Last night on the way back from the hockey game, the roads were heavily brined due to the light dusting that we got during the day. Today when we pulled the Defender out of the garage it was absolutely filthy with salt. I tend to try and wash it or have the wife go through the touchless carwash once a week but I'm wondering if I should go more often?

I've seen people say that "you don't have to worry about corrosion on modern cars" which I can tell you is horsepooey. Sure its not as bad as it used to be, but chemistry is chemistry and even aluminum corrodes. The bolts on the control arms of our Defender are already rusted over and I'm sure there's a lot more under there that I haven't seen yet that is feeling the elements.

I have an NH Oil undercoating on my truck that does an absolutely awesome job keeping the salt away from the metal, but it makes a huge mess when working on the truck and I'd prefer not to do it on the Defendah if I don't need to.

 

Here in Cincinnati we usually have fairly mild winters, but last week we had that big snowstorm, and we do get a decent amount of snow during the winter regardless. I usually try to wash my Defender (and Porsche & Audi) after all the salt & grime is visibly off the road, so it really just depends. On average, I probably wash it around 6-8 times per winter.

Also, winter is the only time I use an automatic car wash. There is one a couple miles from my house that isn’t too bad on the paint, and it also cleans the undercarriage VERY well, hence why I use it in the winter. I also have a ceramic coating on all my vehicles and that helps to an extent. Once it gets warmer, I always have my buddy detail my vehicles.

Like you said, corrosion is still something that you’ll want to prevent, even though the Defender (and my other vehicles) are nearly all-aluminum and don’t rust/corrode on the level of steel.

 

In Western NY here, I have a car wash subscription for $30 per month and get my vehicles washed at least 1-2 times per week in the winter. I feel it's critical to have the undercarriage blast included which doesn't come with the basic $20 subscription, so I go up to the mid-grade subscription... the highest level subscription is $40 and that one adds ceramic. I don't bother with it. Anyways if I go more than a week without washing it in the winter I've dropped the ball. There are weeks in the winter where I would even recommend getting it done three times if you can work that into your schedule, it just depends upon the condition of the roads. If I walk up to it in the morning and there's salt all over it then I should be getting it washed that day, that's the way I look at it... wouldn't matter to me if I washed it the day before. Just depends IMO upon where you live and even here where the winters are harsh I'd say there are probably several months in the fall when I could get away without even having a subscription, it just doesn't seem to get very dirty at that time of year with damp rainy days and what not plus there's no salt around then. The worst case scenario is like today, we had a cold stretch for about 5 days in the teens and 20s, but today warmed up into the upper 30s, I noticed salt on my car this morning and was planning to get it done but never did get around to the car wash. That's the worst case scenario because the bitter cold if it persists for days actually inhibits the salt but as soon as it warms up above freezing it starts eating away at the metal with gusto.

 

Toronto, tons of salt.
You'll have metal parts of suspension rusting, washing won't help much.
I have old Volvo, body doesn't rust at all but undercarriage is a different story.
And rustproof those torsion braces in the engine bay, they can rust easily.

 

Thanks all

I'll get the wife to up the car wash frequency. We have subscriptions here too, just none with locations near our home or where my wife works. I realize most of the truck is aluminum but I'm planning on holding onto this thing until it hits 200k on the odometer so it's gotta last.

Today both the babies got washed since it was above freezing for a few hours. I use a gutter clearing hose pole attachment that has a "hook" at the end of it to get up under the cars... its got a wide spray pattern on it too with an on/off valve ... if I didn't know any better I'd say it was made to wash under cars instead of spraying out gutters. It's also handy for getting in between the tire and the wheel well, and behind the tires to the backside of the wheel where all of the suspension goodies are.

 

I live in Upstate NY, just south of Syracuse...our roads and vehicles take a beating from the salt and brine they use. I wash my 110 every two week...if not weekly, basically the drive through (touchless) with the under spray. I the summer I hand wash only. I do my own maintenance (oil, fluid changes...), and washing it as frequently as I do has kept it perfect underneath. I just hit 75,000 miles on my 2022 110.

 

I hit the wash with undercarriage on the way back from ski trips, but not as much as I should. Maybe I'll do a subscription. I do hit the undercarriage with FluidFilm once or twice a year however. Especially the steel subframes and other bits.

 

hmm, sounds like I need to up my car washing in winter. On my older cars I would just wait till the end of winter to wash it but sounds like getting it done more often makes sense. After reading this thread, I'm going to get my baby washed, makes sure I get the under also washed/blasted.

 

I'm probably the only one here that seldom washes my vehicles in winter. First of all, I don't run our vehicles through automatic car washes, "touchless" or not. One has a ski roof box and 2 have roof ski racks which should not go through any automatic car wash. All our vehicles are ceramic coated, so rain or melting snow often removes the road salt buildup. I once had an Audi engineer tell me that any high pressure winter washing only pushes the road salt farther into the vehicle so items like door and hood hinges rust when normally they shouldn't. So my approach is gentle hand-washing and rinsing whenever it's warm enough. Defender currently looks like this after the weekend trip to Maine.

 

I’m in South Jersey but hit the beach in Summer and the Northeast Ski mountains every weekend in the Winter. I also have a monthly membership for washes like some others said here too. Well worth it. Ceramic coating was okay but I wash too often. Many weeks I am there twice a week because the new fancy road brine and mud don’t come off as easily in one wash these days.