We all love our cars, be they the newest model or vintage rolling stock. Whether you’re into Lincolns, BMWs or Hondas, we all share the same interest in four-wheeled machinery. And while some cars are pressed into daily service, others are treasured babies, used only when the weather is friendly to them.
For the first time in my life, I intentionally own two cars. The daily driver is a 2006 Volvo V50 2.4i with 86K on the clock. Since last October, it has been an outside car, sitting in my assigned spot at my condo.
This was due, as most of you know, to Car #2, my 2000 Lincoln Town Car Cartier, which now gets the garage. This took some open-mindedness on my part, because I used to go nuts when it would rain as it would screw up my usually-washed-and-waxed V50.
image: caranddriver.com
But that wasn’t all. I always park in the “back forty” whether going to the movies, the grocery store, or the mall. The people who circle a parking lot five or ten times to get a spot two places closer bring laziness to an art form and as such, I assume they are not careful when opening their car doors. Better safe than sorry. Several years ago, I got a big ding in one of the rear doors. I KNEW it had to have happened at work, because that’s the only time I didn’t have the option of parking far away from other cars. Of course, no one ever fessed up–arrgh! I had it fixed after the bank so generously downsized me, and I had no further worries about idiots dinging the car. But I digress…
Now that it is outside, I am planning on getting a car cover for the wagon for spring, summer and fall (winter use would be a bad idea). There are a lot of trees–and, by association, birds–in my parking lot. I will still do my best to keep it clean though! So, how protective are you of your car?
I used to be very protective. Then came a move to larger city, wife, kids, minivan, etc. Door dings and stains don’t bother me anymore. It’s practically impossible to keep them in pristine condition if you use a parking lot and haul kids.
I still take better than average care of them but I don’t sweat the small stuff anymore. I’m not going to park in the back 40 every day just to avoid a few dings. I’m not going to spend several Saturdays each year detailing them. I need more simplicity and convenience at this stage of my life, not less.
At heart though, I suppose I’ve always been a “driver quality” type of guy. I have no desire to ever own a trailer queen.
Parking in the back 40 has other advantages. You have a longer ways to walk to the store. More exercise is good for everybody!
Depends on the car. My old F150 Heritage… eh. It’s a lovable old work horse that I run through the car wash a few times a year, shake out the blankets cover the seats and wash those blankets. No more, no less.
The wife’s car I’ll take to the local wash, wax, and detailing place once a year where they shampoo everything inside and shine everything outside. I’ll nu-finish car polish it at least one a year in between those working overs.
My baby, the Mustang? High quality 4 season car cover whenever its not being driven, just like the guys who have to store their motorcycles outside but use custom covers when not in use.
I’m like Phil. I used to be fairly anal about my cars. Having three teenagers in the house is a good cure for that.
It is always kind of nice (in a perverse way) when a new car gets its first scratch or ding. Sort of liberating, and I can quit obsessing over it.
That depends how long it is before that first scratch or ding. My wife’s car got its first a few days after being purchased, when our son dropped some shopping on the fender alongside the open trunk lid. That ding is still there fourteen years later!
Twice now I’ve owned two vehicles at the same time, but this is the first time I’ve really been able to do so comfortably from a financial standpoint. One is a nearly-new DD, the other a 13 year-old toy.
I only have one spot in my garage, so I rotate them between home and a covered storage unit a few miles away. It certainly isn’t the most economical scenario, but the peace of mind is worth it to me. I keep both as immaculately clean as I can – no eating in either, and they always get washed and fueled before being parked in storage – but I’m not nearly as obsessive as I used to be about keeping both protected from door dings, etc. when out in the wild.
I echo Phil’s comment above, I’m a driver quality kind of guy. I have no desire, whatsoever, to ever have a trailer queen.
I don’t mind the usual dings and stuff that happens, its just what happens. I didn’t even sweat it when someone put a small dent in the side of my new car because it basically popped out in the heat and a little buffing took out the scratch. That said, I wouldn’t have minded bashing in the windshield of the SOB that did it.
Living as I do in Manhattan, I keep my car in one of the “outer boroughs” in a parking space I rent there.
