Will Dish Soap Eat Paint?

[Drunken Yak inc]

Will dish soap eat paint?

A simple question that has been asked many times on many forums, yet all of the answers I have been able to find weren't backed with an actual test, just empty words typed by random strangers on the internet... Not necessarily a recipe for confidence in my opinion. Granted, I have personally used dish soap in the past, with the results being no physical damage to the paint. However, what if I would have been reckless and left the dish soap on the car for an extended period of time?

Let's find out.

The test piece is an OEM hatch spoiler off of Racheal, my 2004 EP3. I replaced the spoiler last year with the HFP spoiler at about 58,000 miles. I am the second owner of the car and it should be noted that Racheal has been garaged the vast majority of her life. The spoiler was wrapped with bubble wrap and placed in my basement since removal.

The products used in this test are:

1. Chemical Guy's Citruswash + Gloss car shampoo
2. Simply Green All Purpose Cleaner
3. Palmolive dish soap




The test was started on May 7th, 2013 at just before nine in the morning. All of the products are concentrated strength and used in that form. The temperature of the testing area was 72 degrees.



Day 1

First up is a set of pictures from the three hour mark:

Chemical Guy's:


Simple Green:


Palmolive:


Nothing unusual as of yet to report.

Second set of pictures is from after the seven hour mark. I cleaned up the chemicals and examined the surface of each area:

Chemical Guy's:


Simple Green:


Palmolive:


As these pictures show, at the end of Day 1, there was no damage to any of the areas. I then refilled the areas and let them sit over night.



Day 2 - May 8th.

Chemical Guy's:


No real change over night, just minor congealing.

Simple Green:


Minor evaporation, I would end up adding Simple Green to the area a few times. I also had to add to the hot glue barrier in order to keep it from leaking.

Palmolive:


Minor congealing.



End of Day 2.

Chemical Guy's:


Simple Green:


Palmolive:




Day 3 - May 9th.

Chemical Guy's:


Simple Green:


Palmolive:


All three show heavy congealing, and definitely look quite nasty. Added some Palmolive to the area.

End of Day 3.

Chemical Guy's:


Simple Green:


Palmolive:


At this point I concluded the test, cleaned up the chemicals and removed the hot glue barriers.



End of Test Results:

Chemical Guy's:


Simple Green:


Palmolive:


As these pictures show, there is no damage to any of the areas.

I will repeat this test outside, in direct sunlight in July or August.