Rick said white vinegar and he is correct.

Rinse it down with the vinegar, and rewash the car.

Clay bar will not do much for aesthetics of the car (sap, tar, contamination mostly). How do you tell if you *need* to clay bar? If after you wash your car, and after a quick wax, it still feels gritty to the touch--you need to clay bar.

Do you need to clay new cars? Cars are shipped by boat, rail, and trailer. Contamination of the paint by rail dust and road grime can happen. I can tell when a new car has been shipped foward or backwards when clay barring. The side heading into the wind is usually more contaminated.

Ever see a white car that is starting to look orange, or has those orange rust spots? It's caused by small metallic dust rusting in the paint. Clay bar will prevent this.

Using a paint cleaner will not get you the same results. Paint cleaners are mainly chemical cleaning and some abrassive. Polishes are abrassive (unless the company likes to confuse you, such as Zaino). Paint cleaners should really only be used on paint that is starting to oxidize. It won't hurt the paint if it isn't--it is just an unnecessary step.

To get rid of swirls (no, clay will not touch swirls) you will either want to use something that is abrassive, or slightly abrassive with filling. Abrassive will remove the swirls, slightly abrassive with filling ability will hide them. If you are working by hand, go with a less agressive and filling product. The other way (by porter cable or another machine) will remove most of them, and follow up with a glaze to fill in the remaining. Meguiars #9 works great by hand. Chanc was skeptical until he tried, and it fixed most of his swirls.

Apply it by terry towel folded. Work for and aft, not small circles, until it starts to break down and get clear. Wipe immediatley. Move on to the next panel. Two problems with going in circles by hand: you don't know if *you* are creating a problem, and if you do create a scratch, it will be visible from all angles (and it is harder to take out).

Apply a non-cleaning wax after anything with fillers. Stress NON-CLEANING because you do not want to clean the fillers out. NXT is non cleaning (it has some cleaning ability, not enough to hinder your results), paste wax #16, paste #26. Mothers has a paste carnauba--pure. Harley davidson sells S100 which is awesome and easy to use.

Uhm. Hm. I don't know, I should get back to my lab, but I wanted to help you guys out a little bit. If I don't see it, listen to Rick, he knows his stuff. I just elaborate on it.

Edit: I have used Meguiars, Mothers, and Clay Magic blue bar. Clay Magic is the bar that I prefer, with mothers second, and I wouldn't bother with the Meguiars. It breaks apart and crumbles, and is not as agressive. Mothers is expensive. You can reuse them--just spray some lube in a bag and seal it. It's time to throw out when it gets noticably dirty. If you have a dirty piece, use it on wheels, it's great on wheels. Also, you can cut it up in half--one piece is fairly big and wasteful to use on only one car.