New car prep in a chip shortage world

[BlkGS]

Howdy all,

We are looking at a new car later on this year, and by all chances our new car has been built and is sitting outside the factory waiting on chips.

On new cars I know the expectation is that they'll need minimal prep, but what about a new car that's sat for 6 to 12 months waiting on parts?

My plan is to ceramic coat the vehicle, as it will be a large Suv, and my wife's daily driver with all the fun stuff that comes with that. Sprinkler water, bird droppings, relentless FL sun, etc are all to be expected, so hopefully a ood ceramic coating will make keeping it up a little easier.

Any thoughts on a situation like this?

[Odrapnew]

I'm no expert, but I'm guessing the answer will be: It depends.

The car could be sitting in the middle of a dry parking lot, never see rain or ever touched by someone, so it could just need a quick decon wash and prep.

Or, it could be 'hammered' due to environmental and human factors and need a full correction.

I don't think you'll really know until you see it.

[The Guz]

Do you know for sure the car is going to sit in waiting for parts? If not then it’s a non issue and you can proceed with prepping for a ceramic coating wen you get the car.

[PaulMys]

I would go the full-decon route regardless.

Even if the car has not sat outside of the factory waiting on chips (modules, actually), it is still subjected to rail dust from the railroad shipping, and horrible road grime from the car haulers.

And that is not even factoring in bird bombs, overspray, or industrial fall-out.

I work for a dealer, and one of my main jobs is to inspect and stock in all new arrivals.

Believe me when I tell you, that none of them roll off the truck even remotely resembling "clean".

And all of those nice, shiny ones you see at your dealer have been "washed" by the "detailing department". This is perhaps worse than the dirt/grime/rail dust. :(

[glen e]

Depending on the brand, most of the high-end cars are applying a white vinyl over the horizontal surfaces to keep environmental fallout from ruining a car as they know it’s going to sit somewhere. You may get lucky and you might want to check to see if the car is coming in has that addition. If so your decon is going to be a lot easier.

[PaulMys]

Depending on the brand, most of the high-end cars are applying a white vinyl over the horizontal surfaces to keep environmental fallout from ruining a car as they know it’s going to sit somewhere. You may get lucky and you might want to check to see if the car is coming in has that addition. If so your decon is going to be a lot easier.

Ford EcoSports have this. Real high-end! :laughing::laughing:


But yes, this is very true, Glen.

[Jazee]

Depends on the dealer's in-house detailing competency and conditions and length of time of the car's storage before sale. I bought a brand new Acura 15 years ago (that deep medium blue metallic.) Parked it under the parking lot lights a couple days after picking it up and major deep swirl marks all over. Like it was probably washed quickly with a dirty mitt/bucket. Made them reimburse me to have a professional detailer fix it!

5 weeks ago I bought a brand new Mazda CX-5 (cherry red). Got it home prepared to just do a Klasse AIO+SG on it, but was pretty surprised all the contaminants I could feel running my hand over it so had to clay it too as the AIO couldn't get rid of it all (but I was using a MF bonnet, not a foam pad.) But my hunch that was probably average as dealers I doubt clay, polish and seal every one of their cars (maybe like Porsche dealers, etc do it since they have the profit and picky clientelle, not sure.) Too much labor cuts into profits. If you aren't experienced or don't have all proper tools/products, and are wanting a perfect finish, then budget in a full exterior detail at a reputable shop. I've even done that myself a couple times on cars I've had that are 3 or 4 years old and just wanted a Pro to "reset" the finish for me. It can be "fun" to detail yourself if you've got a good part of a day free but sometimes it just is worth it to pay an expert to get everything as good as possible as a base to start from, then maintain it yourself for a while. Specifically someone that is an expert at using a rotary (not random orbit) buffer. That's something you don't mess around with unless you're sure you really know what you're doing. Rotary shouldn't be necessary on a brand new car though. Just a good wash > clay > polish > seal/wax. If the car was parked inside or not sitting outside on the lot long you might not need it to be clayed.

[Lone Wolf]

I took delivery of a 2021 Explorer ST in July. Told the dealer to not touch it when it came off the truck. They didn't. I was lucky that it didn't sit in a lot after it was built so it wasn't that dirty at all. That being said it had a lot of rail dust so I would plan on doing the whole works.

[BlkGS]

I looked at Explorer STs late last year, but ended up paying cash for a TBSS. Almost immediately after that my wife got pregnant and she ended up next in the new car rotation.

We are currently looking at 21/22 tahoes, with the diesel. I'm not sure what they're doing in terms of paint protection at the factory, but have heard they have something like 10k of them sitting around waiting on modules outside the factory.

Hopefully that means steep discounts later this year. They're going for over MSRP by 10 to 20k right now for absolute lunatics. Though, the wife does like Lexus, and I could be swayed to a 2022 gx460. That way our newborn will be able to inherit it with no problems when he's old enough, lol.


Ibwas kind of thinking that full decontamination route would be the way to go.

[Desertnate]

Do you know for sure the car is going to sit in waiting for parts? If not then it’s a non issue and you can proceed with prepping for a ceramic coating wen you get the car.

There really is no telling. The only vehicle sitting outside for long periods of times I've heard about are Ford F150's. There are thousands of them sitting in lots. Companies like GM are simply slowing down production or eliminating features from the vehicles to reduce the total number of chips needed per vehicle.


I would go the full-decon route regardless.

Agree. I always do the full process for any car, especially if I'm going to be doing a coating. Even when the production market isn't crazy, you never know how long a vehicle sat at a dealership or what it was exposed to at various shipping yards or while being transported on trains/trucks/ships.

[Desertnate]

Do you know for sure the car is going to sit in waiting for parts? If not then it’s a non issue and you can proceed with prepping for a ceramic coating wen you get the car.

There really is no telling. The only vehicle sitting outside for long periods of times I've heard about are Ford F150's. There are thousands of them sitting in lots. Companies like GM are simply slowing down production or eliminating features from the vehicles to reduce the total number of chips needed per vehicle.


I would go the full-decon route regardless.

Agree. I always do the full process for any car, especially if I'm going to be doing a coating. Even when the production market isn't crazy, you never know how long a vehicle sat at a dealership or what it was exposed to at various shipping yards or while being transported on trains/trucks/ships.