Driven

For any of you that have been plagued with the "to wash or not to wash" dilemma of going to an automated wash....DON'T DO IT! I vowed not to, but my procrastination on winter storage forced me down that road. I wanted to get the underbody flushed to remove any salt prior to storage, and buckled under pressure and am now paying for it. I had a fairly lengthy discussion with the operator of the wash about what type of system it is...you know, what kind of cloth is used, what are the chances of any swirl marks etc... With anxiety I proceed to enter the wash. I feel the pin grab my front left tire and the car gently lurched forward entering the wash. All seems fine when I feel the first only slightly abrubt jar...and I continue through the wash. Then I feel another, but this time hear a rubber sqeek in addition. As I roll near the end of the system where the knife air blow offs are doing their job, I notice there are mirrors across the entire floor on the wall to my left. As I am admiring how damn good I look in this new ride, I notice to my horror some markings on my wheel as it rolls forward. I exit the wash and jump out to inspect closer. My heart falls into my stomach as I see three semi circle gouges around the wheel. THROUGH the paint and into the aluminum! I run back to get the attendant, and he can't figure what may have done this. He's been working there "forever" and has never seen this before. I assure him the wheel wasn't like this prior to entering his wash, and go back to inspect the track myself. Within moments I find these little weld deposits within the inner edge of the track which is otherwise perfectly smooth. The lengths of steel track are obviously welded together, but few if any of the welds are ground down and these metal weld spots protrude at least 3/8 inch! I point them out, and the guy seems to agree this is what happened and says they don't get to many low profile tires through. I suggest they grind these down, because certainly it is going to get costly replacing wheels for customers when they run $500 and up per! He says he will talk to the owner tomorrow and let me know how they will handle. I pointed out that there are no signs as you enter the wash stating that vehicles with low profile tires enter at their own risk. And that I fully expect they are going to take responsibility for this. He says they are pretty good on things like this, and I can only hope so!

Moral of this long-*** story? Don't risk it...leave your car dirty until you can do it by hand...no matter what the circumstance! I'll post later as to how things are handled. Makes me really wonder if I want to invest in even more expensive wheels for this car?

Thunderbolt

Man that sucks! Thanks for the warning, let us know how this turns out.

Driven

I should know more tomorrow and will either share in my satisfaction, or bury the name of this place in public...not that it really matters cause there are only a few of you from my area...but it will make me feel better!

ares

iTrader: (2)

sounds like they might treat you good. none the less, Id only dream of going to touchless, which I think does a shitty job of cleaning the car... so whats the point?

however it is pretty tough to get the underbody clean by yourself, unless you happen to have ahydrolic lift handy.

Thunderbolt

You just gave me an idea. There is an wand attachment for high pressure cleaners that is at a 45. That would be the ticket for cleaning road grime off the underside of the Z.