What's new

Touchless best chemicals?

carwashireland

Active member
Joined
Oct 25, 2013
Messages
271
Reaction score
40
Points
28
Location
Cork, Ireland
I was unable to see the pics but from other responses it seems like you have either dirt left over, or rinse water left over causing spotting. If its dirt left over you do not have your chemicals and or water softener set up right. If however you are getting the vehicles clean but then the rinse water is hard, you need an r.o system to give you a spot free rinse. So the question is. what is on the cars...traffic film or white chalky mineral deposits????
 

kentadel

Active member
Joined
Feb 21, 2010
Messages
272
Reaction score
119
Points
43
Location
Nebraska
Wash12 that looks like just a spotting problem to me. Soft water? Are you applying spot free? How about wax/sealent? How does your basic wash do, does it also leave spots? There are steps you or your chem rep can do to find the source of your problem. Your chem rep should have never left your site until you were satisfied.
 

wash12

Member
Joined
Jan 14, 2018
Messages
174
Reaction score
2
Points
18
Location
USA
Are those cars coming in with that?
No this car was dirty it had dirt on it from driving on a dirt road she said and took most the dirt off but left this residual, even looked worse in person. I got a rag and it wiped off easily. This car is only a few months old so the paint was in great shape.
 

wash12

Member
Joined
Jan 14, 2018
Messages
174
Reaction score
2
Points
18
Location
USA
I was unable to see the pics but from other responses it seems like you have either dirt left over, or rinse water left over causing spotting. If its dirt left over you do not have your chemicals and or water softener set up right. If however you are getting the vehicles clean but then the rinse water is hard, you need an r.o system to give you a spot free rinse. So the question is. what is on the cars...traffic film or white chalky mineral deposits????
All the above we get traffic film especially in the monsoon season and lots of dirt and salt and mud in the winter. I switched to Hi ph pre soak first and then a Lo pre soak to see how that responds after talking to a forum member on here.
 

Greg Pack

Wash Weenie
Joined
Sep 3, 2007
Messages
4,388
Reaction score
2,167
Points
113
Location
Hoover, Alabama
If the car wash is responsible for depositing those spots then that's likely a water quality issue: super high TDS with not enough spot free rinse, spot free not working altogether, or a softener problem. I've had a tire cleaner leak on my gantry unit before that would cause a bad streaky appearance. Check the TDS in both your rinse water and spot free to see what they are.

Just to be clear a road film will be a subtle buildup on the car, worse on the sides than on the top as the tires kick up off contaminants off the road. It is not usually spotty looking like your pictures.
 

rph9168

Carwashguy
Joined
Aug 31, 2007
Messages
2,663
Reaction score
11
Points
38
Location
Atlanta
I remember a while ago when one of the best chemists in the industry described road film as what is left after a touchless wash. He said some things need friction to be removed. That was a long time ago but to a certain extent it is still true. If a car is only washed infrequently it is highly unlikely that a touch free wash will get it clean. If a car receives regular touch free washes it will clean nicely. It is those that get a wash once or twice a year that are the problem, not the wash.
 

PEI

Active member
Joined
Sep 8, 2007
Messages
290
Reaction score
63
Points
28
Location
Danville, VA
A few suggestions. 1. Get a TDS meter and check your RO water. You should get a value less than 40 parts per million (ppm). 2. Dump a little bit of all of your waxes, sealants, polishes, and drying agents out their feed lines at the injectors. Then fire a soap, hopefully none of the lines pulls up. If it does then you have a bad Danfoss and have an anionic and cationic cancelling one another out. Basically your soap passes are useless. 3. Check your volumes to be certain you don't have a clogged tip. 4. Call your soap rep and tell them what is happening. If they don't come to fix it, find one that will.

You asked what the low pH does. It is an acid that thins the road film to allow the high pH and surfactants to work better. Once the layer is thinned the surfactants temporarily release it from the car and dissolve through the road film. Then the high pH removes it. Most high pH's use hydroxides to clean. When a hydroxide meets an oil or fat like road film it bonds with it and drags it off the surface of the vehicle. If the film is thin enough it breaks off and ends up in your pits. If the film is too thick, the hydroxide can't pull it off and it will soapanify. This actually thickens the layer turns it white and can only be removed by friction.

I hope this helps. Your chemical rep should know all this. If they don't then see suggestion 4 above.
 

wash12

Member
Joined
Jan 14, 2018
Messages
174
Reaction score
2
Points
18
Location
USA
Well, wash12- What happened? Did you locate the problem?
No, I switched to hi then lo to see if that helped and it did not, still not able to get cars clean, especially road film from monsoon season it isn't doing anything to remove that film.