Because I don’t drive it daily (or sometimes, even, weekly), I like to keep a cover on it. But I can’t be OCD about it. If I ever buy an old Cadillac convertible, which I kind of want to do rather badly, THAT car I would garage. Not as a show car, but as a nice weather car. It makes no sense to leave something with a convertible top out in the weather. It would certainly get driven fequently in the summer and on nice winter days.
Not protective enough,my Mk4 Cortina was stolen from the war zone I was living in back in 87
For daily drivers, not at all. Mrs DougD parks in a public lot at the hospital every day, and one of our vehicles gets scraped or clouted at least once a year by an elderly driver who doesn’t notice.
After about the third time I decided it was easier to live with it than get upset about it. I just sigh and say “That’s why we can’t have nice cars”
I would advise against the car cover on an outside car. Dirt and dust seems to find a way of blowing up under the cover, no matter how perfect the fit. The wind moves the cover and you move the cover applying/moving it and the dust under it acts like sandpaper on your clearcoat.
+1 yes my experience as well…..don’t put a cover on a car outside just a bad idea especially in the north freeze…thaw cycle you wont be able to take the cover off once its frozen without hacking at the ice
Yes, I learned that lesson. I used to have a Mustang I parked in the winter under a cover. When my winter beater blew a front seal I needed to get the Mustang out. The rather expensive cover was frozen to the car and I ruined it taking it off. Obviously it wouldn’t have been frozen to the car unless it had trapped moisture underneath, which isn’t a good thing.
I also had a bra on one of my Mustangs, which ended up doing far more damage than it could have possibly prevented.
Still, depending on conditions, covers can prevent more damage than they cause. It’s a lot easier to buff out a few scratches than it is to replace a convertable top, dashboard, weathered trim, etc.
I wasn’t too worried about it until I traded in my ’01 Prius and got seriously dinged for all the door dings it had.
Now I always go for that spot on the end by the grass strip where I can get well away from the car next door (or the next car’s door, or something). So far so good, the ’10 Prius’ naked trim-less flanks are ding-free. (Its curb-scraping air dams are another story, but at least I can fix them with touchup paint.)
Used to be all but the stripper models had a long full-length chrome strip that took the dings. I wish they were back.
My car is outside all year round, which means I have to have a vehicle that in some ways is already past bothering about. I’m with Bowman on the cover thing, plus if moisture get under that fabric it does the car no good as well.
With my 03 Caravan SE (received last July) I keep up on the maintenance and partake in preventative maintenance. For example, the owner’s manual says to replace the Timing Belt at 101-103K miles, but I figure Daimler-Chrysler was full of **** and this was one of their ways to kill your vehicle so you will buy another one of their vehicles. So I replaced the Timing Belt and all related components including the H2O Pump at 89K just to be safe. Before I got the Caravan (which I named Edward) the Tranny was rebuilt at 80K and it has a useless Tru-coat-like rust proofing that does not work so I assume the previous owner(s) were inept when it comes to vehicles. Plus, there are various dents, terminal rust from being a New York vehicle for 10 years, and other things that make me not like the previous owner(s) vehicle knowledge. No road salt in Oregon so I only wash the Caravan every few months.
Usually try to be easy on the throttle and not mash the accelerator which has rewarded me with almost 21 MPG. Overall I treat it like the underpowered and fragile Daimler Chrysler product it is, but I still drive defensively. If road debris or nature scratches or dents it I no longer sweat it.
Comment system says I do not have permission to edit my comment even though I thought there was a 15 minute window.
If I feel like it I will put a club on my steering wheel if in a rough part of town or traveling.
21 mpg in town or on the highway? Our ’98 GC (3.3L) averaged around 23-24, and we’ve seen 26-27 on long highway trips (driving gently, as you described, and at posted speed limits).
The ’12 Routan (3.6L) we got last year has hit 30mpg a couple times on highway trips, and averages about 25.
Of course, we live out in corn and bean country, so not much stop & go traffic to contend with, if you discount the occasional combine.
Right now I drive about 75% on the Interstates around Portland, but usually I am on surface streets and have gotten as low as 15 MPG. I have the 150 HP 2.4 Litre engine motivating 3,750 Lbs and I plan on getting a new, better battery shortly. My 95 Voyager with the 3 Litre with 142 HP hauling 3,300 Lbs got about 18-19 MPG in mostly country driving. I figure the 2.4 Litre is just overworked despite my best efforts thus the so-so MPG.
