Test& tips: which car interior and display cleaner?

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test& tips: which car interior and display cleaner?

In the last years we have tested several car interior cleaners! Here we summarize our favorites – from cheap to expensive. We also have a tip for optimal cleaning of sensitive displays like digital tachometers.

interior tip 1: chemical guys innerclean

the chemical guys inner clean cleaning spray is our favorite not only because of its good smell ;). It cleans gently but effectively: fingerprints, coffee stains or grease stains from lost French fries can be wiped away with just one wipe. On the other hand, it is so gentle that it does not attack even sensitive surfaces. It leaves no greasy streaks and also cleans touch screens without leaving streaks. According to the manufacturer it should (probably with silicones) also refresh the colors of the plastic parts. We have not yet been able to test this on new cars. The innerclean spray bottle from chemical guys is available for around 16 €. unfortunately chemical guys is not available on amazon at the moment, but z.B. Here at autoglanzwelt via ebay. Tip: the cleaner always on a microfiber cloth, never spray directly on the cockpit!

tip: never spray directly on the cockpit, but on the microfiber cloth!

Interior tip 2: meguiar’s quik detailer interior

In our video below we show that the interior cleaner from meguiars sometimes leaves significant streaks behind. This is because we are showing an "old" version from 2015, which probably contains even more silicone/oils. We link here but the current version of meguiars quik detailer, which is on amazon for just under 10 € to have. According to reviews and manufacturer description, it is now "non-greasy" and should therefore no longer leave streaks. Also it is a top alternative to the chemical guys cleaner.

Sensitive displays : spectral cleaning foam

In principle, you can clean displays very cheaply with glass cleaners such as sidolin and a kitchen towel. If you have scratches in a digital speedometer or other displays, you will never get them out again and they are very annoying in sunlight. We are therefore fans of the spectral foam (ca. 25€), which was specially developed in germany for cleaning displays and TV screens. you should always spray it on the white glass cloth provided and then spread the foam on the display with gentle pressure until it disappears. The spray cleans absolutely streak-free. since the foam "lifts" the dirt, so to speak, you also avoid scratches. Unfortunately, the spray is expensive at 25€, but it is sufficient for several cleanings and we also like to use it for our notebooks and TVs.

Spectral display foam: application on the active info display in the passat.

Floor mat and seat cleaner: meguiar’s carpet& interior cleaner

while for surfaces, the cockpit and displays the chemical guys are our favorites, for fabrics it’s clearly the meguiars carpet& interior cleaner. We bought a bottle a few years ago that is still at least half full today. Most of the time we used it to remove grease residues, coffee stains or ketchup stains and more. You spray the cleaner directly on the floor mats or. The seats. It smells strong, removes dirt and odors incredibly well. You leave it on approx. 30 seconds soak and then wipe it off. With a clean, wet (only water) microfiber cloth should be wiped again. The place then necessarily let dry well. Afterwards, every stubborn stain should be gone, and the chemical smell will disappear quickly. We have not experienced any faded areas on any car so far. For the meguiars carpet and upholstery cleaner you can buy for approx. 12€. A hammer price, if one considers, how long a bottle lasts.

Window cleaner inside& outside: alclear or meguiars?

For cleaning the windows from the inside you can use sidolin from the supermarket or premium products like alclear or meguiars without any problems. To clean the inside of the windows, there is also a separate article here. On the outside, however, the cleaning performance is more important: in summer, burnt-in insect residues need to be removed. Here meguiars and alclear work well, whereby the alclear cleans rather in the chemically gentler way and not so powerfully. With the meguiars glass cleaner (ca. 15€), but even stubborn insect remains can be removed well.

W hen you’re on the road in your car, there’s one thing you shouldn’t do without: your personal playlist. Because anyone who trusts that there will always be a radio station that suits the track and the mood will almost certainly be disappointed.

A classic way to bring your favorite music into the car is to digitize a CD collection on the computer. "in the long term, anyone who owns a lot of cds will have no choice but to convert their music library," says car hi-fi specialist michael zeitler, who runs a specialist shop in cologne.

