Dave, Read this quick before it gets binned...Frank Carson complains about his new pacemaker - every time he passes wind his garage door opens.
Matt35.
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Who is Frank Carson?
Frosted up or misted windscreens are not in any way a joke. Just a couple of years ago I read of a coroners court case for a two babies, in proper baby seats, killed by whiplash. The car driver, their father, hit a stationary lorry which should have been clearly visible. The only reason I could imagine was a frosted of misted windscreen.
I always use a domestic fan heater, on an extension lead, for as long as it takes to clear the car. When away from home I use a 12V hairdrier which I keep the car. This takes a little while, but it's safer. The hair drier is very old, at least 20 years. Perhaps they are still available.
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Agree Hillman - what's so difficult about deicing/ demisting a car before setting off ? How long does it take ? My car's 12 years old but it only takes 5 minutes ? Why not just get up 10 minutes earlier when the weather's dodgy and clear the car properly before driving off ?
BTW if it's a Hillman that you drive I'm not surprised you need a hairdryer to get things moving!
Just joking :-)
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Now I've got another one. Not only do I not know who Frank Carson is, I don't know what BTW means. Is it akin to GSOH?
I use the psudonym Hillman because I live in the Peak District, on a steep hill in view of Kinder scout and in a direct easterly aspect. Marvelous frosty conditions.
Try a fan heater in your car. Warm as toast before you set out.
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BTW = By the way
IIRC = If I remember correctly
AFAIK = As far as I know
These last two can be substituted with either "I heard this in a pub once" or "I'm guessing".
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I use the psudonym Hillman because I live in the Peak District...
Not because you're a fan of Avengers, Hunters, Imps and Minxes? Shame!
If you've no idea what I'm prattling about try
www.imps4ever.info/marques/hillman.html
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hillman,
Frank Carson is an Irish comedian....very funny man with a sense of humanity under his humour - AFAIK.
My post was in response to a comment about electronic gadgets - was not meant to joke about road safety.
AFAIK - as far as I know.
Matt35
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I had the pleasure of driving behind a lady last week who was veering all over the place as I followed behind her around Stoke. As the traffic slowed down I realised that this was being caused by her struggle to use the passenger sunflap mirror to apply her makeup.
Never fails to amaze me how many people around here drive around with a child on their knee on the passenger seat. Thick as a Gurkha's wrist.
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I'm still seeing people driving while using a hand held mobiles (including a bus driver with passengers!)
Davy S.
Oops, where did that screw go!!
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I have found a great way to defrost my windows.
one empty 4 pint plastic milk container filled with warm water and then the lid screwed on.
then moved above over the windscreen. Its almost as quick as using an ice scrapper and it keeps my hands warm !!
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I\'ve got an even better solution to a frosty car, pour luke warm water into a basin and fill with a cap full of washing up liquid. Pour over affected area and hey presto!!!
Works every time, make sure the water is luke warm and you will be assured of a frost free drive to wherever you are going.
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You do know it's a very bad idea to get washing up liquid on your car paintwork don't you?
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Would you include bird droppings with that?????
I've used that method for years now and it's never effected my paintwork. What would a welliesorter extole for this type of predicament. Words of wisdow are very good if you can positively reply with an alternative. lol
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Indeed. I don't claim to know the ideal solution other than to use a garage or cover your car. For what it's worth I do neither but we sorters of wellies don't keep normal office hours so I don't have to go out when the ice is at its hardest. On the other hand, I was shocked to have to de-ice my car inside and out at midday last week.
I wonder if the sole of a wellie would make a good scraper.
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I wonder if the sole of a wellie would make a good scraper.
I think you would need a lot of hip flexibility to manage the top of the windscreen!
teabelly
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If the inside of the windscreen frosts over too, check that you are not using you heater fan on recycle for too long a time. That causes the humidity in the car to rise. very badly.
I had an episode when I was driving over the A623 between Baslow and Peak Forest. My passenger feels the cold keenly. He had been playing with the recycle to raise the temperature and directing the warm air to his feet. When we got to the top of a hill and were exposed to a cold wind the dew point of the air was at critical for the temperature of the windscreen and it immediately misted over. Couldn't see a thing, so I had to stop in the crown of the road. He rubbed the screen vigorously with his hand, but it misted up again instantly. I had to ask him to put the heater into defrost and open the window. That fixed it after a minute or two. I don't like to think what following drivers were saying about me.
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They apparently use salt in the formulation of some washing up liquid to thicken it. Wouldn't hurt the actual paint but if it gets into the seams it's a different matter.
Before I heard this many years ago, I used frequently to wash the car with it, including an Orion that was rusting in the badly sealed seams at 2 years old. Coincidence?
