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[funkydoodycool]

Sacrilege!  I know right

But honestly, the absolute worst thing about it is the spray up the back!  I gave mine the Meguiars 3-step yesterday afternoon, and polished all the glass in and out.  It looked FANTASTIC.

Drove 25 miles round trip to work and back, and can't see out the back for dirt!

[kanapa1]

Drove 25 miles round trip to work and back, and can't see out the back for dirt!

  I have a WV Variant - its really worse. 

[Problemchild]

Ferrina fitted a lotus style rear undertray and that helped but it won't work with the BRAB lower rear spoiler.

May be worth investigating though

JJ

[CrazyG]

Unfortunately having a dirty back end of a car can be either a mix of good design, or bad design...

Aerodynamics play a significatnt part in recent/modern car design. By directing the flow of air
over as well as under the car, and it is used to generate a 'suction' effect at the rear to draw the
car down to the road, enhancing roadholding. The downside to this is that the trubulent air then
causes dirt and muck to be depositied all over the rear of our 'pride and joy'.
Of note kis that the Brabus upper roof spoiler and lower valance spoiler actually increase that
effect even more !  I know as the back of mine got dirtier faster when I fitted the Brab roof
spoiler, and even more dirty quicker after I fitted the lower valance !
(recently the lower valance came off...accident damage...and the rear hasn't got quite so
  dirty as it used to do....but it looks odd without it, and I'm waiting on fitting it back on again.)

[nomad8459]

What CrazyG says is the truth, it can be an annoyance of course.

But the handling qualities are so much improved by that air pushing that rear end down (compensating for lack of engine weight).

The forfour suffers greatly from the "dirty bum" problem but its a small area to concentrate on to re-polish more often than the other areas.

[funkydoodycool]

Well the joy of the meguiars 3-step is that it only needs it every 3-4 months.
In between I wash it with a wash and wax (meguiars yellow gooey one at the
moment) which keeps it shiny.

[Big Dunc]

It is annoying (but the Brabus is no worse than my range rover in this respect), but really anoys me is....

the rear screen washer jet

a) keeps blocking up

b) is particuarly useless when not blocked

[mr singh]

i havnt washed mine since about october last year. i carnt see a point in washing it with all the salt on the road. it will get the full treatment when the sun comes out in april onwards and my car will shine once again!

one thing that annoys me on mine is the rear wiper, i replaced the wiper rubber and ever since it doesnt cleant the rear screen properly.

[funkydoodycool]

i carnt see a point in washing it with all the salt on the road.

That's one of the best reasons to wash it regularly in the winter!  The salt is bad for eveything (except probably the plastic panels) but will rot paint and metal alike.

I always wash my cars once a week (probably twice for Brabbie thanks to the theme of this thread) and in winter get the hose under the car to wash the salt off the undercarriage.

But that's just me Some of us don't service a car in 2 years

[LadyV]

I agree- I wash my car every three months or so. I spend £15.00 and get a full valet and the car shines like new.

With all of the dirt, grit and salt on the road, you're causing untold damage to your paintwork.

The problem for me is the back of the car and also my white alloys...they are covered in dirt and you wouldn't know that they were white unless it had had a wash!

[Alex]

If they did make something at the back that would stop it dirtying up, it would probably increase drag by a huge amount. All that dirt that sticks on the back of your car is from air rushing to fill the gap that the car makes in the atmosphere, so filling a void that would otherwise pull you back.

It's impossible to make a hatchback stay clean, it's just it's shape. If it had a bit of a bum, like in a fastback it would get dirty only up to the point where the air coming down the rear window detaches from the car. But since on our car this happens right off the top of the car, than there's nothing we can do about it.

I drive with the rear blind on at all times, and can't see anything out the window unless it has lights. So it's no issue for me. Wiper only comes on a few times a year, when i forget to switch off the front wipers and i reverse

[CrazyG]

Perhaps the real issue here in respect of the 'unclean' rears of our cars is that we all
are put off doing it as we feel we have to clean all the car... and the time and effort it
takes to do it is what puts us off.
Maybe we need a 'shift of logic' to...."I'm going to clean the back of the car", and do just
that !  Do not let yourself get sidetracked into then doing the sides, the front and the roof,
just do tha damn back, and be done with it.

[Unknown]

My reg plate and lights get cleaned regularly but if I were to clean my car fully I would be doing it daily!!! I do 80 to 100 miles a day, my journey starts off in rural Yorkshire (mud everywhere), then continues into the city (spray from other vehicles), then onto dual carriageway and Humber Bridge (spray from the Humber, lorries, cars, etc.). Then its trek across rural Lincolnshire again mud and crud. My forfour is currently brown with mud 'flames' and pin striping. She won't cleaned until the weather improves enough to justify cleaning her.

[nomad8459]

Its a question of how you feel really. Is you car a utility or something to value?

I wash mine twice a month with Turtle Wax ICE wash and then give a thorough polish with Turtle Wax ICE once a month.

Personally I think washing in winter is more important, that salt can be very damaging!

[LadyV]

I agree with Nomad, but also who has the time to wash their car more often? I know I don't and I certainly don't want to be outside in the freezing cold during limited daylight hours washing the car!