I really love the "new car smell"

[Scotlex]

I really love the "new car smell" 😀😀😀

One of the best bits of getting a brand new car. 😀

[HPS13]

Have you been out buying magic trees? 😀

Good luck with your new car!

[Rabbers]

1 hour ago, Scotlex said:

I really love the "new car smell" 😀😀😀 …

Can’t disagree.  It’s one of life’s great pleasures.    But when experiencing the nice smell of a new Lexus I’ve always found myself wondering if a new Bentley might not, for example, smell even better.

[Scotlex]

2 hours ago, HPS13 said:

Have you been out buying magic trees? 😀

Good luck with your new car!

Thanks 😀

[Scotlex]

16 minutes ago, Rabbers said:

Can’t disagree.  It’s one of life’s great pleasures.    But when experiencing the nice smell of a new Lexus I’ve always found myself wondering if a new Bentley might not, for example, smell even better.

Bentley might have more leather in the new car smell but you would have to live with all the "bling" which is not for me 😀

[Ken R]

3 hours ago, Scotlex said:

I really love the "new car smell" 😀😀😀

One of the best bits of getting a brand new car. 😀

Bottle it and you could make a fortune!🙂

[Scotlex]

21 minutes ago, Ken R said:

Bottle it and you could make a fortune!🙂

I know 😀

I haven't found any car cleaner that comes close.

[Rabbers]

 

1 hour ago, Ken R said:

Bottle it and you could make a fortune!🙂

 

1 hour ago, Scotlex said:

I know 😀

I haven't found any car cleaner that comes close.

I find Dr Leather wipes, sparingly used, bring back the leather component of the new car smell quite effectively when it begins to wear off.  

A less orthodox method recommended by a former Spanish colleague of mine - and which I haven't got around to trying though I keep meaning to - is to vaporise a tiny amount of one of the better local brandies such as Cardenal Mendoza, Lepanto, Carlos 1° etc.  Apparently, when the alcohol has evaporated, which it quickly does, the cabin is left with the smell of fine leather. 

[DavidCM]

1 hour ago, Rabbers said:

 

 

Lepanto, Carlos 1° etc.  Apparently, when the alcohol has evaporated, which it quickly does, the cabin is left with the smell of fine leather. 

I find that alcohol never gets the chance to evaporate near me..

 

Back to the thread..some years ago I bought a new MX5 with leather upholstery.Initially, it had a strong spirit smell inside,probably new plastics and vinyl from the non leather parts .

In desperation,I bought some air fresheners from Gliptone..the leather treatment people.They were leather scented and did the trick.By coincidence,I found an unused one I had carefully sealed in layers of clingfilm.I put it in my RC and it still gives a very faint but definite leather aroma.Not bad after 10 years or so.

[Rabbers]

33 minutes ago, DavidCM said:

I find that alcohol never gets the chance to evaporate near me. …

I completely understand, David, but you’ll have noticed that the advice was limited to a tiny amount.  What one does with the rest of the bottle is one’s own business. 

[Gary H]

New car smell - it really is one of the finest smells in the world. It’s something I’ve said for about as long as I can remember. 

Even as a relatively small child I remember being fascinated by it. One of my earliest childhood memories that I distinctly remember was going to Cromer on holiday in my father’s company Toyota Carina II liftback in white, with blue velour. It was an ‘E’ plate and one of the last of the boxier, original ‘T150’ models. Anyway, it would have been a young car at the time. Around 18 months old, two years at most. I distinctly remember pushing my nose into the seat fabric to smell a ‘stronger newness’ still in the seats! 😄 I’ve never forgotten that... 

Anyway going back twenty years, I remember ‘Magic Tree’ did do what they called a ‘New Car Scent’ fragrance. I remember the tree being blue. I’m pretty sure it’s still available but I’ve no idea if it still smells the same or not. My only advice is to avoid this. I did put a few up in my first car (a Ford Ka). I wasn’t keen on it when I opened the packets. It smelt sweet but I couldn’t quite tell what it was. I thought maybe it would be better left in the open air for a while, so I left them hanging up in there for a few hours and when I went back to the car to give it it’s first proper...’whiff’...should I say, what did I smell? New car scent? Like new glues, carpets, plastics and fabrics?

