- Mr. Clean Auto-dry Car Wash - Anyone know of this?

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Pink_Floyd

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I just saw a comercial for the Mr. Clean auto-dry car wash. It is some special thing you attach to the end of your hose with a built in filter and some sort of special soap. Aparently you wash your car like normal but when you rinse the soap off you dont have to hand dry it. They guarentee a spot free shine by just letting it air dry! I know these claims are usually bullshit but Mr. Clean is a pretty popular name brand...

So anyone know anything about this or try it themselves?

The price is $29.99 and if it really does what they say it does it definitly sounds like its worth every penny. I'd wash my car a LOT more if I didn't have to hand dry it every time. That's definitly the most borning and tedious part...
 
PuShAkOv

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sounds promising... but I wouldn't want any special chemical just for spotless drying. I want wax in my wash and for it to fight crap good.... if it has all that and leaves no spots I would buy it [thumb]
 
vlad

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Maybe it acts like a water softener! I'm looking for a decently priced, small water softener. Ya know, like the big household ones but smaller that you can carry around.

I've seen a couple, but not at a decent price.
 
wileycoyote

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I saw that also, and it peaked my interest. I suspect it has some kind of reverse osmosis filter or micro filter to remove solids (mostly calcium, iron, and other metals) from the water. Being the ever vigulent skeptic, I doubt it works. I say, one of us should buy it, try it, and report back. If there's enough interest, I'll be the guinie pig. I have really hard water.
 
MrElussive

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God damnit, I posted about this before and nobody responded !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
It uses a PUR water filter (yes, from that company PUR) to de-ionize the water and therefore gives you a spot-free car without having to dry it. I am going to order one real soon (at the very least, it will act as a nice head for the hose for car washes) so I'll be our test piggy.
 
PuShAkOv

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MrElussive said:
God damnit, I posted about this before and nobody responded !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
It uses a PUR water filter (yes, from that company PUR) to de-ionize the water and therefore gives you a spot-free car without having to dry it. I am going to order one real soon (at the very least, it will act as a nice head for the hose for car washes) so I'll be our test piggy.
Click to expand...
We don't like you [:D]
 
MrElussive

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Cloth doesn't scratch the car, as long as there aren't any rocks or debris in the towel. Air-drying is terrible, the water spots show up like crazy.

MyHarley, go to your local KMart or Target and pickup a California Water Blade. It is about $20, but it will save your life, trust me. It is a rubber blade with a handle and you sort of "swipe" the water off of your car...similar to a windshield wiper. This is by far the best tool I have ever used for drying your car...it completely wipes all the water off of your car...saves time and works extremely well.
 
MrElussive

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Yup, exactly...don't they just kick ass??
I haven't hand-washed my car in a few weeks because it has gotten so cold (37 F outside right now), but in December I am gonna hand-wash and wax my car and I can't wait to use the California Water Blade to dry the car off !!
 
MyHarley

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I purchased a water blade per your instructions on another thread......[rofl] [rofl] it just isnt out of its package yet........been helping another student make money....[fake] [fake]
 
PuShAkOv

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MrElussive said:
Cloth doesn't scratch the car, as long as there aren't any rocks or debris in the towel. Air-drying is terrible, the water spots show up like crazy.

MyHarley, go to your local KMart or Target and pickup a California Water Blade. It is about $20, but it will save your life, trust me. It is a rubber blade with a handle and you sort of "swipe" the water off of your car...similar to a windshield wiper. This is by far the best tool I have ever used for drying your car...it completely wipes all the water off of your car...saves time and works extremely well.
Click to expand...
I don't mind waterspots. [:I] Usually I kinda hand-dry only the hood since this is like the only most visible place for them. The car becomes very shiney after wash and those spots don't hurt. [hihi]

I know that it doesn't scartch the car.. its just that there will almost be something that will tend to scratch it besides the cloth. I only hand dry the car (well) before I wax it,... otherwise you are just asking to get soemthing under your dryging cloth. .. you can never get the car too clean for that.[rolleyes]
 
wileycoyote

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vlad said:
Found it!

Like I said, not exactly cheap!
Click to expand...
I wonder how well the ion exchange element in this compares with the PUR one in the Mr. Clean unit.

In case anyone wants to know, here's how a water softener works, and what causes water spots.

Almost all water contains minerals such as calcium, magnesium, sodium, potasium, sulfur, chlorine, etc. It is these minerals that give water it's taste. Water high in certain minerals, is often sold at hyper inflated prices becuase of it's unique taste (Perrier, San Pellegrino, Calistoga).

However, when you wash your car with Perrier, you will notice water spots almost immediately. These minerals have a positive or negative charge and are called ions. Much like magnets, these ions are drawn to oppositely charged ions. Because water is a polar molecule (just like a magnet, one side is a positive ion, the other a negative ion) it sticks together with other water molecules. The ions hang loosely to one end of the wate molecule. When water evaportates, the minerals tend to get left behind.

These minerals, being ions, are naturally drawn to opposite ions. Most soap is made from fatty acids that react with the positively charged ions (calcium, sodium, etc) to form salts (calcium chloride, sodium chloride, etc.). These salts are no longer ions and don't stick well to water, a property known as hydrophobic (oil and wax are hydrophobic). They fall out of the water, and stick to your car.

A water softener uses a special filter made of negatively charged beads (this is the ion exchange unit). The positive ions in the water (except sodium for very technical reason) stick to the beads leaving only pure water and negatively charged ions. Many softeners use a second filter (usually a carbon filter) to trap the negative ions, leaving only sodium and pure water. More complicated and costly deionizers can also remove the sodium (sodium chloride is common table salt and does not form a strong bond on most surfaces).

Pure water will not react with soap to form salts and will rinse clean leaving no spots.

The Mr. Clean product works (according to their information) by:
1. Reducing the amount of ions (softens the water).
2. Uses a non fatty acid based soap (does not react with remaining ions to form salts, this also means it wont strip wax, a secondary benifit).
3. Adds a polymer (synthetic molecule) that cause the water to sheet off surfaces. This reduces the amount of water that actually drys on the surface, further minimizing spots.

If you have a good quality home water softener, using the right soap will produce similar results.
 
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