"New devices still have CD and DVD drives, often also connections for SD cards and USB sticks, but not CD changers."

Music on a USB stick in the car

The easiest way to bring your music files into the car is on a USB stick. Large sticks with 64 gigabytes (GB) cost less than ten euros and can store thousands and thousands of songs.

You can also use this opportunity to store the music files in an online memory. Because even in cars, music is increasingly coming over the Internet. "in the long run, all music will be stored in the cloud or downloaded from streaming services," says zeitler.

There are differences in sound quality between the individual music file formats. During the digitization process, known as ripping, these can be adjusted according to the program used.

"music fans who value the maximum quality of their music collection should save the songs in FLAC format," advises zeitler. Flac stands for free lossless audio codec, a format with high sound quality that compresses music losslessly, unlike MP3 or AAC.

Stable smartphone holder for the car

If you subscribe to a music service anyway, you can of course use it to stream music in the car – provided you have a stable mount and a power supply for your smartphone.

Whether the connection to the car radio is established via a USB cable or bluetooth is irrelevant, says zeitler. If you’re struggling with your monthly data allowance, you should use the offline function of the music service app and download your music at home via wifi.

Another way of playing music via smartphone is often used by matthias wagner, chairman of the specialist trade group car acoustics. In the car, he accesses songs that he has stored on his phone: "I always have my cell phone with me, and all my favorite songs are stored there." they also come from a digitized CD collection.

The aforementioned holder for the smartphone in the car is particularly important. Because the stvo regulates that the cell phone may neither be recorded nor held while driving. When operating and using the smartphone, only "a brief glance adapted to the road, traffic, visibility and weather conditions" is allowed.

When is music in the car too loud??

And even if listening to music while driving is fun, you shouldn’t overdo it. A rolling disco not only harms your hearing, but can also be dangerous and annoying for other road users.

But what is too loud? There are no precise regulations on how loud drivers are allowed to turn up their music. According to the German Road Traffic Act (stvo), the driver is responsible for "ensuring that his or her vision and hearing are not impaired by the occupants, animals, the load, equipment or the condition of the vehicle."

"drivers must always make sure that they can still perceive traffic acoustically while driving and listening to music. These include the horns of other vehicles, the sirens of emergency vehicles and the ringing of bicycles," says Kay Schulte, head of accident prevention at the German Road Safety Council (DVR).

Headphones in the car are taboo

"There is no exact decibel number," explains Schulte. If the driver and passenger can still talk without shouting, the noise level is usually still acceptable: "the important thing is that the driver can still hear background noise outside the car."

schulte expressly warns against wearing headphones in the car because the driver is more or less completely cut off from outside noise – especially with in-ear headphones, acoustically closed headphones and, of course, noise-canceling headphones with active suppression of outside sounds and noise.

Making music with the driver’s psyche

Can music in the car be stressful or even dangerous?? Ralf buchstaller, head of the medical-psychological institute of tuV nord, does not consider listening to music in the car to be particularly disturbing.

"but it always depends on the traffic situation, the psychological situation of the driver and whether the music is self-determined," says buchstaller.

Turn off all lights when you leave your home and turn them on as soon as a movement is registered, or have a certain scene executed as soon as you unlock the door – all completely automatically. With the home app, you can automate your devices and scenes so that they perform the actions you need at the exact time you need them to perform them.

Requirements

The homepod and apple TV are not available in all countries and regions.

Create a scene

Scenes allow you to control multiple devices at the same time. You can create a scene called "good night" create a scene that turns off all the lights and locks the front door at the same time. Or you create the scene "in the morning", playing your favorite playlist on your homepod, apple TV or airplay 2 compatible speaker. follow these steps to create a scene on your iphone, ipad, ipod touch or mac.

Create scenes and automations with the home app

tap or click on "add" in the home app , and then select "add scene.
Select a suggested scene. Alternatively you can create a custom scene by first giving it a name.
tap or click on "add devices".
Select the equipment you want to add and tap or to select the desired option. Then click on "ready.
To adjust settings for a device on an ios or ipados device, press and hold the device on the screen. double click on it on mac. If you want to preview the scene, tap or click on "test this scene". activate "show in favorites, to go to the control center, on the "home" tab and access your scene on the apple watch.
tap or click "done.

