Sister-in-Law's Buick

[Don]

I’m cleaning my sister-in-law’s Buick Park Avenue for her. My wife brought it home for me today, and it was waiting for me after work. When I got home, she looked at me and asks: “It’s bad, isn’t it?� I just looked at her, and she knew. Let me put it to you this way…In the past three hours, I had to scrub the floor mats twice each and the tires/rims three times each. I had to go to the self-serve wash to use the high pressure on the tires/wheels and engine. Even so, I had to scrub the tires AGAIN with GREASED LIGHTNING, and go over the rims AGAIN with Meg’s Gold Class Instant Wheel Cleaner (strong stuff, let me tell you), and a terry cloth rag. Even after being sprayed with A to Z and hit with the pressure sprayer, the tires still turned brown almost instantly after I sprayed then with the Greased Lightning.

I hosed the engine with full strength Simple Green and hit it with the pressure washer at the self-serve bay. After the car wash, I brought the car back to the house where I finished washing the wheels/rims, the floor mats and the door jambs. I’m about ready for bed since I have to work early tomorrow, but I’ll leave you with a few before pics:

[Don]

[Don]

[scottlee]

:eek :eek cant wait for more pics good luck buddy

[00GREENMACHINE]

we had a fundraiser at my church and I cleaned probably 3 buicks like that. Those rims are a pain to clean. The ones I cleaned were caked on. purple power did not even cut it. ONLY FINGER SCRUBBING

[G35stilez]

Ouch...This one will make for good pics

Good Luck.

[Don]

Meguiars online is having an issue this morning, so I dounloaded the pics to the gallery here, once they're approved, I'll link them to this thread.

I will be able to give some after pics tonight after work, but most will probably come tomorrow.

00GREENMACHINE: I had to finger scrub too (I wrapped a piece of a terry cloth rag around my finger though for better cleaning)...the only brush that would fit was a toothbrush, and it was nowhere near stiff enough to work.

[edschwab1]

Good luck. I will be on the look out for the after pics.

Eric

[Don]

The good news is that I'm finally done (except for the windows). By the time I finished the interior, I was too tired to do a full exterior, so it got a Color-X x2/UPP wax job (it's a freebie, & they NEVER wax their cars anyway) even so, it made a dramatic improvement.

The interior leather was horrible, & I had to get some Meguiars GC Aloe Leather Cleaner.

This stuff worked really well. It seems to use a strong emulsifying (dissolving) action on the dirt & grime. I spilled a couple of drops on an uncleaned section, and when I wiped them off, there was a definate clean spot. Instead of the recommended terry cloth, I used a medium bristle brush to apply the cleaner. It added some scrubbing action and allowed me to leave a relatively thick layer on the leather so it could work on the embedded dirt. I only had to do this to the seating surfaces, which had more texture. The smooth surfaces came clean using a terry applicator. Once they were cleaned, I used the GC Aloe Cleaner & Conditioner to remove the light dirt still remaining and condition the leather.

The carpets and mats eventually came clean after being scrubbed with Simple Green, extracted, scrubbed again with Woolite (3 oz/29 oz water), then finally rinsed with a 4 oz fabric softener/3-1/2 gal water mix.

Oh yeah, the bad news?...The wife took the digicam with her to her sister's house, and I won't be able to get after pics until "after" the car's been driven through about 10 miles of construction :ticked