We bought the 562 booster that stinger sells to increase the strength of the hi Ph, how do we measure how strong we are putting it on the rep said they don't have a titration kit, so how are we supposed to measure the strength? I am thinking we need it atleast twice as strong to get these cars to come out clean.
 

carwashireland

Active member
Joined
Oct 25, 2013
Messages
271
Reaction score
40
Points
28
Location
Cork, Ireland
Any rep that does not titrate when supplying touchless cleaning chemicals should not be a rep! If interested then get in touch with Whiting Systems and order the Smartbrite xtreme low pH and Tornado Xtreme high pH soaps. These are really concentrated with fantastic cleaning results. If your car wash does not produce clean cars then it is definitely going to fail. You need to get on top of this problem before it ruins your business.
 

tdlconceptsllc

Well-known member
Joined
Jul 30, 2013
Messages
1,060
Reaction score
427
Points
83
Location
NC
If the rep said they can't provide a titration kit I would drop them today you should ask them why there in business that's crazy. You need a good local rep. That sells booster.
Normally booster is injected with a dual injector with high start out with using 320:1 tip ratio and go up too 170:1 tip your conditions will determine what size tip.
 
Last edited:

chaz

Active member
Joined
Mar 22, 2008
Messages
919
Reaction score
110
Points
43
Location
Cincinnati, Ohio
I recently changed to JBS soaps. A GREAT DECISION. I was very loyal to Warsaw products and my (equipment) distributor for many years. My cleaning is substantially improved and cost per car is down!

What I’ve learned is that good chemicals are very important....but more so...a good rep! Mario at JBS has been on site 4 times tweaking titration and coverage. For all I know...my previous products would have been better with more on site set up. The old stuff was set up 10 years ago by the equipment dist...never once saw a rep from the chem folk.

Bottom line I learned....if your chem company isn’t available to help on site......look for other products. I went with JBS but decide for yourselves.
 

OurTown

Well-known member
Joined
Nov 8, 2017
Messages
3,631
Reaction score
1,406
Points
113
Location
Ohio
At the very least you could call Stinger directly and ask for a titration kit. They will probably send one for free.
 

wash12

Member
Joined
Jan 14, 2018
Messages
174
Reaction score
2
Points
18
Location
USA
So we did a titration test and low ph was at 73 and high was at 30! We were using a ton of chemical to achieve this but from my understanding since we do low pre soak followed by a Hi pre soak being that my low is so strong once the Hi pre soak hits it it is just neutralizing and doing basically nothing?

Since then we have tried blend co, we have low pre soak at 18 and hi pre soak at 40. It seems to be working better but still having issues getting the eyebrows off the windows and some road film but definitely see some improvement on the new set up.
 

DiamondWash

Well-known member
Joined
Aug 31, 2007
Messages
2,371
Reaction score
478
Points
83
Location
Des Moines, Iowa
What are you using with Blendco? I too have blendco and I have the Rhino Brite Plus which has no HF as my Low Ph and Presoak with Fragrance as my High Ph I also have a 15 sec dwell between the two.
 

carwashireland

Active member
Joined
Oct 25, 2013
Messages
271
Reaction score
40
Points
28
Location
Cork, Ireland
What sort of dwell time do you have between applying low then high? Then how long between high then washing. It seems like you are on the right track with the strength. Is your softener working ok?
 

wash12

Member
Joined
Jan 14, 2018
Messages
174
Reaction score
2
Points
18
Location
USA
What are you using with Blendco? I too have blendco and I have the Rhino Brite Plus which has no HF as my Low Ph and Presoak with Fragrance as my High Ph I also have a 15 sec dwell between the two.
I am using Rhino brite I do not see a plus anywhere is there a difference in the rhino brite and rhino brite plus? For my High Ph I am running HA Powder with bug remover grape fragrance. I have 4 second dwell after lo and a 12 sec dwell after hi.
 

carwashireland

Active member
Joined
Oct 25, 2013
Messages
271
Reaction score
40
Points
28
Location
Cork, Ireland
I would try increasing the dwell after the low ph, to allow it to tackle those eyebrows. add 5 seconds-then test then add another 5 if this is still no good. The extra run off time will also stop it from neutralizing the high p.h. The strengths look pretty good!
 

DiamondWash

Well-known member
Joined
Aug 31, 2007
Messages
2,371
Reaction score
478
Points
83
Location
Des Moines, Iowa
Wash12 here is the link to Rhino Brite Plus https://blendco.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/Rhino-Brite-Plus-Sell-Sheet.pdf
I suggest having your distributor allowing you to sample the Presoak with Fragrance with H.A powder as your High Ph to see if that will help improve cleaning. Blendco's website needs some attention as they don't have all of their products listed I will have to send Brent McCurdy a email about it.
 
Etowah
Top