Car wash
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
A car wash is a facility used to clean the exterior and in some case, the interior of motor vehicles. While there are many different types of car washes, most fall into three main groups:
- Self-service facilities, that are generally coin-operated
- In-bay automatics, which consist of an automatic machine that rolls back and forth over a stationary vehicle
- "Tunnel washes", which use conveyors to push or pull the vehicle through a series of fixed cleaning mechanisms.
Mechanized car washes, especially those with brushes, were once avoided by some meticulous car owners because of the risk of damaging the finish. This perception of vehicle damage was the motivation behind the rise of the touch-free car wash facility.
In a modern car wash facility, whether automatic, in-bay automatic or self-serve, soaps and other chemicals used are based on milder acids and alkalies designed to loosen and eliminate dirt and grime. This is in contrast to earlier times, when hydrofluoric acid, a hazardous chemical, was the most common cleaning agent used in the industry. There is currently a strong move in the industry to shift to safer products. Many car wash facilities are now required by law to treat and reuse their water, in contrast to less elaborate facilities where wash water simply ends up in the storm drain and eventually into rivers and lakes.
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[edit] Self Serve Car Washes
A simple and automated type of car wash is a coin-operated or token-operated self-service system. The vehicle is parked inside a large bay that is equipped with a house cleaner sprayer and a scrub brush. When customers insert coins or tokens into the controller, they can choose to have soap or water dispensed from the sprayer, or to scrub the vehicle with the brush. The number of coins or tokens inserted determines the amount of time customers have to operate the equipment, however in most instances, a minimum number of coins are necessary to start the equipment. These facilities are often equipped with separate vacuum stations that allow customers to clean the upholstery and rugs inside their cars.
[edit] Automatic car wash
The first automatic car washes appeared in the mid 1950s. Mechanized car washes consist of tunnel-like bays into which customers drive their cars. Some car washes, following the exterior express trend, allow their customers to pay through a computerized POS, or point of sale unit, also known as an "automatic cashier", which in many cases may take the place of a greeter. The mechanism inputs the wash PLU into a master computer or a tunnel controller automatically. When the sale is automated, after paying the car is put into a line-up often called the stack or queue. The stack moves sequentially, so the wash knows what each car purchased. After pulling up to the tunnel, an attendant usually guides the customer onto the track or conveyor. At some washes, both tires will pass over a tire sensor, and the system will send several rollers. The tire sensor lets the wash know where the wheels are and how far apart they are. On other systems, however, the employee may have to guide the customer on and hit the 'Send Car' button on the tunnel controller.
While on the conveyor or track, the attendant will usually ask the customer to put his or her vehicle into neutral, release all brakes, and refrain from steering. Failure to do so will inhibit the conveyor. The rollers catch the tires, pushing the car through a photo eye or magnetic loop detector, which measures vehicle length, allowing the controller to tailor the wash to each individual vehicle. The equipment frame, or arches, vary in number and type. A good car wash makes use of many different pieces of equipment to thoroughly clean the vehicle.
The customer will first encounter one or two arches, often called pre-soak arches. They either apply a lower pH (mild acid) followed by a higher pH (mild alkali), or the order may be reversed depending on chemical suppliers and formula used. Some use hot water feeds during dilution into a hydrominder of some form to enhance the operation of the chemicals. Others go more corrosive, some being pH eight and above using sodium hydroxide, phosphoric acid, or hydrofluoric acid which can etch glass. Of course, these are not used in harmful concentrations since car washes are designed not to harm a vehicle's components or finish.
The customer next encounters tire and wheel nozzles, which the industry calls CTAs (Chemical Tire Applicators). These will apply either a degreaser with a high alkalinity solution, or even an acid. These remove brake dust and build up from the surface of the wheels. The next arch should be entrance wraps usually made of a soft cloth, micro-fiber, neo-glide, or other or cloth-like material. This gentle cloth, despite popular belief, will not scratch the vehicle unless something is caught in them. This is why most washes will not allow anything in the back of a truck go through their wash. These should rub the front bumper and, if programmed with a good cloth pattern, will make a swipe on each side of the rear of the vehicle cleaning the license plate. Past the first wraps or entrance wraps is a tire brush spinning at a high RPM that will scrub the tires. This is usually located beneath the mitters (hanging curtains of cloth strips that move front to back or side to side) or top brushes. There may also be rocker panel washers which are shorter in size (ranging in size from 18 inches up to 63 inches tall) that clean the lower parts of the vehicle. Most rocker brushes house the motor below the brush hub so they don't inhibit cloth movement and allow the brush to be mounted under a support frame or below a mitter.
