I'm at $ 1.30 just for presoak , so if you are happy with the results at 44 penny's than I wouldn't change a thing or your results will surely decline! As far as I see it, to clean it requires chemical and chemical costs money, there are places to save without sacrificing quality but theres a critical point that shouldn't be crossed or quality disappears. In most cases you get what you pay for, and the barrel price means nothing unless you divide 7040 by the barrel price which will give you ounce price. Then depending on how much you use if brand a is 500 a barrel and brand b is 1000 a barrel, but you use 2 ounces of brand a and 1 ounce of brand b then they are exactly the same. Its ultimately up to the owner on this topic but chemicals would be the last thing I will resort to nickel and dime. Also I'm in no way affiliated with any chemical company, supplier, or otherwise, I never said chemicals were not a rip off. Best thing to do is setup a virtual volumetric station at your car wash and test,test,test compare,compare,compare (note this is a never ending task, and then when you are absolutely satisfied with performance vs cost then you are there, but never stop trying new products and testing existing ones. I usually don't go this far into detail but if you add a nano water softener to your system you will definitely be able to use much less presoak (note Nano) not regular old water softener. You will be amazed!
