# My New Car! – Detail Part 1 – Interior Steam Cleaning + Washing and Claying



## mattjonescardiff (Dec 12, 2006)

I promised e46zone.com members a write-up of the Detailing process that I've started on my newly acquired BMW E46 2001 330i SE and to explain/demonstrate some techniques. Apologies if I'm 'teaching granny to suck eggs' here on Detailing World, but I've tried to go into some detail for this write-up explaining steam cleaning and claying to those who have never done it before.

My e46 3 Series has covered 63,000 and the overall condition was very good to begin with (hardly a scratch or stonechip), but a good thorough Detail was needed to bring back the finish to standard after 9 years of use.

This first part of the Detail is covering the interior, engine and cleaning the exterior. Paint correction will come later when I've got a bit more time on my hands. These first few jobs were done over the space of some evenings and the weekend so approximately 12 hours work time.

Apologies that some of the photos are huge. I need to go through them on photobucket to resize them smaller (Does anyone know how to re-size a whole album? Doing each image individually is taking ages). Will change them as soon as I can.

First up was to clean the leather and plastics. Like the exterior, the interior had little or no wear but being cream, it shows all the dirt in the crevices and grains of the materials. Here's what I started with:








Ingrained dirt in the leather:








Even dirtier on the door trim: 
















Here's the tool for the job - a Vax steam cleaner.








Here it is in action. 








The process for the leather was firstly a good brush and vacuum, then a gentle steam to loosen ingrained dirt and warm the leather. Then it was sprayed with Zymol leather cleaner and gently scrubbed in circles with a soft bristled brush. Then wiped with a damp cloth to remove residue. A 50:50 shot of half the drivers seat (I went back over this section a little more after this though):
























With the hard plastic trim you can be more aggressive with the steam (the leather will degrade if you hit it too much). Here's a 50:50 of the top of the drivers door half done:
















This process was repeated over the rest of the leather and trim. I then vacuumed the whole of the car and took the mats out. The mats were sprayed with All Purpose Cleaner and scrubbed with a stiff brush, then hosed liberally to remove the soap and left to drip dry overnight on the washing line:








Then in the morning I wet-vacced them with the Vax 6131 to remove the last of the water:








Using a spirit level I put in some stripes (like mowing a lawn):
















Then I finally applied some Chemical Guys Fabric Guard to protect them:








Mats all finished and left in the sun to dry:








There was some stains on the boot lining so this was also shampooed and wet vacced. No stripes here though sorry (I'm slacking I know!):









Back to the interior, there was loads of dust in the vents and around the buttons. Firstly cleaned out using APC, detail brushes and microfiber cloths:








The glass was cleaned and air freshener applied, then the plastics were brushed and wiped with microfiber cloths and Poorboys Natural Look dressing:








The finishing touch was two coats of Zymol Leather Conditioner (although I recommend Gliptone if you're looking for a conditioner - although the Zymol is good the Gliptone is better VFM and smells great).









Interior all finished I moved on to the exterior. The first job is always arches and wheels. The e46, like quite a few cars, has a big lip under the rear arch that's lethal for collecting dirt. A common or garden bog brush and some APC is ideal for removing this. If you've never done it, here's why you should:
First go at removing the dirt: 








Plenty more to come so I jacked up the rear:








The grease on the jack mechanism showed that it's never been used in the past, which was nice to see (so I gave it a good clean before storing it away):








Here's the dirt I was getting out. A fair few kilos which would just cause rot if left, so go out and do yours this weekend (but please buy a new toilet brush, don't borrow the one from the bathroom!):








I then cleaned all the crevices of the exterior with APC and brushes, plus the door and boot shuts:








I wasn't planning on doing the engine just yet but I opened the bonnet and couldn't resist. Here's taking out all the leaves and debris from those hard to reach places with some pincers. Again, would otherwise rot:








Engine sprayed with APC and scrubbed with brushes (as was underside of bonnet), then rinsed lightly with a hose on 'rain' setting. Engine then run for a few minutes to dry. Normally you need to cover electrics under an engine bay but the e46 is very covered. If in doubt spray electrical connectors with WD40 before washing to protect them, and always take care with where you apply cleaner and water. Avoid those electrics, plus avoid belts etc:








After a good thorough wash of the body with a strong shampoo solution, microfibre wash mitt and two buckets (one with shampoo and one to rinse your dirt mitt in - therefore meaning you always have a clean mitt going onto the car) to remove and previous protection layer it was ready for claying. There's no need to dry the car first, just got for it. Here's the tools, a couple of pieces of clay in warm water and some lube (weak shampoo is fine as lube):








To clay, you firstly spray a panel with lots of lube (and keep continually spraying):








Then rub the clay with finger pressure back and fore. This grabs out the contaminants that are bonded on to the paint and normal washing just won't remove. Paint that felt sandpapery rough before becomes glass smooth. 








