Okay, so it isn't a mod, but it is the best thing to happen to my Passat since I bought it used a few months ago.
I spotted a Mr. Clean Magic Eraser under the kitchen sink today and decided I should try it on the nasty gunk that had built up on the interior handles on my beige Passat.
I didn't take a before picture of the driver-side door pull because I didn't expect it to work that well...
This was from maybe 1 minute of cleaning. I'm shocked! It was nasty looking before, and I'd actually started pricing replacement plastic peices!
(The sun moved on me in these shots, but if you've got scuff marks and mechanic fingerprints on the inside of your ligher-colored Passat you NEED to try these Magic Erasers out.)
Before -- I had cleaned this with water, windex, goo-gone... everything I could think of.
After
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Before
After (sun moved a bit between photos) -- All the junk gone! Did take off some of the rubbery stuff on the handle, so be careful.
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Before -- I had scrubbed this with a soapy rag and got it this clean...
After -- literally a minute with the Magic Eraser
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Notes:
Absolutely perfect for kick marks on hard plastics inside car, did wonders for that strip of bumpy plastic that you step over to get in the car
Don't use on painted/scratchable surfaces
It seemed to make deep scratch marks in the rubbery surfaces more noticable -- i.e. it takes off the black junk, but also takes off some of the rubber. Be careful and rub gently!
Anything dark you use it on will need to be washed off with a rag after, as it leaves white residue that comes right off
Didn't try it on the black lowers, but I'm going to after I wash the car
I used it on the steering wheel to get off all the crap from the lotion-wearing previous owner. It took it all off and looks like new now, but do this at your own risk as it could damage the coating or something, I don't know.
Didn't "Magically Erase" the fog on my headlights -- yeah, I tried it.
Oh yeah, and rinse out the Magic Eraser a lot as you go. I just had a jar of water and had to fill it up probably 20 times as I went through so much water rinsing it out.
Seriously-- I can't decide how to go about that. I've heard woolite is good, but I think I might just rent one of those cleaning machines instead because I don't think this '98 of mine has ever had a thorough cleaning.
Any idea what I could use on the *entire* surface of the seats... they just look dim in general, like they could use a good overall cleaning...
Ya, you sure don't pass yourself very often on the road with Elegant Green. No green interior lights, but I'm glad for that. I always lusted after the red and blue... however, the mirror switch (old style push button rather than break-off knob) on the driver side is definitely green tinted, but has red lights behind it. Looks fine at night, but during the day if you look closely you can see that it is obviously green. Guess my car was one of the first red and blues...
EDIT: Now that I look, you can see what I'm talking about with the green on the mirror switch in the wider angle photo of the entire driver side door. See how the plastic where the illumination comes through is tinted green?
Ah, I probably can only see it because I know what I'm looking for. At night it looks completely normal because the backlight is red... during the day in the sun the clear part of the plastic looks green, though.
Here's what a REAL green interior looks like... not bad.
Apologies to whoever I stole this from!
there's a target equivalent that performs no worse than the mr. clean product and both are made in germany so i'm assuming it's just different packaging of the same product. The target branded ones are rectangular and about half the cost.
cleaning carpet, headliners and upholstery... windex. the real stuff with a good absorbent towel to wipe it off. just use a tiny squirt on the headliner though - don't want to sog the glue.
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