For the first time since I have had had my Max, I am having a problem with water spots. There are large water spottage areas all over the hood, roof, and trunk/spoiler. I have tried Meguiars paint cleaner but it's only slightly improving the issue. I don't know what caused the spots but basically they showed up after I washed and dried the car last night....aggravating.

 

use a mixture of vinegar and water. i dont know the exact proportions i think its 1:5 or 1:3. so one part vinegar to 3 parts water or something to that effect. Someone can help me out here.

 

IIRC you can use the vinegar straight. Moisten a MF with some and see if they come off. If not, try some polish.

Did you get the spots after washing the car?

 

I suppose I did -- my paint is normally flawless as I am way too into keeping it like new but these spots are deep and look horrible.

 

Well, tried the vinegar with no luck -- I used balsamic, should I try another type? I will see if I can't get the camera to pick the spots up.

 

use white vinegar...your not making a salad. lol

 

Hey vinegar is vinegar, lol. I will say this though -- after letting the vinegar settle to a haze and then buffing off, the black paint shines like crazy.

 

My package of Mother's Clay Bar states that it will remove water spots. I don't know if this is true since I didn't have any spots, but it might be worth a try.

 

Tried the clay -- no luck...basically what I am doing right now is scrubbing the hood really hard with the Meguiars Step 1 Paint Cleaner. It is slowly but surely coming out but the hood alone has taken a couple hours. Boy, do I need a PC.

 

Try a polish - Scratch-X, Menzerna etc. Sounds like whatever it is has etched the paint. Polish will work better and faster than paint cleaner. And a PC would help, too!

 

im really curious how this happened and wat it looks like...does it look like normal spots?

 

Here, hopefully these pictures will give you some sort of idea.

 

S00NR, keep us updated on how you make out...I just washed my car and am getting the same dam problem. Curious to see how you make out!!!!

 

Looks like hard water spots. Are they on all parts of the car or only the horizontal surfaces (i.e. hood, roof, trunk) Did you wash the car in the sun? Hard to tell from the pics but it looks etched. I'm sure a polish will remove them. It will be a PITA, but they'll come off.

 

Anything you'd recommend?

 

Ya, I did an initial wash in the sun yesterday then couldn't finish it. I rewashed it again last night at about 9pm in the dark and that's when I noticed these spots. They are in fact only on the horizontal surfaces and it has taken me the better part of several hours just to get them off the front hood. What do you mean by they look etched?

 

Etching is when something actually gets into the clearcoat instead of just drying on the top of it. Once it actually gets into the clearcoat it needs to be polished out. The minerals in the water got into the clearcoat when it dried in the sun in the same way that acid rain does, or bird poop.

Does anyone near you have a PC? Applying polish with it would be the easiest way to remove it. Or consider buying one. (It's the best detailing investment I've made). I bet your arms are getting sore....

 

Ya, this is not fun whatsoever -- hard to believe this would happen with as many coats of sealant and wax my paint normally has, but I digress. I think my sister's boyfriend has a Dewalt rotary - I might see if he will let me borrow it to try to get this PITA out.

 

If you don't have experience with a rotary, be careful with it. It can burn the paint real easily.

That's why I prefer a PC. It's almost impossible to mess up.

 

Here are some after pics of the hood --- after about 6 hours of scrubbing.

Process:
1. Meguiars Step 1 Paint Cleaner (scrub hard several times for each spot)
2. Meguiars Step 2 Polish (again, scrub hard several times)
3. TFP Polymer Sealant
4. Meguiars NXT Wax
5. Meguiars Yellow Carnauba Wax

 

Nice job SOONR1! (thanks for the PM) That's a lot of work to get rid of them.

Note to Self - Don't wash the car in the sun!

 

Yes, VERY BIG note to self......I've been detailing cars for 5 years and have never run into a problem this big.

 

Great job Soonr1 ... thx to chicago weather, i guess i had almost all the time got to wash the car on cloudy days Dry it then and there itself always But this is a very good lesson on why not to wash in sun

 

Ummm...stupid question, but what is a PC?

 

porter cable buffing machine

 

Got rid of the swirl marks too, looks nice!

 

Well, I'll be damned, they came back -- completely! All that work I did on the hood was for not. Furthermore, I tried the distilled white vinegar and that definitely didn't work. So I guess that means I will just have to live with them until I can afford a PC.

 

That $ucks. I bet the paint is etched seeing as they came back.

The PC and a polish would be the next logical step. Hope you can get one soon.

 

Ya, I need to have them gone by Maxus.

 

If not, I can bring my PC to Maxus.

 

You need a polisher and some cutting pads......those meguiars polishes are not adequate to your paints needs

 

Yup, going to have to find someone around here with those tools....I have always been strictly by hand.

 

Meh...im sick of ppl telling me that. Hand waxing is fine, but polishing should be done by machine. If you have a garage kept councours level car, and are using zymol heritage wax...then I understand the strictly by hand policy. Now should you have a normal car, with a hard clear coat (aka any nissan) machine polishing is the only way to really do anything. Sure, the car looks nice after a hand wax, but all the swirls and marks are still there being hidden by the wax.

 

I was not meaning that I will ONLY hand wax/polish, but at this time, that is the only option available to me as I can not currently justify the nearly 200 dollar expense for all of the supplies for machine polishing -- that will be later on this summer.

 

Get the Sonus kit....its a good value

 

Just to give a quick update.....Tom (Bluesbrekr) wanted to try his Menzerna intensive polish on my car at Maxus Saturday afternoon before I left and I am very grateful. He was thinking about using the PC (and I would have loved to have seen it in action) but it was so damn hot that I was afraid using it may have damaged the paint. So, he decided to try some of it on the hood by hand and all I can say is WOW. He tested it on one small spot of the hood - first with the intensive polish and then topping it with the final polish - and the spots were completely removed (and still are). Thus, I will be purchasing some Menzerna in the near future (may do the intensive polish/final polish/klasse AIO package from premier autocare for 50 bucks) and will be attacking those sumbishes. Thanks Tom for all the help!

 

No problem, Lance. You've got a great looking Max. It shouldn't have to suffer with those water spots. I still have no idea as to why they were so hard to remove.

By hand ought to work, but it will be very labor intensive. Keep trying to locate a PC. I have used both those polishes with a PC with excellent results. Either way, post pics when you're done.

 

Here in Houston I have the same problem....I would say definately invest in a PC as my water spots come off in a breeze whenever I detail my car. I usually let my car dry in the sun before detailing so it has some mad water spots all over it before I start after I'm done looks like new. The PC was one of the best investments I've made!!

 

where can i get a pc?

 

Lowe's has them or can order them. Also a bunch of places on line carry them. Try Google.