Here's the contaminants (tree sap, tar, acid rain etc) removed from one pass of half the bootlid:








Keep switching the pieces of clay from the warm water to keep it supple. Once a side is dirty, knead the clay to get a fresh face and continue. These two pieces will easily do the whole car, just keep kneading it. Here's the clay after one half of the roof:








I then rinsed the same half of the roof and repeated the process over the same area with a fresh face of the clay. More contaminants came off, so I kept repeating the process till the clay was not picking up any more. Here's the clay after the second pass:








Work from the top down, cleanest to dirtiest (as you do for washing the car). Side panels are the worst for tar deposits. Here's the clay after the drivers door:








Be aware that claying will inflict some 'marring' (small marks in the paint). Ideally you should machine polish afterwards, but a hand polish will remove them. Use a polish with a light abrasive like Autoglym Super Resin Polish, and give it plenty of elbow grease when you work it in.

Once the whole car was clayed it had a final rinse off. Meguiars Last touch was spritzed over the car as a drying aid and a large plush drying cloth was used. I recommend not using aqua blades, as they can drag dirt over the paint and cause damage. Chamois leather isn't really ideal either for the same reason. Microfibre ply towels are the best bet as if they come across some dirt it sits up into the ply rather than being dragged along the flat face of a blade. A similar principle applies to sponges, a flat sponge will drag dirt across the car, whereas a microfibre mitt will be less likely to do this. If you don't want to pay for an expensive drying towel then a house towel will do the job pretty well.:









As I said earlier, the corrective polishing will have to wait until another day as this is a really time consuming part of a Detail. In the meantime I gave the car a quick once over for some protection. I used the UDM random orbital polisher:








And some Meguiars Tech wax on a Lake Country CCS polishing pad. A good off-the-shelf all-in-one product that contains chemical cleaners, fillers and a sealant. 








The polishing/waxing underway:
















Some final touches:
Megs Endurance Tyre gel applied with a brush:








Rain x applied to the windows (thanks to Bob for bringing me back to Rain-x!)








Dirty exhaust before:








Autosol and wire wool used to polish (although I will get the Dremel polisher out on this soon):








Shiny exhaust:








Meguiars Hyper dressing applied to engine bay (no finished shot of the engine yet sorry):








Here's the interior finished and the mats back in:

















And here's the car at the end of the above. I'll take better photos once the exterior is properly polished and I've applied some layers of top quality carnauba wax.
































Thanks for reading. Hopefully you've found it interesting/useful/a good laugh at how sad I am!

Any questions are welcome.
Matt


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## AlanQS (May 6, 2009)

Thanks for this very interesting write-up. I look forward to the rest.

I have a question. I have a 2 year old E92 with cream beige leather. Although I use either Gliptone or AG to clean the leather, I suspect that, over time, the leather is a little darker than original. Do I have to go to the extent of steam or would a leather brush with Gliptone suffice? (I have only used a damp cloth to date to clean the leather.)


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## shredder1uk (Oct 5, 2008)

looks good Matthew.


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## SuperchargedLlama (Apr 25, 2008)

Very good write up there matey - and well done for explaining the reasons behind the steps before the main target audience you're aiming it!


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## colarado red (Jun 5, 2008)

Superb work,nice to see someone else using nxt


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## ryanuk (Jun 22, 2007)

looks good mate,just post bigger pictures next time  lol


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## mattjonescardiff (Dec 12, 2006)

AlanQS said:


> Thanks for this very interesting write-up. I look forward to the rest.
> 
> I have a question. I have a 2 year old E92 with cream beige leather. Although I use either Gliptone or AG to clean the leather, I suspect that, over time, the leather is a little darker than original. Do I have to go to the extent of steam or would a leather brush with Gliptone suffice? (I have only used a damp cloth to date to clean the leather.)


Hi Alan

Thanks for the kind words.

When you say you're using Gliptone/AG to clean the leather do you mean you are just using their cleaner fluids, or just using their conditioners, or both?

I get the impression you're just using the conditioner? If so, prep the leather first by working some cleaner with a soft bristle brush then removing the residue with some MF towels soaking in warm water. Then apply the conditioner afterwards. This should clean off dirt (or dye transfer from clothing) that is darkening the colour. I would avoid using a steam cleaner in your case as the car is very new and it shouldn't need such an aggresive technique.

Matt


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## mattjonescardiff (Dec 12, 2006)

Pictures all re-sized now!


