Glass cleaning. This can make your car look extremely pleasing and magnificent, or it can be a terrible, unpleasing, eye sore. Now cleaning glass is nobody’s favorite part about washing and detailing their vehicle, but here’s some tips to make the job a little easier, and to provide a better end result.
1 - Use The Right Towels
Not using the right towels is going to be one of the main reasons that you are not receiving the results that you are looking for. You are going to want to be using waffle weave towels: This fiber orientation is great for glass because of the low pile and ridged pattern. The waffle ridges trap dirt as the glide across the glass surface like tiny windshield wipers.
As well as plush 70/30 or 75/25 blend microfiber towels which will be excellent at mopping up excess cleaner to leave your vehicle streak free.
Towels can be purchased HERE from The Rag Company.
2 - Use The 2 Towel Method
The 2 towel method consists of one damp towel, to remove dirt, grime, and residue, and a clean, dry towel to remove residual moisture and streaks. Many prefer to use a waffle weave as their first towel then follow up behind with a more plush towel to remove excess streaks, and buff to a streak-free shine.
It is important (regardless of the chemicals or towels used) to make sure that your final wipe is with a clean towel section. A dirty, or over saturated towel will leave streaks.
3 - Wipe in Different Directions to Avoid Streaking
When wiping in different directions it allows you to identify where streaks persist on the glass easier than when going in the same direction. Final wipe the outside and inside of the window in perpendicular orientations. For example, vertical on the inside and horizontal on the inside (or vise versa). This way you will know which side of the glass the steaks are on.
4 - Using The Correct & Safe Glass Cleaner
Most glass cleaning chemical products are:
Alcohol Based
Ammonia Based
Alcohol based glass cleaners are solvents with strong cleaning action and fast evaporation to help prevent streaking. Ammonia based cleaners are stronger, but are not safe for tinted windows. For best practices, stick with alcohol based cleaners, as they are going to be the overall safe choice for all window types.
5 - Using Dirty or Over Saturated Towels
Dirty and over saturated towels leave streaks. For this reason always use a clean dry towel for the final wipe.
6 - Check Your Work With The Sun or a Flashlight
Now you’ve just completed your window cleaning project, but are not sure if there are streaks. The best way to check your work is to position your vehicle so that the sun is shining on your windows, then move around in different angles of your window to see if any streaks persist. This can also be duplicated using a paint match light or other type of flashlight. Just make sure to look in different angles when viewing your glass.
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