Why You Should Get Your Car Detailed
But not just any auto detail. Often my customers have asked me what the difference is between my details and the one they can get from their favorite car wash, usually close to my pricing or even slightly cheaper.
To start off let’s cover the important role your car paint plays.
Our Cars paint is the layer of skin that protects the sub-surface from damage. The metal underneath is strong but can rust and denigrate quite rapidly if exposed to the elements. Usually this is the case because a rock chip or deep scratch penetrated down to the metal and now is allowing rust to grow and spread. The rust is often not even visible as a small rock chip on the lower runner of a car won’t be noticed, but the rust can spread across the entire panel of a car right under the rest of the paint. This is an extreme scenario but one that I see fairly often.
The more common occurrence is peeling and flaking of the clear coat, which can only be repaired by a new and costly paint job. This occurs when the layer of clear coat is cut by a deep scratch. Now we have a valley between the top layer and the base coat of paint. Various elements such as chemicals, road fallout, UV radiation, sap, bug guts, and more will start to wear on this area and eventually work its way under the clear coat from the scratch and begin to cause peeling.
What Auto Detailing Does for Your Car: Not Just Aesthetics
It is great that after a quality detail our cars looks amazing, but the role a detail plays is much more important then just looks.
- Contamination
Removing contamination is the most important part of keeping your paint healthy and increasing the lifespan of the paint. If you did nothing else but properly decontaminate your paint every few months your paint would last substantially longer. Oxidation, cracking, and flaking are all proponents of contaminated paint. By removing build up on your paint, which is often not easily visible to the eye, you are preventing contamination from wearing on your paint.
- Swirls & Scratches
Swirls and scratches are more on the aesthetic side of things, but by removing swirls and scratches from your cars paint you are keeping your paints surface as smooth as possible, which will allow water and dirt to bead off and prevent additional build up. If you have ever washed a car and then carefully went back over it, you may notice that the scratches are holding onto dirt which contain chemicals that will slowly eat away at the clear coat. Since they are already sitting inside of a scratch, they are one layer closer to reaching the metal and then rust can occur.
These are the two primary categories of items that are being fixed when a proper detail is done to your vehicle.
Even if you could care less what your care looks like day to day at some point you are going to want to get a new car. On average car buyers will keep their car for around six years. Cars today can last for well over 12 years if properly maintained. The condition and appearance of your car is on the top five reasons people will buy a car for the asking price.
Swirls, scratches, contamination, oxidation, and more do not build up over just one week or even several months. If a proper detail is completed then a quality layer of protection such as a synthetic wax sealant or even a ceramic coating is applied after the paint is properly reconditioned and corrected. This added layer of protection helps fight against harsh UV damage and when contamination does occur it is not on a superficial layer that is protecting the original paint underneath. However, it won’t last forever and this is why you do not need a full detail but every 6-12 months. Just be careful, if you go to long without a quality detail your protective coating can wear off and now contamination is affecting the paint directly. Slapping on another coat of wax will not help, which leads me into another great piece.
