Today I washed my car cuz it was really dirty and when I was done I waxed it and noticed all over my bumper there are these water spot looking stains that aren't coming out. I waxed it pretty hard. You guys have any ideas on what I should do to get it out?

 

Did you wax it by hand or with a buffer? By hand just isnt going to cut it. If you cant get it out with a buffer then it will probably need to be wet sanded.

 

Get a good polish or an all in one polish. Klasses AIO would work, or get a nice polish like Menzerna's Intesive Polish, then Final Polish II. After that put a coat of what ever Wax you like. Also Poorboys SSR 2.5 and SSR 1, if you want something good, but less expensive than menzernas.

 

Wet sanded? Thanks for the replies guys.

 

Take some really fine sandpaper, like 3000 grit. Get a spray bottle filled with water with a few drops of soap in it. The really really wet down the area you want to sand. Then sand away lightly keeping the area well lubricated. I wouldnt try it if you dont know how to do it, because you might f**k it up. Or if you do try it, do it in a less conspicuous place first so you get the hang of it. After that your going to have to polish it.

 

Oh yeah, check out www.autopia.org and start asking those gurus over there questions. They know alot more than I do of what to do.

 

Holy hell, don't wet sand water spots unless you have no other choice!

Water spots are tough to get out and in some cases you can not remove them with traditional polish etc...

You have some options:

1 - Re-wash and use a final detail product on the affected area such as from Maguires or similar. These products have been known to correct this issue if the problem is not too severe.

2 - Wash the car and rinse the affected area with distilled water. Be sure to use very, high purity water such as distilled or similar. You can buy this type of water at any store or get a few bottles of Aquafina. The pure water will have a tendency to re-dissolve the deposits and you may be back in business.

3 - If #2 does not work, add a little bit of weak acid to the water such as Vinegar. If you have pH paper, you can actually measure the strength. If you get desperate, you can use the vinegar straight. The vinegar should not harm the surface, but test first in a small area. You can even put some on a rag and then rub it over the deposits. Depending on the makeup of the deposit, the vinegar will either work terrific, or just OK.

4 - If all else fails, then you need to wet sand and then buff.

 

you can use a rotary and or PC with some cutting/wool pads and a cutting/compounding agent to lessen the visual impact of water spots. Ultimately what you are trying to accomplish is to "level" the etching so you cannot see it with the nake eye. Wet sanding is the last resort as you would be removing your clearcoat and on a daily driver removing clear is a big no-no since your paint will then become exposed.

 

If he wet sands properly, he won't pull off all the clear....just the top layer.

Water spots don't etch, they are very adherent spots. The spots are the result of contaminents in the water and when the water evaporates to dryness, the contaminents come out of solution (super saturate) and leave residue. It is really just that "residue"...not "scale" as scale implies that it is crystaline and has been heated.

Some of these spots are nearly impossible to remove depending on what contaminents are in the water. If, for example, you are looking at dried sodium, good luck. It takes the strongest of acid to remove. No doubt, there are multiple contaminents and many of them co-precipitated with other minerals. When this ocurrs, softer deposists will act like glue and if you can break those down, then the entire mess goes away.

BTY, try a clay bar too. If you had a healthy coat of wax, you might get it off with nothing more then a clay bar.

Seriously, try some of the less invasive things that I suggested.

The WaterDR

 

I did have(still have a few)some water spots that I'm not sure where I picked up, that wouldn't wash off as well. Claybar'd the whole car. Had no affect on the spots. Took it over to a buddies thats a body man. He tried some Mothers clearcoat cleaner, didnt work. Ended up having to buff em out with a semi-aggressive foam pad with 3M Microbuffing compound. Got majority of the spots out and made the paint slicker than glass.

Also had the same spots on the glass as well. Used some XXX steelwool along with the 3M compound and that worked really well on cleaning up the windows.

 

Not to argue or debate but (I know you deal in this line of work as a CE):

If water spots are allowed to stay for more than a week or so, the minerals will etch the paint. In this case, using vinegar will remove the mineral spots, but the paint will have etched spots (dimples). In this case, it is necessary to use a medium cut polish (if you have a polisher) or a fine cut polishing compound (for use by hand) to restore the paint surface.

Water spots do etch themselves in the clear and part of wetsanding, using a rotary/PC or by hand it so lessen the depth of the etch and level it out to make the spot seem less visable to the naked eye.

Wet sanding should not be done by a novice at all; heck I know a ton of detailers that work on exotics and they won't wet sand anything larger than literally a piece of paper as it takes alot of practice not to mention how thin your clear is and the fact you will likely end up going right thur it and on a daily driver this is not a good thing to do.

anyway Lizard like was mentioned above you always do the least abrasive steps first then work up from there until you receive the desired results

 

use meguires scratch x it worked wonders on my car

 

Hey man, not to start a fight or nothing, after all, I have never looked at these things under a micro-scope, but I just can't seem to find a mechanism where a deposit can cause an etch in the surface. There would have to be a chemical reaction of some kind to do that. I don't deny that it could happen, I just don't see how it could. Deposits are generally just that...."deposits". Which simply means something that lays on the surface of something. Sure, a deposit can bond to the surface, but etch into the surface so that it creates a crevice....I just don't see how that is possible.

I work with these situations all the time, but not with paint. My experience is with metal, plastic and glass. Perhaps with clearcoat, something else takes place.

Either way, we have all given you options to try. Some invasive and others not.

 

i have proof that the water etched into my clear and my paint....its where the wing posts are..since i have water in my wing (dont ask how cause i dunno) it would leak out and constantly keep the area wet...ill get pics tommorow...im gonna have my trunk lid repainted anyways so im not complaining..

 

That's a different situation all together that you are describing. That is probably from "acid rain". The low pH of the water overtime eats away at the clear. Water can be corrosive if the condition is right.

 

o...ok...that works for me....i thought that the condition of the paint on my trunk is the same as we were talking about in terms of etching cause of sitting water...haha

 

Had the same problem on my car too. I used a DA, and soft pad, with a product called Liquid Ebony, worked for me, in fact it worked so well I did the whole car with it. then a coat of my favorite Maguires wax, and all is cool now. I just have to make sure when ever it gets wet, it gets dried off right away. The remedy was great, but painstakingly laborious.