Stubborn water marks and bird crap etching into new paint

[TypeR]

Hey everyone, In need of some advice. I keep my car outdoors, (unfortunately) and its exposed to the elements. I try and take care of to my best ability. The car is a few months old, its black, and for some reason I am having a hard time removing hard water spots, and now fresh bird crap. I have tried blackfire water spot remover with no luck which tells me its likely etched into the paint. The bird droppings I noticed this morning baking in the florida sun, so I immediately rinsed it off, but you can see the blemish now. I have a coating of wolfgang paint sealant 3.0 on the vehicle, but it doesn't seem to do anything against etching. I do not have a garage or electric polisher, only my hands.

What can I do to remove these markings and prevent them from reoccurring asides from PPF and Ceraminc coating which I cannot afford.

Thanks

[Mike Phillips]

Tough problem.

Because this is your first post to AGO,

Welcome to AutogeekOnline! :welcome:


Water spots first....

I just posted this in another thread TODAY. And I posted it at least once or twice last week,

Here's the thread,

Ceramic Coat Damage (?) (https://www.autogeekonline.net/forum/ask-mike-phillips-your-detailing-questions-/126018-ceramic-coat-damage.html)

Here's what I post about water spot issues all the time,





And if it is the WATER in your area, be it rain water, sprinkler water, hose water, etc., you have to ask yourself,


What's in the water?
(root cause)




Wolfgang Deep Gloss Paint Sealant is a great paint sealant with a cult-like following. If whatever corrosive element is in the water is etching it, then don't drink the water. This etching issue will probably happen no matter what wax or sealant you use. The only hope for relieve will be something more resistant to chemical attack and that takes us to the Si02 options.

You could try this,

SONAX Polymer Net Shield - Closest thing to a coating without being a coating (https://www.autogeekonline.net/forum/2018-new-car-detailing-how-to-article-by-mike-phillips/120275-sonax-polymer-net-shield-closest-thing-coating-without-being-coating.html)

http://www.autogeekonline.net/gallery/data/722/sonax-polymer-net-shield-75-ml-3.jpg



SONAX Polymer Net Shield 75 ml. (https://www.autogeekonline.net/forum/redirect-to/?redirect=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.autogeek.net%2Fsonax-polymer-net-shield-75ml.html) - $9.99



:)

[Mike Phillips]

For the bird dropping etching,

What did the bird eat?



That is, what's in the bird dropping that makes it so corrosive. Your car's urethane clearcoat is pretty stout stuff to start with, if the acids in a bird dropping and even the corrosive elements in water are strong enough to etch urethane, there's no easy fix..


Here's the deal, anytime you have any kind of sub-surface defect, the ONLY way to remove it is to abrade the paint, (compound, polish or cleaner/wax), and level the surface with the lowest depths of the defects you're' trying to remove.

You really need an orbital polisher to do any kind of abrading work to modern clearcoats. I used to teach "hand polishing" when I was at Meguiar's teaching their classes and from my experience, 99.9% of the human population do not possess the skills or muscle to rub out a basecoat/clearcoat paint system without marring the paint at the same time.

I type this all the time,

It requires more skill to polish paint by hand than it does to work by machine -Mike Phillips


Without a garage or carport, or machine, you're in a touch situation.





Here's something else I wrote in the thread I linked to above, it's in post #4

If this car is a daily driver, not a garage queen, take it out only on Sundays to car shows and park on the grass for others to admire, then I would probably learn to live with them and just do what you're doing, wash and keep the car clean and then move on in life.


Probably not the answer you want to hear but any other remedy is going to be time consuming with some form of investment. Count the costs and again, is this a daily driver. Don't go crazy over the small stuff. And especially if you don't have garage to store this car in anytime it's not in use.


I have a small paint defect in the hood of my Lexus, the ONLY way to fix it proper would be to repaint the entire hood. Not going to do it. It's a daily driver that's parked outside 24x7 and it doesn't bother me enough to throw $1000.00 at it. Instead, I wash it, keep it clean and drive it.



:dunno:

[TypeR]

Thanks for the quick reply, Mike!

Fortunately it is not my daily driver, but unfortunately I don't have a garage and it sits outdoors. I do wash it weekly here in my apartment complex. I am willing to try what you recommend and even invest in an orbital buffer. I have not used this before, ( I do have a cordless dewalt drill, but read this could be sketchy). I researched and found a lot of folks like the Griot's Garage 3" orbital buffer. Would that sonax paint sealant be something I could do on top of the wolfgang? I do eventually hope to own a place that has a garage so I would be able to give the car what it deserves.. I suppose if the problems I am having now wont give me permanent damage, ( as long as I stay on top of them as much as I can) then knowing I can tackle them in the future in my garage alleviates some of my worry. I still want to be able to do as much as I can for now though.

Do you have any beginner polishing videos you can share?

[TypeR]

Would be great to tackle the light swirl marks along with the embedded blemishes at the sametime. I am going to read your links in depth when I get home, thank you!

[Rsurfer]

I feel for you, but want made you buy a black car with no garage? Even with a garage it's a part time job to maintain a clean finish.

[TypeR]

I feel for you, but want made you buy a black car with no garage? Even with a garage it's a part time job to maintain a clean finish.

Limited production car and not a lot of dealers were willing to sell for MSRP.

[Rsurfer]

Limited production car and not a lot of dealers were willing to sell for MSRP.

Nice ride and good luck keeping it looking like new.

[TypeR]

Nice ride and good luck keeping it looking like new.

Thanks

[ducksfan]

Is there a place near you that sells RO water. Around here there's private water purifiers that sell it for 25-35 cents a gallon. You could rinseless wash your car for a little over $1 per wash (Maybe less if you're thrifty.). Waterless style would be even cheaper.

[TypeR]

There is a local aquarium store that sells it, but how good that an actually be? If the car is really dirty, I feel like it would need a proper rinsing first to loosen the dirt no? Otherwise, ill be creating a ton of swirl marks. I think I found the culprit for the water spots though. Apparently the water I was using was coming from the canal and is used for the sprinkler system. I have now found the city water hook up and will be using that. So hopefully no more NEW water spots lol

[ducksfan]

It doesn't matter what you begin with on the car. It's what dries on the car that matters.

There are ways to deal with a dirty car. The roof is the only difficult area, but is the least likely to have the bigger dirt particles. And if it does, it can be rinsed off with only getting about 1/3 of the remaining car wet. Usually 1/2 of the vertical panels are shaded.