The mitters cloth can vary greatly between perma color, micro-fiber, or more gentle neo-glide. After the mitters, the car passes through exit wraps which are just like the entrance wraps. This is where the water works begin with high pressure streams of water. The customer either passes over an under carriage wash or gets high pressure nozzles pointed up on a mounted base. Next, if available, is a tire spinner or omni spinner. These are high pressure nozzles angled and mounted on a spindle. When high pressure is forced through, it causes the nozzles to spin rapidly. If timed, programed, and adjusted correctly, the nozzles will follow the front and back rims. Past the omni spinners are the omnis-- high pressure nozzles mounted on the sides and top of an arch. These will move side to side and up and down blasting dirt from the cracks of the vehicle (not yet in the rinsing phase). After passing the omnis, the vehicle may triple foamers, usually red, blue, and yellow.
There are two types of foam: polish and wax. Polish is cheaper and may be harder to rinse off, sometimes becoming solid matter in its holding tank. Wax is more expensive, but rinses well and covers the vehicle with a lighter and puffier foam. It does offer more protection than the polish, but is not what protects overall. The next arch will be mitters to rub the foam on the vehicle. Some washes have multiple rinse stages, usually offering a protectant. Protectants vary greatly with some making water bead (or gather) and some making water sheet (or spread to a thin layer) before being blown away by a dryer. Near the rinse is where a tire shiner, which is made of foam pads that retract and have a thick oily substance pumped through them like glycol to rub across tires producing a wet or new look. Finally the vehicle encounters a spot free rinse of soft water that has been filtered of chlorine and sent trough semi permeable membranes to produce highly diluted water that will not leave spots. After using spot free water, the vehicle usually does not require hand drying. The wash often finishes with this drying, and a light usually indicates for the customer to leave.
Old-style automatic washes used rotating brushes with soft nylon bristles, but these tended to put faint scratches in the vehicle's paint. Some brushes are made of soft cloth, and these are less harmful to a car's finish. The most current technology is a foam based brush (called a "wrap"), which is resistant to this when properly lubricated with water. In order to avoid scratching issues, "touchless" or "no-touch" car washes were developed. This means the car is washed with high water pressure instead of actual machine equipment.
At "full-service" car washes, the exterior of the car is washed mechanically with conveyorized equipment, but attendants are available to dry the car manually, clean any spots the equipment has missed, and to clean the interior (normally consisting of cleaning the windows, wiping the front and side dashes, and vacuuming the carpet and upholstery).
[edit] Bikini car wash
Bikini car washes are a summer event that occurs, usually for two purposes:
- It is generally a fund raiser for a school, a sport association or any other youth organization or charity. Typically, attractive college/high school girls in bikinis bring in donors by standing on a roadside with colorful cardboard signs, and the cars are washed by their male and female classmates in a nearby parking lot.
- There are also commercial bikini car washes, where bikini clad girls actually wash the cars for a fee and the entertainment of the drivers. Hooters restaurants usually have bikini car washes in the summer to attract customers.
There are frequent references to bikini car wash in pop culture, for instance, the movie The Bikini Carwash Company or in the Jessica Simpson music video These Boots Are Made for Walkin'.
[edit] Environmental factors
The primary environmental considerations for car washing are:
- Use of water and energy resources;
- Contamination of surface waters;
- Contamination of soil and groundwater.
Use of water supplies and energy are self-evident, since car washes are users of such resources. The professional car wash industry has made great strides in reducing its environmental footprint, a trend that will continue to accelerate due to regulation and consumer demand. Many car washes already use water reclamation systems to significantly reduce water usage and a variety of energy usage reduction technologies.
Contamination of surface waters arises from the rinseate discharging to storm drains, which in turn most commonly drain to rivers and lakes. Chief pollutants in such wash-water include phosphates; oil and grease; and lead. This is almost exclusively an issue for home/driveway washing. Professional carwashing is a "non-point source" of discharge that has the ability to capture these contaminants and have them undergo treatment before being released into sanitary systems. (Water and contaminants that enter storm water drains does not undergo treatment, and is released directly into rivers, lakes and streams.)
Soil contamination is sometimes related to such surface runoff, but more importantly is associated with soil contamination from underground fuel tanks or auto servicing operations which commonly are ancillary uses of car wash sites - but not an issue for car washing itself.
For these reasons, some state and local environmental groups (the most notable being the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection) have begun campaigns to encourage consumers to use professional car washes as opposed to driveway washing, including moving charity car wash fund raisers from parking lots to professional car washes.
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