Should you buy a ShamWow to wash your car? Consumer Reports says, "No!" Instead, apply the suds with a large, soft natural sponge or a lamb's-wool mitt. Then use a natural or synthetic chamois or terry cloth towels. [Consumer Reports]
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I was watching "Pitchmen" on Discovery this weekend, and the director on a shoot brought up the Sham-Wow to Billy Mays. You could see the seething.
Darn it. I misread the title as, "Should you buy a ShamWow to wash your cat?"
I'll be moving along now (mutter mutter mutter)
So it's a sham? wow!
@Auto-Erotic_GitEmSteveDave-ation: Yeah, but in a brawl between Billy Mays and a hooker, my money would be on Billy.
It's okay, Billy, you're still the man!
Cheapo towel from a dollar store. Wring out once in awhile. Doesn't support icky Vince.
Why would you use it to *wash* a car? Isn't the point that a ShamWow absorbs water?
Oh, good! Let me just grab my lamb's-wool mitt and...
...OH WAIT.
Nobody has those.
OK, I'll bite. Who was saying that you *should* use a ShamWow to wash your car? Vince says to use it on the car, boat, RV but the video shows people drying those vehicles off. One of the "testimonial" guys says "if you're gonna wash your car, you need one" but for some of us, wiping with a "shammy" (i.e. chamois) has always been a part of the car washing routine.
@pecan 3.14159265: A dog is not a cat. A dog hides it's sapiencidal rage. A cat broadcasts it openly.
I've been using a squeegee to take most of the water off. The "shammy" get's the rest :)
@Snarkysnake: So what you're saying is all cats will go to hell, which just proves my theory that cats are demon-spawn ;-)
@Turcicus: I got a nice one direct from Meguiar's a while back. Don't know if they're still selling them, but it's pretty fantastic for washing.
@Snarkysnake: The little fuckers look cute till its time to give them a bath. Then they want to scratch the bejesus out of you.
Yes, I have attempted this unsuccessfully.
@I_have_something_to_say: Squeegees can do a number on the car's finish from the residual particulate matter left after a cleaning, so watch out.
ShamWow? Nope. Get a Water Sprite. Cheaper, more effective, and easier to get a hold of. Walmart's got them and so do little boutiques like www.shinesupply.com
@CaptainSemantics: Exactly. I thought the whole point behind the name was that the "sham" part is homonymous with the first syllable of chamois, and that the shamwow is a synthetic chamois, in which case it would be an optimal drying cloth after you've washed your car with something more suitable like a microfiber towel.
I believe the point is for drying you car.
Like a chamois.
Like the part where you say, "use a natural or synthetic chamois."
A synthetic chamois... which is what the ShamWow is, no?
But why lamb's wool? We don't like llamas?
@dohtem: @Snarkysnake: It helps if you do it one at a time.
Save the dumb one for last. B/c he can be sitting next to the wet one, and not realize what's in store for him.
I like using Costco's mirco-fiber towels to dry my car. :)
I was expecting the report to compare the ShamWow with a chamois, or some such thing. It didn't appear to me that they really addressed the effectiveness of a ShamWow in drying a car at all. It was just kind of a re-hash of the same report from a while back.
Poor effort, Consumer Reports.
I've discovered that cloth diapers are excellent at drying a car, more absorbent and softer than even terry cloth towels. We just used some old diapers that we had on hand, but they cost under $2 new, which is a far better bargain than ShamWow even if you bought them just for that.
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What about paper towels? You can tie it in a knot, it's still there.