Homemade car cleaning products

By glblguy


Car Wash
Photo by: Aislinn Ritchie

This article is part of an ongoing series called Money Saving Monday. Each Monday, I share tips and techniques you can use to start saving money.

Inspired by Lynnae’s Homemade Laundry Detergent article, I decided to do some research and see if there were any homemade recipes available for car cleaning products. I found a number of recipes, some a bit crazy and some not so home made at all (i.e. mixing two commercial products together). Fortunately though I did find a few that I would actually consider using on my cars. Once our water restrictions are lifted, I plan to give them a try.

Car Soap

Car soap isn’t near as sophisticated as the manufacturers would like you to think it is. Here’s a simple recipe that will make all the suds you need and keep your car nice and clean:

  • 1 cup liquid dish detergent – Ivory works well
  • 12 T powdered laundry detergent
  • 1 large bucket of water

Car Wax

Carnuba is the key ingredient for a good car wax as it provides a very hard protective coating over your car’s paint. Here’s a carnuba based homemade car wax recipe:

  • 1 cup linseed oil
  • 4 tbsp. carnuba wax (available at automotive stores and available online)
  • 2 tbsp. beeswax
  • 1/2 cup vinegar

Put ingredients in top half of a double boiler or saucepan. Heat slowly until wax has melted. Stir, and pour into a heat resistant container. After wax has solidified, rub it on the car with a lint-free cloth. Saturate a corner of a cotton rag with vinegar and polish the wax to a deep shine.

Tire Cleaner

I like to clean my tires with Soft scrub with bleach. The bleach whitens any white letters or stripes along with giving the tire a nice black color. Here’s a homemade alternative:

Non-Abrasive Soft Scrubber:

  • 1/4 cup borax
  • Vegetable-oil based liquid soap (such as Murphy’s Oil Soap)
  • 1/2 teaspoon lemon oil
  • 1 teaspoon bleach

Carpet Cleaner/Stain Remover

Here’s a few homemade ideas to clean the carpet in your car and to help you remove stains:

  • A great carpet stain remover is club soda. Soak the spot immediately with soda and blot until the stain is gone.
  • Sprinkle cornstarch onto carpet, vacuum.
  • Grease spots can be removed from carpets by first absorbing excess with a sponge. Next rub a liberal amount of corn starch into the spot. Let sit overnight, then vacuum.

Carpet Freshener

Want your car to smell cleaner? Here’s some homemade carpet freshener:

  • 4 cups baking soda or cornstarch
  • 35 drops Eucalyptus essential oil
  • 30 drops Lavender essential oil
  • 25 drops Rosewood essential oil or any combination of your favorite essential oils

Measure 4 cups of baking soda into a bowl, add essential oils. Break up any clumps that form, stir until well mixed. Before vacuuming sprinkle powder from a shaker type can or jar. Let it sit on the carpet for about 15 minutes then vacuum.

In a bowl, mix the borax with enough soap to form a creamy paste. Add lemon oil, bleach, and blend well.

Windshield Wiper Frost Free Fluid

Mix 3 parts vinegar to 1 part water and coat the car windows and fill your fluid reservoir with this solution. This vinegar and water combination will keep windshields clean, and ice and frost-free.

Have any homemade car cleaner products you use? Share your recipe!

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24 Responses (including trackbacks) to “Homemade car cleaning products”

  1. No Debt Plan Says:
    March 24th, 2008 at 8:14 am

    Hmmm.. I think I remember reading somewhere that using dish detergent soap stripped wax off of the car. That would be my only hesitation on your list. Unless of course you plan on waxing the car every time you wash it :)

  2. glblguy Says:
    March 24th, 2008 at 8:25 am

    @No Debt Plan – Actually I thought the same thing and did a considerable amount of research. It’s actually a hotly debated topic. What strips the wax off is the high PH of the detergents. Detergents like Dawn and Ivory have a low PH similar to car cleaning soaps.

  3. Frugal Dad Says:
    March 24th, 2008 at 9:38 am

    Great ideas for a “frugal” carwash! Now if I could just convince my kids to actually wash the car. I may have to resort to bribery.

  4. Matt Keegan Says:
    March 24th, 2008 at 12:52 pm

    I’ve done the windshield wiper fluid routine in the past, but haven’t thought about doing it again in quite some time.

    Most of the suggestions listed seem like more of a hassle then what they are worth; I usually find a “no brand” item at Wal*Mart — such as car wash detergent — and have paid less than half the price of the big brand items.

    I don’t even have rosewood, eucalyptus or lavender oils handy — wouldn’t it cost more to buy these oils instead of finding a low-cost ready made product that can do the job for less?

  5. glblguy Says:
    March 24th, 2008 at 2:01 pm

    @Matt – Not sure if it’s a hassle, as most of the ingrediants my wife keeps around the house anyway, including the scents (eucalyptus and lavender). Not sure on the cost if you didn’t already have it, I’ll have to ask my wife.

    One thing to consider…all of these product are environmentally friendly and bio-degradable. Not sure if that applies to store bought products in all cases or not.

  6. Lynnae @ Being Frugal.net Says:
    March 24th, 2008 at 5:30 pm

    My husband made me bookmark this page on del.icio.us for him. Thanks! :)

    Matt Keegan – The oils can be expensive to buy initially, but a couple of drops go a long way. I’ll bet you probably wouldn’t need to add so much essential oil, if you didn’t want to. In fact, I’ll bet plain old baking soda would be just fine. It wouldn’t give you a pretty scent, but baking soda is a great deodorizer.

  7. The Financial Journey Says:
    March 24th, 2008 at 7:00 pm

    Never thought about making my own car cleaning products. Great post thanks!

  8. claudia Says:
    March 27th, 2008 at 12:21 pm

    another good tip is using dollar store baby shampoo, is very mild it won’t strip the wax or paint on your car, also baby shampoo is a good alternative detergent for laudering your black clothes since it won’t leave a residue and your blacks would come out lint frre and smeling like a baby! :-)

  9. Ryan S. @ Uncommon-Cents.net Says:
    March 30th, 2008 at 9:02 pm

    From experience, usinga bit of Dawn for a car washing detergent works great! Here at least the majority of the grime seems to be grease.

  10. Funny about Money Says:
    March 30th, 2008 at 11:02 pm

    I’ve always used plain dish detergent (Ivory) to wash the car and never had a problem with it damaging the finish or a wax job.

    Also I discovered that the variety of Windex that comes in a spray bottle that screws on to the end of a garden hose (it’s meant for washing high windows) works exceptionally well on a car. Doesn’t do much for windows, but it’s great for cars and sidewalks.

    And Murphy’s Oil Soap (a dilute solution) is lovely for vinyl dashboards and appointments–and smells good, too.

    Has anyone tried to get coffee out of a car’s carpet? I’m thinking of trying a really dilute solution of Simple Green and then vacuuming it up with the shop vac. Ideas???

  11. Stephanie @ PoorerThanYou Says:
    April 3rd, 2008 at 4:51 pm

    This is a great list! Thanks for posting this – I have to admit, I’m more interested in it for the environmental aspects (as I don’t really spend much on cleaning my car, so there’s no real money for me to save), but that works because most everything on here is better than the 10-syllable ingredients in commercial cleaners!

  12. Bob Says:
    April 21st, 2008 at 2:43 pm

    I am just wondering about the cost of the homemade car wash. I would think that the cost of 1 cup of dish soap per bucket compares similarily to (or is even more expensive than) a couple squirts of car wash soap formulated to not degrade your finish.