I refuse to hibernate the car over the winter here in the Northeast. Car’s meant to be driven and enjoyed I think. Consequently, I get this horror- car covered in road salt. I tried to spray under the car at one of those car wash ports, but not sure if there’s anything else I can do. Most of the car’s underbody is covered with panels, so I guess that’s ok? Just spray under the engine and exhaust/suspension components? What do other folks who drive these cars all year long do?

 

I drove my 911 last year throughout the rain,snow and salt. This year it will be sitting in the garage until spring. It is my opinion that the driving conditions were not worth the miles and wear on my car.

That being said, I would wash my car ~once a week or immediately after salty wet driving. The paint is not really the primary concern but rather the underside. The undersides of 997 are well covered but water does splash up there. Make sure at a minimum to remove the covers and clean well in the spring. If you find a warm day with nothing to do you could get under the car and spray everything with a winter seal - WD40 will work if you have it laying around.

 

Thanks! I will try to give it a good cleaning in the spring under the panels, and in the meantime will spray at least once a week under the car.

 

Perhaps someone may want to weigh in on whether or not washing the engine / exhaust area (with the engine hot) could create any issues. (Cold water / hot engine = ???). My brother had a bad experience with washing the engine of his BMW when it was hot - cracked the exhaust manifold.

 

Same sitch for me in NJ. Not ideal, but you can take it thru one of those car washes (gasp!) where the car is stationary and the spray equipment moves around the car, just make sure you select the undercarriage spray option as well. I've only done this once or twice, but plan on having my first paint correction (black car) in the spring/summer.

 

I have had very good results on my vehicles that see salted roads and on my boat. http://www.saltawayproducts.com/

On the vehicles, I hit the undercarriage especially.

 

Be careful, as many of these car washes recycle the water, so you may actually be spraying salty water back up under the car. I always sprayed my SUV's and other yearly drivers at these washes, generally with good results. However - use the soap option first - you want to loosen that salt build up. Then rinse. I also worry about spraying the hot engine with cold water - I think you do need to be careful. Best bet is to take it to the car wash and spray it before driving far and getting it real hot.

 

Ammo foam and boost winter wash

 

There is a product we used in the offshore fishing world called Salt-X that was excellent at removing salt and salt build up. Not sure how safe it is for a car's clear coat but it would be worth investigating. I used it on the rods, reels, painted surfaced of the boat, aluminum tower, etc.

 

There is an underbody attachment for a powerwasher which has casters and nozzles pointing up. Tons of them on Amazon. I have an electric powerwasher which costs about $120 and it will power this to get under the car during the winter. If you have a pressure washer with a soap tank, you could do a pass with soap. It fans the water out so it isn't too aggressive, similar to the undercarriage cleaners in some drive through car washes. You don't want it too strong, because you don't want to accidentally cut a CV boot or push water into greased sealed components like the wheel hubs.

This can help reduce salt buildup under the body, at least rinsing it off from time to time. Like you said, the underbody panels cover alot, but not the suspension or the engine bay. I would recommend you drop the panels in the spring to inspect and clean them. You'll be surprised how much road gravel accumulates on those panels.

I find rinsing and then a foam cannon (or foam spray at the car wash) and then a high pressure rinse works pretty well for softening and then removing 90%+ of that winter road grime on the exterior body panels. If it isn't too cold out, then a two bucket wash can get the rest, but I rinse the foam soap off first this time of year to prevent getting fine road sand in the wash mitt.

 

Thanks for all the suggestions guys!

 

I don't live in the NE rust belt. I saw videos on youtube by Eric O who runs a shop in uptown new York and whatever job he does under the car, it just shows everything rusted to pieces or rusted shut altogether. While I believe that Porsches are meant to be driven, but if you want to keep your car for a long time, I would just get a throw away winter car. Drive it anywhere, park it everywhere, never vacuum or wash it during the 3 winter months, then take it off your insurance for the remaining 9 months.

Peace, it's your car, do with it what you want.

 

The worst thing you can do IMO is drive the car in the salt slush and park it after that. I am religious about cleaning the cars and trucks I drive in the winter with an under body spray wand on a power washer. It certainly helps, but you can’t get a good amount of it off. Driving it in the rain after the salt has washed off the road is a good practice. Even after 10 minutes of under spray with the wand the salt is present when on the lift.

Most people wash the outside of the car off and think it’s good, but I haven’t seen many, or any cars for that matter rust from the outside to the inside. It all starts in overlapped body panels or panels that are spot welded together and grows from there. The Porsche unibody isn’t that prone to corrosion, but they do get crusty underneath.

If you want to keep it nice , don’t drive it in the salt and brine, if you do wash it quickly and thoroughly underneath and let it dry in a garage. I have a Datsun 240z that came from Kingman Arizona that is absolutely rust free, every fastener could be removed by finger after loosening with a wrench, and also a 996 that spent some of its life in NYC and it’s pretty crusty underneath and things are corroding.

If it’s lived in the rust belt most of its life, unless the previous owners didn’t drive it from late October to mid April chances are its seen road salt. If it’s a pristine southern, or western car that hasn’t seen salt it would be a small shame to introduce it now. After all that it’s just a car that was mass produced, but probably not the best one for snow and ice driving.

 

A solid sealant, wax or ceramic coating for the paint. An undercoating for the underside of the car. Although the panels are there, that will not help the salt water that will spray onto the suspension components.

In a perfect world, you have that car that you don't drive in the salt and get a second car. But there is nothing wrong with driving it if you don't plan to keep it forever.