Posted by Maria Dimitrova

A guest post by Omar Negron

Read this if: You want to get rid of difficult stains in your car’s interior and exterior without using harsh materials to avoid further damage

Gain: Enjoy driving a clean and well-kept car that looks brand-new

When you want to maintain a good relationship with your girlfriend, it takes a lot of effort to make it last, a concept equivalent, at least for me to taking care of my car.

To achieve this, you should do regular maintenance and cleaning. This article will provide you useful know-how when it comes to taking good care of your precious car.

Interior Cleaning:

Several contaminants might reside in your car. Pet owners can expect to have a lot of hair for example and carsick kids can leave even worse deposits on the seats and carpet. Dirt, spilled drinks and other routine problems all add up to more mess.

In order to clean your car’s interior swiftly and efficiently use my helpful tips below:

General Equipment for cleaning car interior:

• Paper towel, cloth, vinyl/plastic cleaner (for cleaning plastic interior parts like dashboard, seatbelt covers, steering wheel etc.),  glass cleaner and shop vacuum.

Cleaning The Carpet

Since the carpet is the dirtiest place in your car you need to be patient when cleaning this area

• Materials to use: Vacuum, hot water, dishwashing detergent, spray bottle, hard quilled brush, vinegar and towels.

• Points to consider:

1. Vacuuming will eliminate all contaminants that reside in your carpet such as dirt, mud, pet hair, debris etc.
2. Use an appropriate spray solution to remove any stain like an ink stain, coffee stain in several interior spaces.
3. Vinegar, hot water, and dish detergent form an effective solution to clean effectively the carpet particularly spilled drinks, vomit or oil stains.

Cleaning a plastic dashboard

The clear plastic covering your car’s dashboard gauges should be cleaned regularly too. However, when cleaning several interior plastic areas you need to do it very carefully to prevent it from having any scratches since even hard plastics are damaged easily when you’re using unsuitable cleaning equipment.

• Materials to use: 4 pieces of smooth cloth, paper towel, water and mild dish detergent
• Additional Tips:

1. Apply a little pressure when trying to eradicate a few smudges on the gauge by using a smooth cloth or paper towel.

2. Come up with a cleaning solution by using water and mild dish detergent. Don’t use harsh detergent with bleach particles since it will scratch the dash.

3. Use the solution with the use of a smooth towel then dry it.

Cleaning leather Seats:

A leather car interior is more work intensive to maintain than a cloth one. It is also important for you to appropriately clean the leather to make sure that it will lasts for a long time.

• Materials to use: vacuum, dust brush attachment, warm water, smooth cloth, fabric protectant, foam applicator pad, and leather conditioner.
• Points to consider:

1. Dust brush attachment is used for vacuuming. It is attached in the vacuum to prevent any leather scratches. When doing the cleaning, make sure to press the vacuum firmly against the leather particularly to crevices and ridges to eliminate the dirt and any debris.
2. Use the smooth cloth and warm water to clean the surface of leather.
3. Use a fabric protectant with a foam applicator pad and leather conditioner particularly for leather seats, doors, console and doors. Allow it dry for a couple of minutes.

Exterior Cleaning:

Cleaning your car’s exterior is not that difficult if you’ll know some tricks to do it fast without adding scratches. It’s easier to work on it from top to bottom to avoid re-cleaning afterwards.

General Equipment for cleaning car exterior: car shampoo, sponges, water/ hose, cloth towels, an instant oil change cleaning kit, wheel/tire cleaner and microfiber cloth.

Simple Tricks:

• Entire exterior

-To avoid scratching your car’s paint, you must rinse first the entire car using a water hose.

• Chrome

-          Material to use: chrome polish, wax, towels/rags, and soap /water

-          Make sure to use a special cleaner for the chrome since it can be damaged easily if you’re going to use a cleaner intended for other kinds of metal.

-          When applying chrome polish make sure to rub it gently with a smooth towel. This will make a mirror-like shine.

• Tires

-          Material to use: clean rag/cloth and tire protectant.

-          For your tires to shine you need to apply tire protectant. It comes in different varieties including spray-on, gel-type, and foam-type dressing tire protectant. The Armor All spray-on protectant which is intended for plastic and rubber car parts is one of the most popular ones.

Note: Clean the tires first before applying the protectant.

• Different choices of wax for the paintwork

1.    Meguair’s Hi Tech Yellow Wax

2.    FX SynWax

3.    Turtle Wax Super Hard Shell

4.    Meguiars Wax

5.    Turtle Wax

• Removing window stickers with nasty glue

-       You may use “goof off” product or any adhesive solvent. Just apply the liquid solution and wipe vigorously.

Note: Apply it several times onto the surface for better outcome.

Omar has a passion for writing automotive articles and also has a website about oil change coupons which gives helpful information on which coupons are best and where you can find them. Feel free to visit his website at http://www.oilchangecouponsv.com/.

Further reading:

What you should know about electric cars

The best “green” cars on the market today

How to negotiate when buying a car

How to get the best price when selling a car