big time water spots

[BogusMalone]

I bought my 16 year old son a 1995 honda civic a few months ago. We could tell it had been recently painted. My son was doing the usual go to the car wash and put on spray on wax when it was through washing.

A couple of months after he had the civic it got rained on (not the first time) and the water sat on it for a while, at least over night. We dried it off only to find some big time water spots left behind. We tried vinegar only on the spot to try and remove hard water spot. No help. We tried the abrasive properties of waxing a small spot. Wax wouldn't touch it.

Here is a picture of the car when it was new (to him).




Here is a picture of the top of the car with water spots. The water spots were all on all flat sufaces (hood, trunk and top).



It seemed that the spots were under the surface. I got some turtle wax rubbing compound and rubbed a small spot for a long time before I could get a spot to come out.

This was taking way to long so I tried 1500 grit sp on a small area and I could get a spot out but I was kind of scared of wet sanding the whole thing.

A friend gave me some 3M products he had left over from painting his truck recently and I used those. I first used Perfect-It II rubbing compound by hand. It took us like 6 hours of rubbing to get the spots out of the trunk lid. Then we used 3M Perfect-It foam polishing pad glaze to take the swirls out again by hand. Then we put on Meguiars colorx to try and protect from spots from coming again. We used these products on the trunk and hood. It took like 8 hours of rubbing by hand to rub out the hood.

It doesn't look to bad





We have not done the top yet.

I bought a PC7424 yesterday and placed an order for an edge 2000 pad kit today here at AG.

I think I can get the spots out with the compound and glaze that I still have some of. My main questions is how do I keep this from happening again.

Is Wolfgang paint sealant the way to go?


Sorry for the long post from a newbie. I have been lurking around here a few weeks and I enjoy the site.

Thanks for any advice.

[abrcrombe]

Good protection (sealant or wax) and not letting it sit for a long time. Seems like a hassle, but my mom always says, It is better to be safe then sorry.

[Meghan]

I would be tempted to put either Wolfgang on that or the Klasse twins. If your son is not going to be keeping up with it, I would do the twins and put a second layer of the glaze on. This might increase your chances on not having this problem again. Just my .02, lets see what everyone else has to say.

[BogusMalone]

Oh he will keep up with it. We are both learning from this site. I have enough to do with out keeping up with his car. It's kind of cool to work on the car together. You know how teenagers are. They don't usually want to hang with dad too much. But he likes when we work on his car together.

He has some microfiber towels now and if it rains on his car he is out at the first chance drying it up.

I can't wait to try the PC on the top of the car. He wants to give it a whirl also .

thanks for the replies.

Keep um coming.

[TLMitchell]

Originally Posted by BogusMalone

I can't wait to try the PC on the top of the car. He wants to give it a whirl also .

thanks for the replies.

Keep um coming.

I ran into some of those real nasty water spots on a friends car. Since my vehicles always have a good coat of protection I was at a loss dealing with these. As you discovered using the hard-but-memorable method, the finish needs abraded. And a machine beats rubbing until your arms are ready to fall off.

After trying quite a few combinations with the PC I found PFW pads and Meguiar's 105 did the most thorough job with the least effort and the M105 finished better than any compound I've ever used. Someone less particular could've gotten away with adding an LSP but I used a finer polish with foam anyway to improve the results before using carnauba. I've found a couple of places that sell Meguiar's products in 12 oz sampler sizes in a handy squeeze-applicator bottle. Nice combo of product and price for something it's unlikely you'll need to use often. (hopefully!)

Good learning experience for the lad and some hard work never hurts either. It's easier to care for almost anything than it is to fix things after they've gone downhill.

IMO, almost any LSP properly maintained will prevent water spots with that severity in the future. Personally, I've been a wax guy for over 30 years and find Collinite products an almost unbeatable value. #845 Insulator Wax is incredibly easy to use and produces excellent appearance and protection that lasts. I'm only now starting to experiment with sealants but it appears there's a lot of good ones out there.

As always, your mileage may vary. Have fun and good luck!

TL

[94LT1]

collinite insulator wax #845.Just make sure u put on very light and give it roughly 10 minutes to dry.It hazes clear but with some natrual lighting u can see where its left behind.Works very well and lasts very long.I live in pittsburgh and have seen almost 5 months out of 1 application.i put a coat on my moms car in july and had to put another coat on 2 weeks ago.it can be found here and some parts stores carry it.it ranges from 10-16 dollars a bottle depending on were u find it.

[builthatch]

my wife's car is a late model honda, with ALOT softer paint than your sons 5th gen. at first, i didn't know how soft it was and all i did was keep it clean, no special detailing. after some months in the environment, her car ended up with INCREDIBLE water spots that had caused severe etching. it needed ALOT of correction. i handled that and vowed to keep it from happening again. well, her car is not garaged like mine so i've had to keep up on it to keep this from happening again and i've been using opti-seal. it's really easy to apply, there are no real tricks or time needed for curing other than a few minutes, and though it won't prevent water spotting, it will in essense 'trap' the spots as opposed to allowing them to attack the clear coat. that is what you are after, is protecting the paint.

so, if the car does happen to spot after opti-seal application, you can just use an AIO like poli-seal to take the spots away and that will re-lay the sealant down at the same time.

the sealant will also be healthy for that old red honda base, which loves to turn pink under the attack of UV.

[amy5732]

Originally Posted by builthatch

my wife's car is a late model honda, with ALOT softer paint than your sons 5th gen. at first, i didn't know how soft it was and all i did was keep it clean, no special detailing. after some months in the environment, her car ended up with INCREDIBLE water spots that had caused severe etching. it needed ALOT of correction. i handled that and vowed to keep it from happening again. well, her car is not garaged like mine so i've had to keep up on it to keep this from happening again and i've been using opti-seal. it's really easy to apply, there are no real tricks or time needed for curing other than a few minutes, and though it won't prevent water spotting, it will in essense 'trap' the spots as opposed to allowing them to attack the clear coat. that is what you are after, is protecting the paint.

so, if the car does happen to spot after opti-seal application, you can just use an AIO like poli-seal to take the spots away and that will re-lay the sealant down at the same time.

the sealant will also be healthy for that old red honda base, which loves to turn pink under the attack of UV.

good post. i like the combination of ease of use and ablity to upkeep. optimum opti-seal and optimum poli seal= great combo