Top 10 Swirl Prevention Tips (991 GT3)

Hi there and welcome to another car cleaning guru video in which I'll be sharing my top 10 tips to help prevent swirl marks from washing and drying your car using this formidable 991 GT3 as subject matter. As a well-kept relatively new and swirl free supercar it was the ideal piece of kit for me to use to attempt to extol the virtues of proper wash technique. Despite the car only being lightly soiled these tips and techniques also apply to dirtier vehicles and in fact the dirtier the car the more important they are to adhere to if you're to avoid damage being inflicted. Although you'll probably be familiar with some of the tips in the video already do stick with it as there may be one or two things you have perhaps overlooked until now which if adopted could complement your existing swirl prevention wash regimen. And so without further ado in no particular order of importance let's get down to the swirl causing nitty-gritty. We begin with a basic yet often overlooked tip which is to thoroughly rinse out your wash buckets prior to any cleaning taking place. Although at a glance they may look clean enough the chances are that in the time they have been sitting there since the last wash whether in a garage shed or even indoors a certain amount of dust dirt and debris will have collected at the bottom of them which if not removed could easily be transferred onto the paintwork of your vehicle resulting in swirl marks and scratches so spend a few moments properly rinsing them out prior to washing. Tip number two is to use grit guards. These relatively cheap items sit at the base of your buckets and keep wash implements safely away from the bottom which is where most of the dirt particles taken from the car reside. They also act as a grid against which you can gently rub your wash implement depositing the contaminants previously removed instead of redistributing them all over the surface. As with buckets grit guards should also be thoroughly rinsed off before use to remove any dirt particles that may have accumulated or been left over since they were last used. My third tip is probably the most satisfying on the list and that is to fully pre-clean your car using an all-encompassing snow foam product to help soften and lift off loose dirt and contaminants prior to contact washing. I should note here that I was experiencing issues with poor water pressure at the tap and so had to apply the foam using short blasts to prevent the pressure from my washer dropping which was somewhat frustrating and noisy but didn't prevent me from getting the job done. The foam is designed to dwell for a number of minutes on the surface without drying softening up dirt from all areas of the vehicle while giving you the time to fill wash buckets and prepare for pre-rinsing. In my opinion pre-foaming and pre-rinsing are some of if not the most important parts of the car washing process in terms of swirl prevention as it's here that as much dirt as possible can be safely removed prior to contact washing so it's vitally important that you spend some time liberally coating the car in your pre-cleaner of choice leaving it to dwell sufficiently and then thoroughly rinsing off all areas before you actually touch the car. Next up is to wash your car using a high-quality plush wash mitt instead of a cheap sponge which can easily scratch and mar the paintwork. Although porous, particles of dirt can still become trapped between the face of a sponge and the surface of the paintwork and when drawn across it can result in unsightly swear marks and scratches being inflicted. A good quality wash mitt on the other hand is not only more gentle on your paintwork than a sponge is but it also allows for stray dirt particles to be safely locked away from the surface in its long fibers reducing the likelihood of damage being done. A decent mitt also provides a more thorough clean than a sponge as its fibers help to lightly agitate dirt in and around exterior details that a sponge simply cannot. So if you want to avoid unnecessary swirl marks ditch the cheapo sponge and replace it with a high-quality wash mitt. Just be prepared for neighbors and passers-by to ask exactly why you're washing your car with a dead cat. The halfway point on my list of swirl prevention tips is to wash your car from top to bottom in a methodical manner. The main reason for this is that the lower areas of a vehicle tend to be the dirtiest and so by tending to them last you avoid unnecessarily drawing dirt particles from these heavily soiled parts across the upper panels of the vehicle which aren't usually exposed to that level of contamination. Washing methodically a panel or section at the time also ensures that you keep track of which parts have been cleaned reducing the chance of areas being overlooked and dirt being left on the car which can commonly occur when washing in a random haphazard fashion. These small unwashed zones can then later serve to contaminate drying towels and redistribute swirl causing dirt particles over the rest of the freshly washed paintwork. Tip number six and probably one of the most important to implement is the two bucket technique. This methodology has now been widely adopted by most professional detailers and hobbyists alike and as the name suggests involves using two wash buckets instead of one. Both buckets are fitted with grit guards and the first referred to as the rinse bucket is filled with fresh clean water. The second which acts as the main wash bucket is then filled with the suds of your choice as well as a plush wash mitt as discussed earlier. A section or panel of the vehicle is first