Water spots from hell

[Salami]

How do I get rid of them?

They appear to be etched in the paint. I've tried vinegar, clay bar, Chemical Brothers water spot remover, my 'high tech' Meguiars DA that goes in a drill with Meguiar's Professional fine cut cleaner #2 and none of these have hardly touched the water spots.

I purchased the car with the spots on it so they aren't fresh. Car had only 7k miles but was from Florida. I think the car might have a ceramic coating on it for that is just a hunch.

 

[Salami]

Anyone?

 

[RMinNJ]

I had to polish my water spots out. The turtlewax Hyrum ceramic spray sealant let the wonderful water beads etch the plain on 3 cars...though the gti was the worst. Polishing is the only thing that would get them out..used meguiars compound on the tough ones and sonax polish on the no so tough ones.

I had like 4 coats of griots 3in1 spray on the hood that seemed to keep them at bay though some still happened.. latest I have for this winter in meguiars hybrid paint coating...too early to tell if I'll get etching from that.

 

[Salami]

Polishing is the only thing that would get them out..used meguiars compound on the tough ones and sonax polish on the no so tough ones.

Which Meguiar's compound did you use?

 

[RMinNJ]

I used the Meguairs Ultimate Compound..fairly common stuff can get in autopart store ... I would start with the Sonax perfect finish 4/6 first ...as it seems let abrasive.. I have never had any car I own paint 's etch as precariously as the clearcoat on this Tornado red... I don't think its just color though as I had the etching on the Ford paint with TW Hybrid Ceramic (its ceramic but will let water etch through)... and the water spots were much easier to take off. I'm really down on TW products after this..

 

[CaptainRatty]

This will easily take care of it. Spray on, let it sit for 2 min and then wipe. It breaks down the minerals in the hard water.

https://www.carpro-us.com/deep-cleanse/carpro-spotless-2-0-water-spot-remover-500ml-17oz/

 

[Salami]

This will easily take care of it. Spray on, let it sit for 2 min and then wipe. It breaks down the minerals in the hard water.

https://www.carpro-us.com/deep-cleanse/carpro-spotless-2-0-water-spot-remover-500ml-17oz/

I have confirmed the water spots are etched in the paint. This product will be a waste of time/money correct?

 

[CaptainRatty]

I have confirmed the water spots are etched in the paint. This product will be a waste of time/money correct?

Ehhh hard to say. I had some pretty serious water spots that were left for a few weeks and this took car of them. It may be worth a shot before going through the trouble of a DA compound.

 

[RMinNJ]

Not much help getting the spots off but I wanted to add I just protected my tornado red with meguiars hybrid paint coating..two coats. Really easy to apply. So far I like it..the water beads are really tiny which I'm guessing means less contaminates in each bead to etch the paint. I don't see any etched spots yet. Not yet..been on about 2 weeks and has seen quite a bit if rain. Praying this staves the spots off. My roof had several etched spots that needed to be polished before applying the meguiars paint coating. It had several layers of griots 3 on1 on it before. My plan is to use meguiar's recommended bead booster when washing now and hope really tiny beads results in less etching.. it may be the meguiars is just a better protectant. If I hadn't used that I may have tried geon cancoat.

 

[sherbet]

Use shine supply flat top with a MF pad, will need to be followed by a finer polish and pad combo as the flat top is aggressive and will leave haze. Also, if you can, after the first round of compounding, heat cycle the paint- let it bake in the sun or under a heat lamp to roughly 130-140°F. Often times they are deeply bedded and will re-appear once the paint has had a chance to relax and re structure from a proper heat cycle. If you are lucky, they are gone after one solid pass, but often takes a few cycles of this to fully remove them for good.

DM me if you want a chemical removal method- CarPro spotless 2.0 does have some good uses but you’ll need something way stronger if you actually want to dig in and get them out. There is a process that works without polishing but the chemicals are not cheap and there is some relative risk with them if used improperly. I do this for a living and happy to share individually, but not a secret I wish to share for the general public to see

 

[sherbet]

Not much help getting the spots off but I wanted to add I just protected my tornado red with meguiars hybrid paint coating..two coats. Really easy to apply. So far I like it..the water beads are really tiny which I'm guessing means less contaminates in each bead to etch the paint. I don't see any etched spots yet. Not yet..been on about 2 weeks and has seen quite a bit if rain. Praying this staves the spots off. My roof had several etched spots that needed to be polished before applying the meguiars paint coating. It had several layers of griots 3 on1 on it before. My plan is to use meguiar's recommended bead booster when washing now and hope really tiny beads results in less etching.. it may be the meguiars is just a better protectant. If I hadn't used that I may have tried geon cancoat.

Also- using anything to increase the beading will actually create worse spotting. The idea is, whatever water is already hitting your paint causing the spotting is just going to increase the issue if you are using a product that holds larger beads of water. The larger the bead, the more calcium and magnesium will be left behind when said beads dry.