Handwashing a car vs using an automatic car wash both have their respective pros and cons. Obviously, we’re a bit biased in favor of the former, since we employ live people to perform the cleaning. We don’t believe in automated machines. It just makes the job feel industrialized and impersonal. Nevertheless, we’ll break down the pros and cons of each.
Handwashing and Automated Car Washes at a Glance
The biggest benefit of an automated car wash is the speedy process, often completing the job in no more than five minutes. This makes it the go-to choice if you’re strapped for time.
Beyond the time factor, we recommend car washes by hand in almost every other instance. Most automatic car washes use a touchless system. This means there are no brushes that make contact with the car. This reduces the possibility of scratches and swirl marks, but it may also result in completely missing some obscure spots.
When our people wash a car by hand, they pay much more attention to detail. They can look for surfaces with deeply embedded dirt or grime that require extra attention. The same detailed attention also occurs when we clay, polish, and wax a car.
In addition, our human staff can also spot areas that may require additional servicing, such as a pebble-sized chip on the auto glass, or badly clouded headlights.
Automatic machines also dry the car using an air-drying method. This process may miss some areas, leading to those dreaded water spots.
We Clean the Exterior and Interior by Hand
Bring your car on over to Bellingham Detail and Auto Glass. Since we wash by hand, the process will take a bit longer. However, you can be sure we’ll do the job right. We believe there is simply no comparison when it comes to handwashing a car vs automatic washing.
Edited by Justin Vorhees