gently washed using the mitt flipping it over on your hand if necessary to reveal a fresh contaminant free surface for washing before it's immersed in the fresh water rinse bucket and gently rubbed against the grit guard at the bottom to safely deposit any dirt particles removed from the car. Once wrung out it's then placed back into the wash bucket to reload it with fresh suds again gently rubbing against the grit guard to remove any remaining dirt particles before going on to clean the next section of the vehicle with your now theoretically contaminant free wash mitt. If you're new to the two bucket technique one way of remembering the methodology behind it is to think of it in the simplified terms of wash, rinse, rub, reload and repeat. It will take a little longer to wash your car like this and so if you're working in direct sun light you may want to have a hose pipe or pressure washer handy to rinse off each panel after working in order to prevent the suds from drying but it's definitely worth spending the extra few minutes it takes to greatly reduce the chance of swirls and scratches being inflicted. Lucky number seven is to avoid cross-contamination of your wash implements when cleaning. As stated earlier the lower areas of a car tend to be the dirtiest and so it makes sense to designate specific wash mitts for use on these parts to prevent the ones used on the upper panels from becoming progressively contaminated and spoiled. Although wash mitts can and of course should be cleaned out after every use heavy contaminants from the lower bumpers, sills and grills can build up in the fibres of them over time and potentially cause scratches and swirl marks during subsequent washes so it's worth remembering to reserve your main mitt for the top two thirds of the vehicle only with a secondary one being kept for the lower areas. This of course includes the wheels, tyres and arches for which a third mitt if you use one on your wheels should be reserved as no wash implement that is used to clean wheels should ever be used to wash the paintwork even if it has been thoroughly cleaned out after use. My number eight swirl prevention tip and one that runs parallel to using a soft wash mitt instead of a sponge is to also use a high-quality plush microfibre towel to dry your car instead of a chamois leather whether genuine or synthetic. While they may be great at absorbing water, chamois leathers are also great at trapping stray dirt particles between the surface of the paintwork which is only going to result in more scratches and swirl marks. They're also not really soft enough for most modern vehicle finishes and when drawn across the surface can cause unsightly marring even if no dirt particles are present. A good quality drying towel on the other hand is soft and gentle enough to be used to remove rinse water from the paintwork but more importantly has the capability of locking away those potentially dangerous stray dirt particles deep in its microscopic fibres and away from the surface. Towels are also far more versatile than chamois leathers, can be washed in the machine after use and in my experience are less prone to streaking or water spotting when used correctly. So, as I advise with the budget sponge option, ditch the outdated chamois in place of a modern microfibre drying towel with a nice deep pile. The second to last tip on the list is to use a detail spray when drying your car. Firstly this acts as a lubricant which allows the drying towel to glide over the surface more freely and secondly it can serve to encapsulate and suspend any remaining dirt particles that may be present either on the surface of the paintwork or in the fibres of the towel. It should be liberally misted over either the entire vehicle or a section of it depending on your preference or the conditions prior to drying the car in the usual manner. Using a detail spray should also help your towel to absorb moisture a little more effectively, reduce unsightly water spotting and streaking from standing and trapped water and generally give a better finish than drying alone and so it's a win-win combination of swirl prevention and quality of finish. Finally, swirl prevention tip number 10 is to keep those wash mitts and microfibre towels away from the ground. While this may seem like an obvious piece of advice, to the amateur car cleaner sometimes the ground can seem like the most convenient place to leave them but of course the ground is also the place where all the dirt you've just spent hours cleaning your car to remove it comes from, so avoid compromising your wash implements by avoiding contact with the ground which includes during the wash process when working on the lower areas of your car. Grit guards can act as a convenient platform on which to place your towels and mitts if you're struggling for space but you still run the risk of them falling off so the easiest and safest option in my opinion is to simply drop them back into your bucket ready to be carried away and cleaned in preparation for your next wash. And there we have it, while there are other things you can do to further minimize the risk of swirl marks and scratches being inflicted during the wash process, these are some of the top tips that for me represent a realistic goal most people can easily achieve and while ideally this should all be implemented simultaneously, adding just a few to your existing wash regimen should help to significantly reduce the chance of swirls and scratches being inflicted. As always, cheers for watching, don't forget to subscribe to see more sweet cars like this being cleaned and I'll be back with another video for you very soon.