If I make a long drive up or down I-5 I am going to drive at 60 for a hundred miles or so and see what kind of MPG I can muster. Doing that on I-40 with the Voyager got me nearly 23 MPG back in 2012.
Knock on wood, I’ve always been fairly lucky in terms of parking lot dings.
When a clean car is clean, I find it kind of frustrating because I feel the need to keep it flawless. After giving the faux Touring Sedan a full wash/clay/wax treatment, for instance, I spent the following week carrying a microfiber rag in the console to correct any imperfections, and hand-washed it almost daily because it bugged me to see that perfect finish dirty. But when the week after brought constant rain, I was forced to get over it.
Worst ever? I was 18, five months after graduation and doing some consulting for my former high school. I was driving the Regal at the time. It was around 2:00 and I had to grab something from my office, so I parked the car behind the school and ran in – windows open, doors unlocked (wasn’t worried, since it was rare for anyone to pass through that area).
Returned less than 5 minutes later to find three kids who were cutting class, hiding out behind the building, and checking out my car. One was actually sitting in the driver’s seat, holding the wheel and making engine noises! I would have completely lost it had I not been concerned about job security. Instead, I growled out something to the effect of “what the hell do you think you’re doing”, which prompted the kids to utter a barrage of apologies and make a hasty exit.
That one still ticks me off to this day. Needless to say, I didn’t make the same mistake twice!
As my daily driver approaches “beater status” (14 years old), I am still careful (but not anal) about where I park it. It has only the same 2 small dings it had when I bought it seven years ago.
My favorite shopping spot to park is next to the cart rack. People who bother to put carts in the racks are not likely to whack cars with them.
+1 to parking next to the cart rack. I also like to park as close to the rack as possible, to keep farther away from the next-adjacent parking spot and reducing the chance of door dings on both sides.
I work at a supermarket and always tell new hires that employee parking in the same part of the lot is a good idea because you want to be parked between two other people who’ll also be there all day, probably won’t be coming out with a cart, and know to put it back when they do!
By the cart corral is the second-worst place to park, those things are surprisingly floppy after a winter of being knocked around by the plow and people tend to shove their empty carts in the general direction. Just out from the handicapped spaces are *the* worst, people toss carts there too.
One of the biggest challenges in LA and environs is street parallel parking – which you’re often forced to use because there is little off-street parking in many areas. So many people don’t know how to park or park by ear and your painted bumper is going to get dinged no matter how carefully you park. I tend to search for end spaces on the street when I’m out and about. When my car was new I carefully parked in an end space where there was plenty of room in front. Came back to find that someone had backed into and bent the new front license plate. At least it would have been their bumper that bore the imprint of my plate bolts.
As time goes on you kind of give up because people are so careless or incompetent here in SoCal. I recently saw an elderly woman in a big Lexus swing too wide in a parking garage and clobber the rear of someone’s parked, beautifully restored 50’s collector car.
I kind of long for the days of the big old 5MPH bumpers with guards and thick vinyl inserts. Ugly but protective.
PS Having had two cars stolen since I’ve lived in SoCal, I don’t leave anything of importance in the car. One that was stolen had both a factory alarm and The Club installed. Needless to say, I’ve never wasted a dime or a minute of time on the latter since then…
I’m just like you, Tom when it comes to the Titan. Even though in November I will have had it 10 years from new, it only has 12640 miles on it. I always find the isolated spot far away where no one else is likely to park, and try to find one next to a curb so I can squeeze a little farther to the side so if someone does park next to it their door may not hit it. And I have a canopy in the back yard it sits under. I use it for the times I need a truck or for road trips. But I drive it about 15 miles at least every 2 weeks and keep tank low so it gets fresh gas and battery charged, still has the battery it had when it was new. The Jetta is my around town driver, it still looks good but you can see quite a few “parking lot blues”. It’s at the age now I just park wherever. It does still go in the garage, though.
