How Swirls Appear on Auto Paint?

One issue that's always on people's minds is how to avoid swirls or circular marks in paint, especially on darker paints. These marks appear in ALL colors, but they're most easily observed on darker paints. The reality is that it's impossible to prevent paint streaks; it can be reduced.

Any paint mark occurs when it comes into contact with something, be it your hand, clothing, a microfiber cloth, another car, a shopping cart, etc. Since contact is the main cause of swirls, there's a greater risk of creating swirls when we wash and dry the car (paint). This means we can control and reduce the risk of marking the paint when we wash our car.

When we wash our car, it's essential to use soap and water to remove dirt and easily clean the paint. Soap helps lubricate the surface to reduce friction and prevent swirls. But a common mistake occurs after cleaning the first panel or section of our car, when the sponge or cloth is dirty. We're used to dumping the dirty sponge into the bucket of soap and water to find clean or fresh water. But this creates a problem: that water is now dirty, and when we use that dirty water on the paint, it causes more swirls. This increases the risk of marring the paint.

To avoid using dirty water, I recommend using two buckets or pails: one for soapy water and the other for water with a dirt trap or grill for rinsing the sponge.

This second bucket is extremely important. The idea is to keep the dirt removed from the paint separate from the water used to clean it. This minimizes scraping the paint with old dirt and prevents creating more swirls.

In the photo, I show the idea of ​​using both buckets. As you can see, the clean bucket is the one used only with soap. As you can see, it looks very clean. The bucket with the black water is completely dirty; it's the one used to rinse the sponge with all the dirt. You can also see the grill on the outside of the bucket, which doesn't affect the color of the water.