Just instaled a Quicksilver. All I can say is WOW this thing washes and it is fast. The only thing that I need help with is how to get the customers to load right. It has a driver and passanger side alignment bar for the front wheels and the customers cant figure out where to go. To most people it looks easy stay in the center where your guided to and others its jump the bars and complain that it dosent work. Ive painted lines to help and they cant stay between them. Any ideas guys.
D&S Quicksilver
- Thread starter ajbjoust
- Start date
MEP001
Well-known member
Put up a big sign that says "Do not steer - the rails will guide you straight." I don't know if that will help much since I tried to guide a woman onto our treadle and kept telling her "Let go of the wheel, it'll steer itself in," but as soon as the tire touched the guide and the wheel turned she'd grab it and yank it back. I've thought about a convex mirror on the wall so they can see what their tires are doing.
sudsysllc
Sudsy's LLC
i have the same problem with mine. i try to educate customers, but some of the first time users are murder. i think i have to move the passenger side pad rearward some to decrease the margin of error. D&S has come out with a new pass pad and i have one, just havent had time to install
JIMT
Member
For some reason most customers will turn left when they get into the bay. We have bell tubes that run down on both sides of the tire path. These activate arrows on the sign when they wander out of the path, but the rails cause the problem. As soon as a tire touches the rail the all customers will turn into the rail even when the arrow says turn the other direction. We removed the rails and just put 2' long rails over the treadle switch so the auto will not start unless the tire is between the short rails.
JimT
JimT
Red Baron
Active member
As a car wash ower for 11 years, and having driven aroud 2-1/2 million miles, I'm conviced that 40% of those we share the roadways should never be trusted behind the wheel. Their drivers ed teachers should be searched out and jailed for suggestign they've been taught to drive.
Putting a sign aywhere on my property that says "Take your hands off the wheel, the rails will guide you" is a gold foil stamped invitation to the court house. One of my customers would see the sign while passing by the car wash on the highway at 50 mph, decide he needs a car wash and just let go of the wheel and sit back dumbfouded as to why he drove through the side of the Dollar General building.
It's for this reason that any IBA equipment that doesn't have semi-foolproof rails are risky business for my amazing customers.
Putting a sign aywhere on my property that says "Take your hands off the wheel, the rails will guide you" is a gold foil stamped invitation to the court house. One of my customers would see the sign while passing by the car wash on the highway at 50 mph, decide he needs a car wash and just let go of the wheel and sit back dumbfouded as to why he drove through the side of the Dollar General building.
It's for this reason that any IBA equipment that doesn't have semi-foolproof rails are risky business for my amazing customers.
JIMT
Member
RED BARON,
Do you have rails that work? What are they? I have seen rails 4" in diameter and customers still drive up over them. I have been in the car wash business for 28 years and have had automatics for 20 years. The 3 soft cloth autos have never had rails at the recommendation of the man who installed the first soft cloth because of all of the problems he had seen with them. The high pressure auto was installed with rails and we worked with customers for years but still had people turn into the rail as soon as the tire touched it. As I said in my previous post we removed them and have FAR LESS problems.
JimT
Do you have rails that work? What are they? I have seen rails 4" in diameter and customers still drive up over them. I have been in the car wash business for 28 years and have had automatics for 20 years. The 3 soft cloth autos have never had rails at the recommendation of the man who installed the first soft cloth because of all of the problems he had seen with them. The high pressure auto was installed with rails and we worked with customers for years but still had people turn into the rail as soon as the tire touched it. As I said in my previous post we removed them and have FAR LESS problems.
JimT
Red Baron
Active member
Jim, that's encouraging to hear your experience without rails - I'm considering replacing my 5000 with a Quicksilver. I have had maybe 10 experiences (that I know of) where a customer got on the wrong side of the rail. I guess that's not bad in 47,000 washes.
I tried a new Quicksilver in Lubbock yesterday - sexy!!! Lots of cool features that would make my life easier, such as the ability to be paged when a problem happens and the ability for my dist to make diagnoses and adjustments from his computer.
Speaking of D&S reps and dists, I called mine (Westech) yesterday (Saturday) with a problem with my 5000. He was just getting off the plane from Orlando but came right out anyway and fixed my problem. That's service! Btw, it was a simple mercury switch in the tredle that had spun a little -- a problem I should have figured out on my own. According to my Hamilton fax report this morning, I may have had my best day ever at my IBA yesterday -- I'll have to go check later coz my fax report only shows CC sales. I would have lost a lot of money if I'd had to shut the bay down yesterday.
I tried a new Quicksilver in Lubbock yesterday - sexy!!! Lots of cool features that would make my life easier, such as the ability to be paged when a problem happens and the ability for my dist to make diagnoses and adjustments from his computer.
Speaking of D&S reps and dists, I called mine (Westech) yesterday (Saturday) with a problem with my 5000. He was just getting off the plane from Orlando but came right out anyway and fixed my problem. That's service! Btw, it was a simple mercury switch in the tredle that had spun a little -- a problem I should have figured out on my own. According to my Hamilton fax report this morning, I may have had my best day ever at my IBA yesterday -- I'll have to go check later coz my fax report only shows CC sales. I would have lost a lot of money if I'd had to shut the bay down yesterday.
JIMT
Member
RED BARRON, I am glad you had a great day yesterday, we had no income as it was raining all day in Toledo. We have the D&S treadle switches that you have and we really like them. Several of the air cylinders have failed which are not repairable but we were able to buy them locally at a very low price compared to getting them from D&S.
JIMT
JIMT