After having my 98 Civic door dinged to death in SF parking garages I got religion with my slab-sided Xb1 and only park it at the end of aisles in my parking garage at work, never with cars on both sides and always as far away as possible from the car that is there. Not hard to do if you’re willing to wind your way to the upper floors. That covers 90% of my car’s time and the other 10% in grocery store lots etc I do my best. I’m ding-free. Other than that I’m not all that protective, its just the careless dings I hate.
Oh I forgot, no eating or drinking in the car, period. I was talking to an Italian colleague about people eating/drinking in their cars and asked if Italians would do that. He had this horrified look on his face. “We would go to a café” he said, “why would you want to eat in your car?”
My ’71 Vega got washed weekly at least (college and pre-marriage days). The next few cars were also babied, but after marriage and kids, it became less of a priority.
I didn’t worry about *any* dings the years I drove the Mayfield Belle (rarely washed it, either), but went to the opposite end of the spectrum when the Belle was succeeded by my ’64 Beetle. As I gradually sorted Eeyore car out, I became more selective of where I parked, and it got the garage spot at home.
Living on a farm as we do now, with only a gravel drive and seasonally contending with soil thrown from tractors & implements being roaded field to field, I am back to not worrying about it too much. I do try to run the cars through a touchless car wash with undercarriage sprayers as often as possible during the winter due to heavy salting on county and State roads. We have no proper car garage, and parking inside the machine shed only leads to rapid encrusting with guano, so vehicles stay outside most of the time.
Oh, I *eat* in the car, too. The horrors.
I own a couple of cool cars. I worked hard to buy and/or restore them and I take a lot of pride in them but in the end they are just cars. They are garaged and well taken care of but when someone I know (and TRUST, that being the operative word) needs to borrow one or just wants to take one for a ride, I throw them the keys.
Eating is OK. I do not machine wash or valet park them, I park them as far away from other cars as possible (I usually try and get corner spots) and very rarely do I let a mechanic touch one
I know I commented above, but…
Letting someone else drive your car is a whole ‘nother thing. I can count on one hand how many times that’s happened, outside of immediate family – and I wouldn’t come close to needing all my fingers.
Food is okay, in the hands of adults who can figure out how not to spill things. But no mess gets left after I park it. And I can’t stand garbage in a vehicle – it gets discarded at the first possible opportunity.
“Dashboard dining” is a pretty common occurrence when I’m driving one of the work trucks. But even leaving an empty cup in the holder bugs me.
One other that I don’t think I’ve seen above: pets in vehicles. My old man has no problem with letting the dog sit on the passenger’s seat, or anywhere else he pleases (within reason). But I make him stay on the floor. And in vehicles which have required a lot of interior work, he just isn’t permitted, period. (Good old Trouble never did see the inside of the faux Touring Sedan, for instance; and has only once been in the Suburban. But he’s rode in my Silverado many times.)
Some sure aren’t worried about the dog thing though. The PO of Son of C’s Mazda6 must have let his dog live in the car. It took two full interior details and several additional hours with a vacuum to get only 90% of the fur out, and it still smells like dog. The good news is that that and the 5 speed probably saved us $1,500 when we bought it.
(Full disclosure : I’m a cat person and haver owned a dog, and our only current pets are guinea pigs)
Interesting about letting others drive your car. There are some cars I’ve owned that I doubt anyone else could have even gotten *started,* much less driven safely. (c:
I think my wife drove my ’64 Beetle *once* during the six years I owned it, and not at all in the ’71 VW van (Mayfield Belle, owned eight years).
Come to think of it, she hasn’t driven the ’13 Beetle yet, either. Will have to rectify that come warm weather.
Im with you on the dogs Kieth. I love my dogs and they are family members but they are relegated to whichever car has the worst interior, which right now is my Road Runner but its so loud they are scared to come anywhere near it (old Cherry Bombs + 440 with a radical cam=dogs afraid to come anywhere near the garage). I also have long haired dogs (a German Shepherd and a mutt with Boxer origins) that perpetually shed all year so that does make it harder to justify putting them in a nice car. It was easier when I was married, I just put them in her car, haha.