To activate a scene, tap or click on it. Alternatively you can also use siri for this. If you set up a control center, you can also automate a scene.

to add or remove devices from a scene on your ios or ipados device, place your finger on a scene and press and hold it, then tap "settings. On a mac, double-click on a scene and then click on "settings".

Create an automation

Automations allow you to trigger a device or scene based on the time of day, your location, sensor detection and more. Create an automation that automates your "I’m here" scene triggers when someone from your family comes home. You can also have all the lights in a room switched on as soon as a motion sensor detects movement. follow these steps to create an automation on your iphone, ipad, ipod touch, or mac.

Create an automation based on a device action

You can automate devices and scenes to respond with specific actions to turn them on or off, or to signals from specific devices.

In the home app, go to the automation tab and tap or click on "add" .
To set automation to start when a device is turned on or off, select "when a device is controlled". To set the automation to start on a specific sensor signal, select "when a sensor detects something".
select the device that will perform the automation, and then tap or click "next.
Select the action that you want to trigger the automation (e.g. B. Turn on or open), and then tap or click on "next".
Select the devices and scenes that should be set in motion in response to the selected action, and then tap or click "next".
Hold down a device in the list to adjust its settings on the iphone, ipad or ipod touch. Double click on the device on mac.
tap or click on "done.

Would you like to receive an alert when a device detects something specific?? here you can learn how to set up notifications for your homekit devices.

create automation based on home presence

Automate your devices and scenes so that their actions are executed when they are needed. be set when you or another user leaves or arrives at home.

To create location-based automation, you and the people you want to give access to control your smarthome devices must "share location" for the primary ios or ipados device 1 to control your smarthome devices have activated. select "settings > "[your name]" > "share location, tap on "from, and make sure that "from this device" is selected is selected.

Go to the automation tab in the home app and tap or click on "add" .
For the automation, choose between the options "when people arrive" and "when people leave the location". If you want the automation to be triggered when a specific person leaves the home, or. Once there, tap or click on information . You can also select time and location 2 of the automation.
select the scenes and equipment for automation, then tap or click "continue.
Tap and hold a device in the list to adjust its settings on the iphone, ipad or ipod touch. Double click on the device on mac.
Tap or click on "done.

1. location based automations can not be triggered on a mac.

2. if the location you have chosen is not your home, only you can trigger the automation; other users you have given access to control the devices in your home will be removed from the automation.

set time to perform automated actions for devices

set an automation to run at a certain time, on certain days or depending on the presence of certain people.

In the home app, go to the automation tab and tap or click on "add"
Select "at a specific time of day" off, and then set day and time. Tap or click on "people, to specify that the automation should be executed at a certain time when someone is present. tap or click on "next.
Select the scenes and devices for automation, and then tap or click "next".
press and hold a device in the list to adjust its settings on the iphone, ipad or ipod touch. Double click on the device on the mac.
Tap or click on "done.

Deactivate or delete an automation

To activate or. Deactivate an automation:

Open the home-app on the iphone, ipad, ipod touch or mac, and select the tab "automation" from.
Type resp. Click on the relevant automation.
Switch "activate this automation an or. From.

Tap or click on "deactivate, to set a time period for an automation, after which certain devices should be switched off. For example, if you create an automation that turns on all the lights when you arrive home, you can set it to turn them off after one hour.

To delete an automation, tap or. Click on them, then scroll down, and tap or. Click on "delete automation. On your ios- or ipados-device you can alternatively swipe to the left over the automation and then on "delete" type.

interior tip 1: chemical guys innerclean

Interior tip 2: meguiar’s quik detailer interior

Sensitive displays : spectral cleaning foam

Floor mat and seat cleaner: meguiar’s carpet& interior cleaner

Window cleaner inside& outside: alclear or meguiars?

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