No... I smelt bubble bath. 

Yes, Magic Tree’s ‘new car scent’ smelt pretty much like bubble bath to me. Nothing whatsoever like what I thought it would. Most definitely a false advertisement on their behalf! I ended up taking those trees out after about three days because the longer I spent in the car, the more nauseating/sickly the smell would become. 🤢

The next one I tried in there was a ‘real leather’ one. I honestly can’t remember what brand it was - I just remembered it was brown, rectangular and cost a few quid more than a Magic Tree. Now - this one was very nice indeed...and I had a then three year old Ford Ka that did genuinely smell like a car with leather seats! Not car leather...but the sort of leather from the likes of a DFS sofa. I did like that one! I was sad when it faded as I never found that particular one again. 

Thanks for the tip on Dr Leather Wipes, @Rabbers. I have seen them around but never used them. I’ll keep them in mind. The less orthodox alcohol tip in particular has made me chuckle! I’ve never heard of that one before!

Obviously with my 73 plate car that’s only three weeks old today, it still smells lovely and new in there and I do intend on keeping it that way for as long as possible - as I have done so with any new car I’ve owned in the past. I do have some very simple, but perhaps over the top rules which have caused much laughter with work colleagues in the past. They are:

- Don’t have doors or windows open for longer than necessary. Especially the latter. Use air conditioning. 
- No overuse of deodorants or aftershaves on a person entering the car.
- No eating or drinking in the car. I will accept coffee in the car after around the 18 month mark.
- Following on from the above, there will be absolutely no ‘takeaway runs’ done in said car. 

Obviously all of this only delays the inevitable of newness naturally fading away from the interior, but even after three and a half years with the UX that my NX replaced, you could still detect hints of original newness in it after that length of time. Especially in warmer weather.

[Scotlex]

Autoglym leather care balm gives quite a nice leather smell 😀

I also tried Autoglym autofresh which I was not so impressed with.

[NemesisUK]

11 hours ago, Scotlex said:

I really love the "new car smell" 😀😀😀

One of the best bits of getting a brand new car. 😀

The Japanese hate the smell of leather, their new cars don't have a leather smell, unlike Mercs or other Euro boxes.

 

[Huwge]

I use this one and find it okay. Doesn't smell like car leather, more like shoe leather in my opinion. All very subjective though

 

They also do a new car smell. Not tried it myself

 

 

 

[Scotlex]

9 hours ago, NemesisUK said:

The Japanese hate the smell of leather, their new cars don't have a leather smell, unlike Mercs or other Euro boxes.

 

I wasn't aware of that.

The Lexus (my first) probably does have less of a leather smell than other euro cars.

[Gary H]

I hadn’t heard that one before, either! I can’t say I’ve been in many older Japanese cars with leather in order to comment on that front, but very interesting to hear...

I’d say the strongest smelling leather I’ve had in a car was on a 2008 Audi A3 Sportback I had - which come with fine nappa leather. I bought it new and had it for just over three years. That was truly pungent from collection day and remained that case for the best part of a year. You just had to open any of the doors and not even get into the car for it to waft up the nostrils! As a ‘new car smell connoisseur’, I found this very impressive! It remained quite strong after that time too. It was well into the third and final year before it got to the point the car smelt more like ‘fresh air’ with hints of leather, but still remained very much ‘leathery’ in warm weather.

[Ala Larj]

They used to use urine to soften leather so there may be cheaper ways to get that new car smell!

[Scotlex]

9 hours ago, Ala Larj said:

They used to use urine to soften leather so there may be cheaper ways to get that new car smell!

Thanks for that 😅

I'm sure that the smell that I am talking about is not similar to a gents toilet 😬

[BonzoSPB]

10 hours ago, Ala Larj said:

They used to use urine to soften leather so there may be cheaper ways to get that new car smell!

The mother-in-law has already proved that this is untrue.

[Rabbers]

I knew that lavatories and mothers-in-law were traditional elements of British humour but I never thought I’d come across them in a Lexus forum.

[Scotlex]

2 hours ago, BonzoSPB said:

The mother-in-law has already proved that this is untrue.

😅😅