The only people who’ve driven my wagon are my parents and my brother. No one but me has driven the Town Car–so far. It will probably stay that way 🙂
I don’t mind having a friend take one for a spin. To me its a sense of pride…as in “your car sucks, look what mine can do” lol
I let my GF drive my Road Runner once and she couldn’t believe an old car could go so fast. I also let a young seaman on one of the Cutters drive my 1969 Charger because he had never seen one up close in person that wasn’t at a car show or in a movie. It made his day and hopefully he will look for an old car to restore now.
“But that wasn’t all. I always park in the “back forty” whether going to the movies, the grocery store, or the mall. The people who circle a parking lot five or ten times to get a spot two places closer bring laziness to an art form and as such, I assume they are not careful when opening their car doors.”
Amen, my brother, but I can go one more. I once drove 10 miles back to my house to drop off my pristine 87 911 Cab to pick up my DD to go to the mall because I didn’t want to risk parking it anywhere at the mall.
I was a lot more worried about it with my first new car (87 Mustang), my wife’s 91 Miata, and (for a while) our first family vehicle, a 96 Cherokee. But as others have said, kids broke me of that obsession. Still keep them up mechanically, but no time for frequent washing, and cleaned the interiors after car sick kids, but that’s about it. (Much better now that they’re all teens.) (Except for the collection of Subway wrappers left by the Boy Scouts on the way to our monthly campouts.)
For some reason certain of our cars are parking-lot dent magnets. After a few years our 98 Grand Voyager got quite a number of unexplained bumper scuffs, and our Odyssey’s bumpers were just as bad much more rapidly. But the CRV that replaced the Oddy 3+ years a o has none….
Care of cars – my attitude has certainly changed over time.
My first car got babied. I used to wash my ’74 Cortina weekly, and polish it every two months or so. I’d be very careful parking it. Every weekend if I wasn’t driving it I’d be doing something to it, or cruising the aisles in the local auto parts stores, in case there was something I “needed”. Then I realised I’d polished through the paint on the hood! Rust began to appear here and there. kids came. Suddenly we needed a manual car to teach them to drive, and the automatic Cortina languished in the shed. Eventually it was given to my son’s friend who got it going and sold it to a guy who was going to restore it.
Second car was an ’87 Ford Laser (think Mercury Tracer). Washed monthly, polished three-monthly to try to keep some shine in the old paint. After your teenager drives through a narrow farm gateway at 60km/h you don’t worry too much about a bit of supermarket rash. Then it was pressed into service doing fortnightly trips across the state to care for an elderly aunt. A new job required a reliable car, as the Laser ensured I got my money’s worth from my auto club membership! it was sold to my son’s friend, and wore out two years later after many interstate trips.
Third car was my elderly aunt’s ’84 Suzuki Swift. My daughter quickly claimed it as hers, as the controls were so light, and it just zoomed along despite only three cylinders. Although it came to me as a 21 year old car, it had only 19,000 km on the clock, but the body was a bit banged about already, so we didn’t take particular care about that. my daughter bought a newer car (Honda Jazz), so we passed Suzi on to my brother-in-law, She’s still going well.
My fourth car is an ’05 Mazda 3. She lives outside, might get washed twice a year, and has never been polished. I used to take particular care where I parked it, but after my daughter scraped the side badly in a parking garage, I haven’t been too worried about parking, though I find a good layer of grime tends to keep people from bumping/rubbing up against it!
” Suddenly we needed a manual car to teach them to drive,” is a sentence that would never be said in the US these days. Son of C is the only one of his circle of friends who drives a stick – heck, plenty of his peers don’t drive yet at almost 18.
I’m glad I taught him to watch Top Gear…. (Luckily the insurance company hasn’t seen his Stig decal!)
Both our sons learned a manual shortly after getting their learner’s permit. I also took them out in the snow-covered hay field with the 2WD pickup and had them practice getting into, and out of skids until I felt they were doing it as second nature.
Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately this winter!) no snow-covered hay fields (or any hay fields for that matter) here in San Diego ‘burbs.
But snow covered gravel lots in upstate NY in a 2wd pickup is how I learned car control. I also think that the fact that I had close to 5,000 bicycle miles under my belt by the time I got my license helped a lot too.
Here if you learn in an automatic, that’s all you can drive unless you’ve held a licence for quite a few years. Kind of limiting, but makes perfect sense. Learning in a manual teaches better car control anyway, IMHO.
