Carwash Light Show

[Altivec]

@Altivec great setup! How did you do your soft water setup? I'm considering it to avoid having to spend time drying off the truck after washing.

You must live in the warmer part of Edmonton. I visited the area last winter and they had a few days of -50C with the windchill. Flights were getting cancelled because it was too cold.

The warmer part of Edmonton... LOL. Yeah. -50C with windchill (-58F) use to be the normal cold spells we use to get and a nice day would be -20C (-4F). But things have changed dramatically up here over the past decade... on average it's about 20C warmer. Once in a blue moon we still do get those -50C days but now it's more the exception than the norm.

I built a new house about 5 years ago so I had everything customized the way I wanted it. So the soft water is set up from the perspective of plumbing done at the time of construction rather than a retrofit. I have my plumbing split up into 3 lines. Regular tap water, soft water, and Reverse Osmosis. All the systems are in my furnace room in the basement. RO lines go to separate faucets at the sink locations and fridges, Soft water goes to most of the fixtures, and regular tap water mainly goes to exterior hose bibs. Reason being, the salt used to make soft water is very bad for plants and lawn (unless you use very expensive potassium)

Most softeners are single canister where they can't be used during the time they are changing the ions. This is about a half hour process that happens every few hundred gallons. To avoid being without water, a time is scheduled during the night where it does this. The problem with this, is it must empty its contents and start from scratch even if it's still good. Very wasteful. I got a unique one where it has two tanks that just alternate when they are empty. No waste and no down time.

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[sd25]

Awesome! A well thought out setup. Appreciate the great details.

It's far beyond what I'll need, but it does give me some ideas for a retrofit to use RO. Thanks!

 

[Heliian]

No. I have it shut off

I usually go through the touch less wash, next time I hand wash I'll check but this behaviour is strange. I walk by my truck when it's raining all the time and nothing happens.

 

[Altivec]

I usually go through the touch less wash, next time I hand wash I'll check but this behaviour is strange. I walk by my truck when it's raining all the time and nothing happens.

Give it a try. it's not like you will have to even try to make it happen. It's pretty instant. Just spray your hose near the handles and it for sure will happen. I've never had it happen with rain or snow either. I thought that maybe it was the pressure of the pressure washer even though I was trying my best not to make direct contact. But then I just used a low pressure garden hose and it still happened. Maybe it's the volume or spread of the water that tricks it into thinking it's a hand?

 

[chl]

I am in Canada and it’s winter time, so grime accumulates fast. We need to do a lot of quick washes just to get the salt off. We have car washes here that consist of just a wand wash for this purpose. Basically a big heated warehouse with 20 or 30 coin operated stalls separated by curtains.

When washing around the doors (which is a good portion of the truck), the touch sensors around the locks provide a light show in my stall which is quite embarrassing. Doors lock, then unlock, running boards up, then down, mirrors fold in, then fold out, lights on and then flash off. This repeats 10 to 20 times during the wash. It was nice out the other day, so I tried just using a low pressure garden hose in my driveway and the same thing. I enjoy meeting people to talk about my truck, but having people ask “what’s going in there, are you having a party?” is not really the attention I want to attract.

I surprisingly can’t find anyone else mentioning this so I feel that I am missing something obvious. Is there something like a car wash mode I am missing here? Does anyone else experience this? What do you do?

I sympathize.

That happens with my wife's Prius with the touch lock/unlock sensors that almost always ignore my fingers but open and close for every single drop of water I spray on it when washing it by hand!

I am glad I do not have any such problems with my 2023 Lightning Pro.

I have the same problem with touch screens - when I want them to open or close something they ignore me, but when I accidentally touch anything...chaos!

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