Hello From Indianapolis

[jmininger]

Hey folks, nice site you have here. I am a 40 year old IT Director of a small startup auto insurance underwriter. Married with two small kids. I am from everywhere (Allentown, Philadelphia, Raleigh-Durham, Charlotte, Dallas among other places) but for the last 8 years I've been living in Noblesville, a small northern suburb of Indianapolis, and working in Indianapolis. Always had an interest in cars but I would not classify myself as a car enthusiast if only because my spare time is spent on other hobbies.

What brought me to this site is an interest in protecting the appearance of a new car that I've purchased. I have just purchased a 2008 Honda Fit Sport. Before you laugh at my choice, my Ford truck just died on me with 280K miles on it and since I drive roughly 500 miles per week, I needed something practical ... I figure that even with car payments, I will spend less money with the new car than I spent on gas alone for my truck. Just a week with my new car and I am very happy with it. Not a fast car by any stretch but it has enough zip and handles great. Lots of room in both the front and back and the build quality is much better than you would expect in an economy car. Some may not like the appearance but I think the Sport version looks pretty good. There are definitely some lines on the car that with proper detailing would look pretty sweet.

So ... here I am. I have a brand new car (Storm Silver Metallic) and I would like to spend more time than I have in the past protecting the appearance of the car so that it stays looking new for a long time. I could just have somebody else detail the car but I would like to take a stab at doing it myself. Problem is, I really don't know what I'm doing. My normal modus operandi would be to windex the windshield, armor-all the tires and put some turtle wax on it. This presents a number of problems:

- Even using the softest MF towels I can find, I can't seem to prevent what appears to be fine scratching on the surface. Usually not noticeable but you can see it in the right light.
- The rubber and/or black plastic lining around windows, etc. Turtle wax seems to discolor it and I can't seem to get it off. As careful as I am, it simply seems unavoidable to get a little bit somewhere on the black rubber.
- Armor All looks good when first applied but it doesn't last long and it doesn't take too long for the tires to look bad (discolored) after it wears off. Same with rubber trim. I would like to find something that looks good and doesn't seem to cause the rubber or black plastic from fading prematurely.

I would also like to know how to properly take care of alloy rims to prevent or at the very least minimize the accumulation of brake dust.

Other issues that I have: Indianapolis is a cold weather city ... lots of road salt ... my new car is practically white from the salting they did last night. Freezing is an issue, wipers have a hard time. Goes below zero on a somewhat regular basis ... last night it got down to 11 degrees but the 30mph winds made it hard to breath. In the summer ... not much of a problem in the city but my neighborhood is rural enough that bug splatter in is a significant problem. Doesn't get very hot but it does get very humid. Spring and fall ... Geese migrate over our neighborhood twice a year ... everything gets splattered with droppings. Year round .... we have a lot of construction going on in my neck of the woods ... resulting in significant road debris. The water in the Indianapolis area is very hard ... soap doesn't lather well and mineral deposits stain faucets ... water softening is a big business here.

So, there you go. I am starting with a clean slate. I have not done anything with my new car yet. I see that there are a lot of experts that visit this site. I was hoping that I could glean some knowledge both from the threads on this site but also from any of you who might have some suggestions on the approach I should take and any specific products that are good to use. Clearly this is not a situation where the car needs to get restored. The objective is to bring out the detail in the car and protect the finish.

So, can anybody point me in the right direction? Thanks!