I learnt in a manual back in the days when automatics were not so common. My first car was automatic, but I’ve had manuals ever since.
You’re not allowed to drive a manual here if you passed the driver’s license test in an automatic. In that case, if you want to go manual that means passing a new test.
All my daily drivers have been manuals. 4 speed, 5 speed and a 6 speed (Toyota Avensis) for just two days.
My almost-15 YO daughter will learn on a manual because she will end up getting my DD passed along to her. Of course, she doesn’t know this yet…
Not that anal about anything really.. But eastern Canada is a salty place even in the sumer but this time of year the roads are nearly white with salt and as soon as you set tire on them your car is a scruffy mess so I just deal with it and wash my car every once and a while. Now as dents go I used to care, I would try hard to keep my s70 with only the dents I bought it with( every panel has a dent and that isn’t a joke). That is until the drivers door latch decided it did not want to disarm the Alarm and I kicked the back door in frustration. After this happened a few more times I just didn’t care and now my 10 daughter, nice and. 12 year old nephew drive it around our back lot regularly.
How protective? Extremely so. My daily driver, 2004 Focus, gets a unique spot at work where the car can be diagonal so no one can get near it. Only 1 ding in 10 years now. Washed every week when not raining and the inside immaculate as all my cars are. The F100 is out back under a tent as the paint work is finished up. The Park Lane in front is covered as it waits it’s turn for painting. The Polara is finished and in the front driveway under a cover. The Focus next to it with no cover since this is No. California.
My wife’s Sable is oh so another matter as my wife is a slob to put it politely. Parks in too close in a lot and the inside can be a mess. I can’t stand it so rarely ride in it unless cleaned ahead of time. My 91 626 is a beater with the clear coat peeling off but with a great interior. Probably won’t be treated as a beater once I paint it.
The most precious cars, the Cougar and Mustang, sit in the garage under covers. No one, other than me, drives any of my cars. Not even my father, who owned the Cougar in 1968, can drive it and he did ask once. His constant off and on with the gas pedal always made me nervous. Recently took the Cougar to a Cougar get together and there was no parking. Told had to park it on the street somewhere and the parking was the head in type and not parallel. After a 40 mile trip I turned around and drove home. The Cougar has not been on a public street or lot in 43 years and will never be anywhere where I can’t see it.
Think that is bad you should see me when I clean up all the decks on the Island of the USS Hornet. What can I say I am a perfectionist but only in relation to myself and I am my most contented when I can really restore or clean something up. Tomorrow I get to go to the Hornet and can’t wait as always.
I’m funny about my old stuff. If there’s any chance of precipitation, I drive one of the trucks, my wife’s Mustang 🙂 or the Suburban. I’ve been miserable lately due to the awful weather and summer can’t come soon enough.
I’m one of those who always parks in the boonies or at the corner parking spots at work (if I’m late). Scoring the few select “close” spots in the parking garage at work is actually the reason I’m an “early birdie”.
Despite that, it’s rare if any of my vehicles get washed more than twice a year.
Interesting to see the different perspectives on “protective”. I check and change fluids religiously and like a really clean interior and under-hood. I rarely eat in the car and try to clear out any trash daily. The outside? Meh, not a big deal. I also lock the doors. And if it’s reasonably convenient I’ll park away from other cars. My wife’s car does get garaged and she takes it to a car wash occasionally. But I probably clean the interiior of her car more frequently. That big, black, expanse of New Beetle dash is not a thing of beauty when covered in a layer of dust.
My daily driver 1999 Dodge Stratus, which was still like-new when I got it with only 7K miles at 21 months old, has been treated much better than the previous cars. I’ve tried to rarely ever eat or drink in it. Amazingly, it has survived with no dings or dents, scrapes or scratches. I still park as far away as necessary to avoid careless people opening their doors into my car. And to avoid large vehicles like pickups, vans, and SUVs which are not so easy to maneuver into and out of parking spaces. Will have had this car 14 years in a couple of months and it is up to 220K miles. I note that some people I know have had 3 or 4 cars in the time I’ve owned by DD. Will acknowledge that the car was repainted and had a little body work 2 years ago as a result of a bit of rust on the rocker panels on both sides and on the hood. And will mention that about 4 years ago was given a request from the boss to drive his boss to the airport first thing. Was proud that the interior and trunk was absolutely immaculate; no dirt, dust, clutter or trash! The tires were good and the brakes were good.
