

[tropicatango]

Touchless carwash or automatic car wash use soap that is not ph neutral. The effect of this is that it strip the wax or paint protection from the paint, leaving it unprotected

So NO, i never ever go to carwash

[yanqui]

It leaves your car wet and not completely clean. The wheels look especially gunky

[GregInNewMexico]

Count me in the votes for no visits to the car wash. My M was at the dealer for service and I insisted that they don't do a detail or wash. I don't care if I sound anal or being THAT guy. I would rather have a slightly dirty but swirl and scratch free BMW.