Expert Interior Detailing Tips! | Twin City Used Car Sales Fort Payne, AL

Car detailing means going way beyond the usual washing and vacuuming. When accomplishing the job, you have to heed the tiny details, such as swirl marks, stain, scratches, dents and other surface imperfections. Removing these imperfections will result in making your vehicle look show-worthy and visually appealing. If you want to detail your car, begin with the interior. Here are a few tips on how you can accomplish interior detailing:

•    Remove floor mats and vacuum the floor, upholstery, rear space, trunk and mats. Slide the seat back and forward to vacuum the underneath carpet properly. While dusting, start from the top and slightly work your way down. Dust and dirt settled on the top will fall down.

•    Apply a foam cleanser to clean the carpets or upholstery stains. After cleansing the carpets, rub them with a damp piece of cloth or sponge. Repeat if the stains don’t remove properly. After your final cleaner application, wash the area and blot it properly. Try to get as much dampness from the fabric as much as you can. This is so because excesses of dampness may promote molding and/or mildew.

•    If required, repair carpet holes, burns or small permanent stains.

•    To remove dust from the buttons, crevices and tiny slots on the dash and interior doors, use compressed air. 

•    Use a mild all-purpose cleaner to wipe hard interior surfaces.

•    Clean car air vent grilles using detailing brushes. Use a super-absorbent brush that picks dust and dirt efficiently, if you’re not going to use liquid afterward.

•    While cleaning seats, different methods are used as they can be made from different materials. You can either wash them or simply wipe with a damp piece of cloth or sponge, depending of the type of seat. No matter whatever you do with the seat, don’t forget to vacuum out the seat or surrounding after cleaning.

•    If you have an interior with nylon or other cloths, you can shampoo it with a wet-vac extraction machine. After extraction, dry the cloth properly.

•    Leather or vinyl interiors should cleaned with a leather or vinyl cleaner. Afterward, you can wipe away the cleaner with a microfiber cloth.

Interior detailing is a labor-intensive and time-consuming job, which requires utmost care and high efficiency. Can you do it on your own? Of course you can! 

Parking Under Trees Could Prove Hazardous! | Twin City Used Car Sales Fort Payne, AL

In these hot summer months, the temptation to search for shade in which to park is very high, especially if you have leather interior. Nobody enjoys the feeling of leaving a restaurant or returning to their car from running errands and then hopping in a scorching seat. To top it off, you have to sit in the sun while your car cools down because your steering wheel is as hot as a stove top! Everybody appreciates a chance at avoiding this discomfort.

Unfortunately, parking under trees is not a solution. While you can certainly park your car in the shade of a distant tree or nearby building, there are numerous reasons why you should never park your car directly under a tree, no matter if it is in your driveway or a parking lot. Here are the top 4 reasons to stay away from trees, no matter how shady they are:

1. Bird droppings are no fun. If you are like most people, you do not appreciate seeing a smear of droppings across your windshield or around your door. It almost seems as if birds do this on purpose, especially if your car is new or has just been washed and waxed. Not only are these gifts from above unsightly and gross, especially if they land on your door handles, they can also be harmful to your vehicle. Bird droppings can fade and chip paint over time, leaving stains that never go away, no matter how hard these areas are scrubbed. It is recommended that you wash off bird droppings as soon as possible. Parking under a tree invites feathered fiends--which love resting and nesting in trees, of course--to turn your car into a toilet.

2. When bad weather strikes, you should feel lucky to be indoors. You can be safe and dry inside a building and leave your car unattended in the storm. The most common case of foul weather, light rain, is no big deal to your vehicle. However, if you are parked under a tree, even the slightest winds and rain can lead to a major problem for your car. Loose branches and sticks can easily fall onto it, scratching your paint job or even damaging your glass. If the weather gets very intense, the entire tree could fall on your vehicle. A windshield replacement is simple and affordable enough, but what do you do when your entire roof or hood is smashed in?

3. The only perk to parking under a tree is its shade. However, there are simple solutions to beating the hot sun. You can have your windows tinted, replace them with pre-tinted glass, or put up a simple sun visor. These things might seem like relics from the 80s and 90s but they are still perfectly effective at bouncing sunlight away from your car, which keeps it cool.

4. Not only do birds love leaving their droppings on cars, but they will also love standing on your car. Trees do not only attract birds. Cats may venture by for a hunt and climb atop your vehicle with their dirty paws and sharp claws. Squirrels, mice, raccoons and other small animals may also climb onto your vehicle, eat atop it, and leave nutshells, dirt, and stray hairs behind as they participate in the little ecosystem around the tree. Heaven forbid one of these larger animals should urinate or leave droppings on your car. 

While many of these problems seem unlikely, you could also say that car accidents are unlikely. Everyone knows, though, that when it comes to your vehicle and safety, you should do everything you can to prevent damage. Avoid parking under trees to minimize these risks.