The Best Car Care Products You Can Invest in

Are you the type of person who begrudgingly pulls out the sponge and bucket only once a year? Who figures a vacuum and a quick wipe down is something you only need to bother with before taking the car in for its annual service? If so, you need to up your game. It’s important to take pride in your car by keeping it clean and tidy and well maintained. Not only will that make it a more pleasant place to sit in, but will also help to prolong the life of both its exterior and interior. You don’t want muck and dust ruining the CD player, nor do you want bird droppings caking on the bonnet and damaging the paint.

Sure, it takes a little bit of effort every now and then to care for your car, but if you arm yourself with a few decent products, you might find the whole experience a bit more pleasurable than you’d expect. So let’s take a look at some of the best car care products you can buy to keep your wheels in tip top shape.

1. Shampoo

Good quality car shampoo will go a long way in keeping the paint job in good nick. Just like with regular shampoo, you get what you pay for. The cheap stuff does the job—or more likely it just allows you to tell yourself that—but the nice salon stuff leaves your hair looking much healthier. It’s the same with car shampoo. The regular stuff will do, but spending a little more on a better quality product will always give you better results. Most importantly, don’t just use household detergents as they can sometimes do more harm than good.

2. Microfibre wash cloths or mitts

A decent microfibre wash cloth does a far better job at cleaning off dirt and grime than a regular cloth or towel. Regular material doesn’t hold onto dirt as well as microfibre, so you’ll find yourself just smearing dirty water over the paint rather than removing it.

If you’re quite lazy and find it a bit of a bore to hold onto a piece of cloth, then a wash mitt might be the ideal solution. Just insert your hand and let your arm do the work instead.

3. High pressure hose

Now we’re getting to the fun stuff! If you leave your car without a wash for a bit longer than you should, you’ll probably find there are all sorts of mucky bits that have dried and caked onto the paint. It’s not a lot of fun having to use a cloth and elbow grease to remove this sort of stuff so why not use the raw power of a water jet instead? It’s especially satisfying to use a petrol-powered pressure hose—there’s just something rather appealing about using internal combustion to solve problems. And it gives you an excuse to annoy your partner with your cheesy Tim ‘the Tool Man’ Taylor impression. 

4. Vacuum cleaner

There’s nothing worse than trying to get into nooks and crannies with a big, cumbersome household vacuum cleaner. If you’re a bit heavy handed and tend to get frustrated with simple tasks that are made annoyingly difficult by unsuitable equipment, then a decent hand-held vacuum with a variety of attachments is a must. It’ll help keep the blood pressure down and hopefully keep you from yelling words that you’d rather the neighbours didn’t hear. 

5. Car wax

Having gone to the effort of giving your car a thorough clean, you want something to show for it. A car will always look nice after a clean, but you’ll need to give your Skoda Scala a wax if you want to be able to stand back and bask in its glory. It’s also worth remembering that the only way to squeeze in an authentic Mr. Miyagi impersonation is if you’re actually applying and then removing car wax, so you won’t want to miss out on that opportunity.

6. Squeegee

Windscreen wipers are a pain in the neck to replace, so if something a bit coarse has found its way onto your windscreen, you’d rather use a squeegee to remove it than to risk damaging your wipers. There are few things worse than ending up with those annoying wiper streaks. They don’t necessarily impair your vision in wet weather, but they sure can be eye-twitchingly frustrating.

7. Air freshener

It’s just nice to have a pleasant smelling car, right? Sometimes you have to remind yourself that just because you spend enough time in your car to not notice its various odours, your passenger probably doesn’t, so a nice air freshener will help to avoid offending their olfactory senses.

Your car needs love and attention too, so make sure you have a section in your garage or laundry that is dedicated to storing these products. If you have it all ready to go, you won’t need much encouragement to spend a couple of hours on a Sunday afternoon making your automobile spick and span. It’s certainly a lot easier than trying to put together a hodge podge mix of hand-me-down sponges and household cleaning products that will make you never want to clean your car again. And most importantly, your car will thank you for it!