I’ll share one other detail that is important to me: keeping the windows clean in order to have optimum visibility. Although I park my car in the garage, I almost always take a moment when I get home or before I leave for work to clean the windshield and both side windows. Especially in the winter when the salt and slush get splashed up or sprayed all over the car. Unlike a lot of newer cars, this car offers great visibility and my philosophy is that being able to see clearly affords me the optimum opportunity to avoid any close calls.
Reading the other postings reminded me that there was one relatively small incident that happened to it in the first couple of years I had the car. On the way to work, a young (punk) kid hiding behind a tree or some bushes threw a rock which hit the windshield and permanently nicked it. Fortunately the window has never developed any cracking. I did stop the car immediately to try to find and chase after the kid, but never found him.
Oh, and I did take time today to do a quickie vacuum of the interior. Normally, I get a bit obsessive and wipe down the dash, interior door panels, and clean inside the door jamb, the scuff plate and do the interior windows.
One other habit I have is that when I take the car to a mechanic or service garage, I remove EVERYTHING from the car. I mean from inside the glove box, the console, under the seat and anything inside the trunk save for the tire and jack. Just not willing to risk anything going missing.
I remove most things too. Especially loose change – “lead me not into temptation…” I don’t worry about maps, as most people seem to use GPS these days anyway.
A mate in the US had his truck in for a service, and someone stole the CD he had in the player – which was one I’d sent him of a favourite Aussie band. As he said, now he knows someone else in the States likes the Rogue Traders!
My daily driver (a 2002 Land Cruiser diesel) is always neat and clean on the inside, I hate sitting in a dump area. I don’t care about the outside, it’s an upgraded farm tractor anyway. And since I’m in agribusiness you just can’t keep it dust and mud free.
The hobby car (a 1969 Plymouth) is always neat and clean on both the inside and on the outside. Garage kept, of course. And I’m only driving it when the sun is shining. And when the roads are absolutely free of salt during winter. Last winter was very mild, so I could keep on driving all winter long.
I try not to park my Lincoln near other. Cars. My old truck it don’t matter as its all rusty debuted abs primer painted. They get good maintenance though.
Not at all. After someone stole the tail lights(!) I kind of lost the urge to worry to much.
My Hillman lives in my carport I spent a lot of time repairing rust on that one so I’m not chancing it rusting again, my Nissan and Citroen live outdoors the Citroen hasnt been washed for 12 months buts galvanized so shouldnt deteriorate the Sentra I couldnt care less about if I dont put it back on the road soon it will likely go for scrap anyway.
Using a 37 year old car for a daily driver, I’m protective in the sense that body parts are damn near impossible to find. And being in New England, I wash the bottom half (or the whole car if it’s nasty) each night before I put her in the garage.
When people ask how is it the car is always clean, I answer that it isn’t easy being OCD.
I’m pretty obsessive about mine. It lives outside under maple trees, so I keep it washed and waxed, and rinse it almost daily when the pollen is flying and the songbirds are bombing. As far as parking lots go, I routinely park well away from other cars. I learned a long time ago that people are not concerned about the expensive property of others.
My 2005 Ford Focus has a few dings & scrapes (mostly self-inflicted!), but it still looks pretty good. I do have a garage to put it in & I use the car wash frequently during the winter (I live in MA). I keep the interior clean & I have usually have “my space” in the mall or supermarket which I try to have at least one space open per side.
My 95 Olds 98 was formerly owned by a 90 year old woman and thus has more than it’s share of dents, dings and scratches. I drive it into the automatic car wash booth at the gas station every once in a while. The inside stays very clean, at least according to my coworkers. I am 6’5″ tall and rarely ride in anyone else’s car. No one drives my car but me, ever!
The world hates my cars.