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## egon (Apr 25, 2007)

I have one of them! In the 323Se flavour! That looks great matt!
No leather in mine though...

Have you found a combo that works well on the stilhblau?


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## mattjonescardiff (Dec 12, 2006)

Is Stihl blue the colour? I've been meaning to find out the name of this colour. 

They're great cars, I'm very pleased with it.

I think protection wise I'll be following Dodo Juice Lime Prime off with a couple of coats of Supernatural wax and then overlaying that as often as possible with either Victoria Concours wax or Zymol Creame wax.


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## egon (Apr 25, 2007)

Oooh, forgot to ask if the exhaust is standard? mines matt black...
Yeah, i have a touch up pen for mine to do a couple of stonechips and it says stahlblau...(sorry, spelling was out on my last post...)


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## Lazy_boyo (Apr 2, 2008)

its eithe stihl blue or samoa blue


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## Matt. (Aug 26, 2007)

Great work there, i have a feeling Jeffs Werkstat would work well with this colour


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## Guest (Apr 20, 2010)

Attacking the tar etc. on the doors/sides with Tardis or similar would have saved you some time and clay :thumb:
Very good guide though


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## Eddy (Apr 13, 2008)

looks good, and some good explanations making it simple for the newer guys.


top stuff


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## mattjonescardiff (Dec 12, 2006)

egon said:


> Oooh, forgot to ask if the exhaust is standard? mines matt black...
> Yeah, i have a touch up pen for mine to do a couple of stonechips and it says stahlblau...(sorry, spelling was out on my last post...)


Yes the exhaust is standard. I suspect you might find some metal under that matt black layer of soot on yours. Give it a polish!


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## Gaz_jones (Apr 24, 2009)

Looks very tidy mate. Good job.


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## Ronnie (Nov 15, 2006)

Great write up and love the new car. Health to enjoy.


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## Black-Cat (Oct 7, 2009)

Enjoyed reading that! Some good tips, thanks! :thumb:


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## Ti22 (Mar 24, 2009)

Nice new motor Matt! Glad you're enjoying BM ownership - I've got to hold my hand up to being a bit of a BM nut. 

Can't wait to see it fully corrected!

James


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## -tom- (Jan 27, 2009)

very very nice work


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## NCB (Apr 22, 2010)

Looking good. Im new to all this i've always kept my cars looking good but ive never clayed or machine polished,Ive got the gear but keep putting off doing it all in fear of wrecking my pride and joy.....................is using a orbital polisher as easy as it looks?


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## Christian6984 (Dec 20, 2007)

nice car, looking very tidy.


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## mattjonescardiff (Dec 12, 2006)

NCB said:


> Looking good. Im new to all this i've always kept my cars looking good but ive never clayed or machine polished,Ive got the gear but keep putting off doing it all in fear of wrecking my pride and joy.....................is using a orbital polisher as easy as it looks?


A random orbital polisher like the UDM, PC or G220 is very amateur friendly. Although it vibrates a lot (due to the random orbital nature) it isn't very agressive at all.

What's the car out of interest?

Have a good read of DAVEKG's guides here on Detailing World and have a go. If you're nervous start with a very light abrasive polish like Meg's #80 or Dodo Lime Prime.  You won't get much correction but you can learn the technique of completing a set and breaking down polish. Once you're confident you can step up the aggresiveness of your polishing to acheive correction. Alternatively (and probably the better option), find a willing volunteer with an old car that you can practice on. They get a nice shiny car at the end of it and you get to practice your technique. Good luck! :buffer:


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## NCB (Apr 22, 2010)

mattjonescardiff said:


> A random orbital polisher like the UDM, PC or G220 is very amateur friendly. Although it vibrates a lot (due to the random orbital nature) it isn't very agressive at all.
> 
> What's the car out of interest?
> 
> Have a good read of DAVEKG's guides here on Detailing World and have a go. If you're nervous start with a very light abrasive polish like Meg's #80 or Dodo Lime Prime. You won't get much correction but you can learn the technique of completing a set and breaking down polish. Once you're confident you can step up the aggresiveness of your polishing to acheive correction. Alternatively (and probably the better option), find a willing volunteer with an old car that you can practice on. They get a nice shiny car at the end of it and you get to practice your technique. Good luck! :buffer:


:thumb: Thanks its a mk4 mondeo in sea grey. It's in good condition really and i dont think it needs much correction, i've polished it a few times with Autoglym SRP and i've used the ultra deep shine stuff but i can't get the shine i had on my last car...and polishing the car 2-3 times a week is getting me some funny looks from the nosey fookers on the street..i'm going to try putting some wax on next time i polish not sure if this will give me the deep shine i'm after..:buffer::thumb:


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