How do I do a clean install of Mountain Lion with no disc?

Question

I purchased an iMac in late 2013. This model has no disc drive. It came with Mountain Lion pre-installed. If I ever needed to perform a clean install of Mountain Lion, how can I? I don't have an installer file and no disc came with the computer. What's the official way to deal with the fact that I essentially don't own a copy of the OS my computer came with?

Answer 1

For Repairs/Recovery:

One is to use the build in recovery installed on your hard drive. To check for it use disk utility, but it is a hidden partition so make it non hidden first.

Second one is to use the Internet Recovery.

For clean install:

is to create a bootable USB, with complete ML installer. (you need to have/purchase the ML installer package), and a USB with 8GB space.

http://macs.about.com/od/usingyourmac/qt/How-To-Re-Download-Apps-From-The-Mac-App-Store.htm

Example:

OS X Recovery Disk Assistant v1.0

The OS X Recovery Disk Assistant lets you create OS X Recovery on an external drive that has all of the same capabilities as the built-in OS X Recovery: reinstall Lion or later, repair the disk using Disk Utility, restore from a Time Machine backup, or browse the web with Safari.

Note: In order to create an external OS X Recovery using the OS X Recovery Assistant, the Mac must have an existing Recovery HD.

To create an external OS X Recovery, download the OS X Recovery Disk Assistant application. Insert an external drive, launch the OS X Recovery Disk Assistant, select the drive where you would like to install, and follow the on screen instructions.