The state of a car should be a source of pride for any car owner – and there’s no better way to maintain your vehicle at its pristine best than with a car detailing routine. “What is car detailing?”, we hear you ask. It’s the process of ensuring that your car continues to look just as good as (if not better) than when you first bought it.
Our car detailing kit includes both interior and exterior car detailing products to make sure your car looks beautiful inside and out. Below you’ll find our car detailing how-to guide to help you get the most out of our products and breathe new life into your pride and joy.
Interior Car Detailing Steps
1.) Cleaning the Fabric Upholstery
When it comes to fabrics, you want to use a product that’s designed to remove deeply ingrained dirt and gunk – as fabrics trap dirt and odours.
Our Hestia Fabric Reviver, named after the Greek goddess of the hearth, helps to reignite your car’s glow. Containing UV brighteners and a pleasant linen scent, Hestia is designed to remove hard ingrained soils and smells from cigarette smoke and pet smells – making it one of the best car detailing products for fabric upholstery.
2.) Conditioning the Leather Upholstery
When detailing leather, you want to make sure that you’re not just cleaning it, but also maintaining its soft and delicate texture.
Our Dionysius Leather Reviver uses a special blend of soaps, natural oils and waxes to not only clean but moisturize the leather upholstery in your car, replenishing its essential oils. Dionysius, named after the Greek god of fruitfulness and vegetation, certainly earns its name.
It’s important to remember that your seats or dashboard aren’t always made of leather. Make sure you check before applying Dionysius.
3.) Getting Rid of Stains
For stubborn stains in your car, use a stain remover that’s specially designed to work with your car’s interior.
We recommend our Artemis Stain Eliminator, a powerful foaming formula that, like its namesake, is formidable and doesn’t back down from any challenge. As well as eliminating tough stains, it’s also fragranced to remove lingering scents for a car that looks and smells fresh.
4.) Removing Dirt and Grease from Hard Surfaces
To remove dirt and grease from your window and dashboard, you need car detailing products that are suitable for hard surfaces, like glass, and don’t leave any ugly streak marks. With Glass Perfection Cleaner you have the perfect tool to remove dirt, grease, tobacco deposits and finger marks from both interior and exterior windows. The fast-drying and solvent-free formula makes this the ideal companion to our interior detailer spray.
Our Aether Interior Detailer also perfectly fits the bill. Designed to remove dirt and grease from a wide range of hard surfaces, including plastic, metal, carbon fibre, wood, and trim, it’s an essential tool for any car interior detailing job. Scented with an apple aroma for a pleasant finish, it comes in both 500ml and 5L bottles.
Exterior Car Detailing Steps
When detailing your car’s exterior, it’s important to do this in stages. While it’s tempting to get right into the cleaning, we recommend giving your car a pre-wash first.
1.) The Pre-Wash Stage
The pre-wash stage helps to soften the more stubborn dirt on your vehicle to make the car detailing process easier. You should use an all-purpose cleaner, like our Hades Almighty Power Pre-Wash spray, on some of the tougher-to-reach areas of your car (like the lower areas and wheel arches) to break down any grease or dirt.
For alloy wheels, our Hermes Wheel Perfection Cleaner does a similar job. Simply spray on your wheels and leave for five minutes. The grease will come right off.
You might also consider using our Thanatos Bug and Sap Remover as insects can be a real pain to clean off and their acidic entrails can ruin your windscreen. This is vital in the summer months when you want to remove baked-on bugs with ease.
2.) The Snow Foam Stage
No car detailing kit is complete without a pressure washer and some snow foam. Our favourite car detailing step, this is where the serious work gets done!
Our Arctic Storm Snow Foam is a thick foam that helps to dislodge dirt and other harmful contaminants. Apply a foam blanket over your car and leave for 5 minutes, then rinse off to leave your car sparkling.
We advise using pressure washers for car detailing, like our Snow Foam Cannon, because they ensure that the foam covers the whole car and is as thick as possible for maximum effectiveness.
3.) The Contact Wash Stage
Once you’ve got all the grime off, you can begin the main wash. We recommend getting two buckets, filling one with car shampoo and the other with clean water to rinse your wash mitt.
The best car shampoo should be pH neutral and gentle on your paintwork, like our Proteus Pure Shampoo. When paired with our Hygieia Microfibre Wash Mitt, which is designed for a gentle clean, this silky shampoo allows your wash mitt to glide across your car’s bodywork with ease.
Once you’ve finished washing the car, use a microfibre drying cloth to gently dry the car.
After the contact wash stage of the detailing process, you will want to remove all the surface contaminants which stick to your car’s wax layer or even its paintwork! With Iron Fallout Eliminator, the invisible ferrous deposits can be dissolved and detoxified in minutes. Just spray on and wait for the chemical reaction to occur revealing the contaminants and then promptly rinse off.
Upon drying your car, the final step of the contact wash stage is to remove any pesky tar spots, fuel spills and heavy stains which tend to pool around the lower areas of your vehicle. The solvent and polishing minerals in the Perseus Tar Dissolver will remove these persistent spots with ease.
4.) The Clay Bar Stage
After you’ve finished washing your car, we suggest gliding a clay bar across it.
The clay bar helps to remove the tiny particles that the other car detailing steps might have missed, while also creating a smooth surface for your protective wax coating to stick to.
To apply:
- Make sure you’re wearing gloves.
- Break the clay bar in 2 and return the other half to the packet.
- Rub the clay bar in your hands to warm it up and make it more pliable.
- Apply clay bar lubricant onto the paint to help the clay bar glide more easily across your car.
- Slide the clay bar across the bodywork in straight lines. Once you’re done, wipe everything down with a microfibre cloth – preparing your car for the protective ceramic wax.
5.) The Wax Coating Stage
Applying a ceramic wax coating ensures that your now pristine paintwork remains intact, while also making it harder for contaminants to stick to your paint.
Dispense your wax onto a microfibre cloth then rub it onto your car’s bodywork in a circular, overlapping motion. Leave to dry for 5 minutes before using a clean microfibre cloth to buff to a divine shine.
Shop our range of car waxes
To find out which type of car wax is best for you, check out our article on how to wax a car and what type of wax to use:
Taking the time to detail your car is one of the best ways to ensure that your vehicle remains at its best for as long as possible.