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You do know it's a very bad idea to get washing up liquid on your car paintwork don't you?
True, due to the salt content, but I would think that driving around on salted/gritted roads for a couple of hours would put more salt on your paintwork than a bowl of very diluted washing up liquid water and if the car is washed regularly and waxed a couple of times a year there should be no problem.
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Hate to state the obvious, but does no one use de - icer on the outside of the windscreen? Does no -one put a windscreen cover on - could be anything from a bed sheet, shower curtain or towel!
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True, due to the salt content...
Not just that: won't the detergent break down any wax on the paintwork?
Returning to the subject, I've noticed some people put a sheet of newspaper on the windscreen. I don't know how well that works.
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I have seen this on the site before but to de-frost the external of the windscreen I always use hot water out of the tap. I have had endless people say; 'ooh no, you don't want to do it like that, you'll crack the windscreen'.
I have been doing it for 25 years and never had a problem. Although, I'm thinking there will be someone out there that has. The internal is a different matter of course - I find a chamois sponge quite effective.
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" >> You do know it's a very bad idea to get washingup liquid on your car paintwork don't you?
True, due to the salt content, but I would think that driving around on salted/gritted roads for a couple of hours would put more salt on your paintwork than a bowl of very diluted washing up liquid water and if the car is washed regularly and waxed a couple of times a year there should be no problem."
The powerful surfactents in a washing up liquid make it ingress easily into crevices such as behind seals, where it will sit all season with the salt it took with it.
Washing up liquid can also contain formaldehyde which shrinks rubber, and nonyl phenol which will strip the fats out of the paint.
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Many liquid detergents contain common salt (NaCl) as a thickening agent. By and large, the thicker the liqid, (makes it seem "stronger"), the more salt it contains.
Many, Many years ago I worked in a soap factory in Nottingham and one of our products was a liquid detergent. We used "Teepol" direct from B.P. diluted it with water, added yellow colour, perfume and salt and it left us just as thick as the original, but with 50% fewer active ingredients.
Good profit selling water - as most bacon manufactiurers have fouund out!
..........................................................
"Rude, crude and socially unacceptable"
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Why don't they fit ceramic heaters to car aircon systems, it seems so arcaic to wait 5 mins for the inside to clear. VW Beetles were great they never defrosted on cold days, the windscreen kept frosting up while you drove, and you mate and his girlfiend in the back complained the heater was burning their ankles, even further back in the cold old days a heater was an extra!!! how did they cope???
I always use washing up liquid on all my cars, they are always new and changed at 3 years old, they are never polished but keep their condition fine, many car washes use a cleaner with salt in, I knew a chap that made it, they also scratch the paint.
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I seem to remember that "Innovations" catalogue used to offer a ceramic heater that fitted onto the dashboard and plugged into the ciggy lighter for "instant defrosting" Cost about £19 or £20 - I always meant to get one but never did.
I also remember a nightmare journey from Swansea to the E Midlands in my old heaterless, screen washerless Sunbeam Talbot one night in winter of 1970-71 in a snowstorm. Never been so cold, windscreen continually freezing on inside, snow building up on outside, had to hold hand against the screen to provide a tiny "letterbox" to look through and stop every few minutes to scrape ice of inside and outside. Roads were ungritted, I seem to think that there was no M5 and we drove up hill and down dale in the Cotswolds with the back end of the car (on 20 inch cross plies!) fishtailing all over the place (you BMW and MB drivers will know what that's like!!) even at a steady 10 mph!!. Good job there were 4 of us students in the car - 3 pushers and a driver! Took us about 15 hours to get home but we made it! Don't remember much traffic but probably a good job since we couldn't see the edges of the road and steered by whether the right or left side of the car was bouncing along the grass verge or kerb.
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Flatfour, I remember driving from Beverley to Leeds in a VW Beetle, and I had to keep "re-forming" a hole on the windscreen with the heat from my hand so that I could see where I was going, it was so cold and the de-frost function was just a theory. I was young at the time, and didn't think too much of it! Memories.
Reggie
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I recall heaters were optional extras in the 50s and I think you you could also buy 3rd party heaters and fit them youself. My Morris Minor seies 11 had an heater which was simply a circular box fitted centrally under the dash. Also the A30 and A35 were similar. I don't think there was any pipework off to the windscreen but imagine we must have had a scraper.
But of course there was no such things as screenwashers and a plastic washing up liquid bottle was used by leaning out and spraying water onto the widscreen. This was a neccessity when the M1 opened as you couldn't stop to clean it.
As regards being physically cold one had to dress to suit the conditions and in the depths of winter TUF boots were the in thing. Who can remember them? But as the Scandinavians say if you are cold you must be wearing the wrong clothing.
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