Bought an 85 Mazda GLC new. Within a few months a kid threw a rock at it, left a dent in the driver’s door 3″ across…off to the body shop. A year later, thief broke out the driver’s door window….off to the shop again. A year later, drunk gouged left rear fender and wheel arch…off to the shop again. A couple years later, two idiots sat on the hood leaving big dents, gave up on keeping up with the dents. I didn’t have a garage until the car was 10 years old. By then it was suffering from rust and dead paint.
In spite of all those indignities, I kept washing and waxing it, and parking way away from the idots…even though they kept finding it.
The GLC gave way to a 98 Civic. The world hated that car too. I would, again, park it in the back 40, but the idiots found it anyway. Front left fender was hit by an SUV and caved in…off to the body shop. Went to the local Firestone for a free tire rotation. The idiot that was poking around under the hood looking for something else to sell me tried to close the hood without folding the prop rod, bending the hood and breaking the rod…off to the body shop again.
In spite of these indignities, I not only kept it washed and waxed, I bought a beater to keep the miles down on the Civic, and I paid for winter storage for the Civic to keep it out of the salt. When I sold the Civic last fall, 15 years old, 110,000 miles there was not a dent or speck of rust, glossy paint and clean interior,
Now I have a new Jetta wagon…waiting to see if the world hates it too.
Keep thinking about getting a new beater to protect the Jetta….Chevy Cobalts should be cheap right now.
I have always been very protective of my cars. Oil changes before factory mandates, specialist service, frequent washing/detailing, and lots of my own sweat and toil. I moved to the Twin Cities in June of 2013 and was lucky enough to have a garage for the first time in my life. Which I promptly scratched my car on. Nothing major, just a saturday afternoon of effort to put right. people down the block could hear my swearing. My Saab was always my life. A ever faithful companion. Out of sympathy I lend it to a friend who was ashamed of the over 300k Camry he bought from his father as a daily driver. He needed a car that said “Young Executive” to impress a date. My Black 9-3 complimented his dates black 05′-06′ ish Volvo S60 nicely. Far better than they complimented each other. I gave that car lots of love and after fighting with my friend when he wanted it for a second date, I refused to give it to him and went out for dinner when it was promptly totaled by a Fed-Ex truck that doesn’t understand speed limits or the effect of snow on pavement. No one was hurt thank God!
The moral of the story is I’m even more protective of my new Saab. A 06′ 9-3 Aero.
I used to handwash my car about 3 times a week and waxed it a few times a year. Now with work, dog and wife, I take it to the local car wash about once a month. Both cars are parked outside and so I just do the best I can.
I refuse to own anything that I am afraid to drive. I will admit that I am guilty of parking away from other cars if it’s possible and I try to avoid driving my ’63 Microbus in the rain but that’s more because of the inherent leaking of the safari windshields and it’s annoying.
The way that I am protective is who drives my cars. It is a very short list. There are only three people who I will hand the keys to and let drive them without me there, my dad, my youngest brother and my best friend who might as well be my brother. No one else has driven my Beetle and only one other person has driven my Bus and it was with me riding shotgun.
I’m pretty good about maintenance and keeping the interior clean, but otherwise I just don’t really care. When I bought my Saab, part of the appeal was that it was so ugly I’d never even know if someone bumped into it and dented it. Parking on the street near my office is a full contact sport and even if I had a super nice car I wouldn’t park far away from anyone else in parking lots.
I always get the car washed after it snows, too – so it’s been cleaner than ever this winter!
I use a 1991 Merc 200E as a daily driver. I park it on the street. I don’t use the crowded lot right in the front of the apartment buliding, I parallel park it to to avoid door-accidents. I bought my W124 last year: it doesn’t have any rust but it has some light scratches on it – it looks really good but not show-ready so I’m not afraid of use her everyday in the city. I drive carefully, on big supermarket lots I park her far from the crowded places. It gets hand-washed 2 times a month and that’s all – still looks like when I’ve bought it.
My Merc doesn’t looks new or doesn’t look like a show-car but it looks much better than the average beater W124s here in Hungary. It’s still a shiny black Mercedes-Benz and it will be for years. 🙂
I save my analness for my Harley. My winter beater ’96 Crown Vic, hell, if somebody broadsided it while parked I probably wouldn’t even notice, and my Fairmont isn’t far enough along with her mods and bodywork to worry about be anal with it either.