Argh! Water spots! How best to get rid of them?

I think Zaino makes great stuff. Z-6 Gloss Enhancer takes care of my water spots effortlessly. Well, almost.

 

The best cure is prevention. Wash it using the Mr. Clean Autodry system, which includes its own water softener. After two years using it the finish on mine looks new.

 

I too would be interested in the answer to this question. The finish on my 1-month old car was lovely and smooth -- until I washed the car for the first time. Now I have lots of waterspots and the finish feels very gritty.

I didn't try to dry the car for fear of creating swirl marks which I'll then have to polish out later. Instead I have water spots to remove. Arrgh! Seems I can't win...

I know some folks love the Mr. Clean product, but I'd like to be able to wash my car just using a bucket or two of water. (Hosing it seems like a big waste of water.) Any suggestions??

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(ghostofjk @ Apr 21 2006, 06:12 PM) [snapback]243375[/snapback]</div>

Hi.. Curious, why 'foolishly' with Nu-Finish?

 

Lemon juice? Lime Away? Pouring acid on a new car doesn't sound like the answer.

Mr. Clean has flow restriction so it uses less water than simply turning a hose onto the car. But really, 10 or 20 gallons of water more or less per wash is negligible, even if you do it every week.

 

Water deposits are caused by the presence of everything other than water in your rinse water. Thats why distilled water is such a good rinsate. For that reason, I find it hard to believe that lemon juice, lime-away or almost ANY additive would be effective. The exception would be the additives which cause water to sheet rather than bead. Beaded water will concentrate all of the dissolved things (primarily carbonate species, and particulates/dust in the southwest by YMMV) into one spot. When the water leaves, the dissolved bits will not evaporate, but remain as a residue. Sheeting will prevent the dissolved bits from concentrating, causing them to either run off the car with the water, or at least spread themselves out so that they are not as noticable. Seems to me that if you don't want spots, your best bet is to A) rinse with distilled water, B.) dry your car really quickly, C) use something that causes sheeting, or D) dry with something alcohol based that will allow you to pick up the impurities in the cloth, allowing the alcohol to evaporate when you're done. Lemon juice? I strongly suspect that won't work.... but I've been wrong already once this morning.

 

I try to wash my car in indirect sunlight: the CA sun causes just-washed cars to air dry very quickly, leaving water spots all over the car. I've found that washing it in early morning or late afternoon, or on an overcast day, is key to getting no water spots. We unfortunately have hard water here too...

I clean the car in sections and try to move quickly so it doesn't dry on its own. First I hose it down, use the soft brush + car wash cleaner, then hose it down again. Then when I self-dry it just after rinsing the suds, I use a large lint free towel and dry in sections, beginning from the first section I cleaned. Sometimes I go over the car with a slightly damp lint-free towel should any visible water spots remain.

And believe me, on a black Prius, those water spots definitely show up. I'm not sure which is worse: a dirty black car, or a clean black car with water spots. My former car was also black, so I've kind of lived and learned how best to wash a black car outside.

 

I had an inspiration while in the automotive aisle yesterday...

I bought the refill bottle of Mr Clean polymer car wash "stuff" and will try using it in a good ol' fashioned bucket of water (without using the fancy spray gizmo).

I'm hoping this will help the water fall off when I hand rinse the car (again, I'm trying to avoid having to use a hose since it is a hassle and I hate sending so much water down the drain). I figure I will still have to do some hand drying but a lot less than otherwise.

Think it will work? Anyone else try this low-tech approach??

:blink:

 

I'd bet it won't work very well. Part of their system is a demineralizer cartridge for the rinse spray. No matter what you wash it with, if you rinse with hard water you'll probably get spots.

 

IMO, breaking up the Mr. Clean system doesn't work well. See my comments below.


<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(richard schumacher @ Apr 27 2006, 09:43 PM) [snapback]246482[/snapback]</div>

IMO, the Mr. Clean system needs to be used as a "system". I've tried washing with another nozzle & soap (SudsBlaster & Mothers) and then rinsing with the Mr. Clean unit but still see water spots. As soon as I use the Mr. Clean soap and then rinse using the demineralizer spray the water spots disappear (with an air dry in the shade).

The approach I use is to apply the Mr. Clean Soap a section at a time using the sprayer on the mitt and then the car and then handwash using the mitt. I squirt soap on the mitt and then only squirt the amout of soap on the car I need to cover an area, e.g., rear fender, door, etc. I rinse the smaller areas using plain water and make sure I keep the whole car wet while washing and rinsing. Once I have all the car washed and rinsed I go over it using the demineralized spray. Use nice slow overlapping swipes (like you are painting the car) for the best results. Just doing a quick spray over with the demineralizer leaves spots. BTW, I wash from the bottom up and rinse from the top down. It's a labour of love... :wub:

(Just talking about it tires me out... :wacko: )

 

Water spots are caused by desolved minerals in water. Calcium carbonate (sometimes called lime) is the most common and appears white and chalky when dry. These minerals form ions when desolved in water; when the water evaporates, it leaves the minerals behind. That's why water heaters, coffee pots, and humidifiers get coated with minerals over time. The harder your water, the more desolved minerals.

When you rinse your car and let it air dry, the water evaporates and leaves behind minerals, otherwise know as water spots. They form spots because water tends to pull together as droplets, and as each droplet evaporates, it leaves behind a little white coating of mineral.

Given this information, we see that there are several ways to treat this problem:

1) Remove the water before it evaporates. If you dry a surface with an absorbent material, the minerals are absorbed with the water, so no water spots occur. You can also remove the water with a squeegee or chamois. In either of these cases, the goal is to remove as much water as possible before evaporation occurs. The less evaporation, the less mineral to leave spots. This is why you get more spots washing in the sun - the heat speeds evaporation.

2) Use a wetting agent to prevent droplets from forming. The wetting agent reduces the surface tension of the water, so the water does not pull together to form droplets. This helps the water run off the surface, much like using a squeegee or chomois. The remaining water still contains minerals which are left when it evaporates, but the minerals are deposited evenly over the surface instead of being consentrated as spots. The small, light coating is much less objectionable than spots.

3) Use water containing few minerals. If you rinse a car with deionized water, you can just let it air dry. Since the water does not contain minerals, no spots will be left when the water evaporates. This is by far the easiest and most elegant solution to water spots, but you need to find a way to get deionized water. Alas, there is no free lunch.

How to deionize water:

1) Soft water, as most of us know it, is not even remotely deionized. Chemical water softeners work by trading hard water ions (calcium) for another type of ion (usually sodium). The treated water has just as many ions, but the new ions are a type that interferes less with soap and sudsing, and are less likely to to build up on faucets and fixtures. This is the premise behind water softeners that use salt, and water softening addatives such as washing soda and lemon juice. These all help reduce water spots, but are not completely effective.

2) Commercial water treatment plants often soften water by treating large batches with chemicals that cause the hard water ions to clump together and fall to the bottom of the treatment pond. This is called chemical precipitation. If you have city water and it is treated this way, you are going to have a lot less trouble with water spots. Consider yourself lucky. Otherwise, this is not something you are going to do at home.

3) Hard water ions can be removed by mechanical filtration through reverse osmosis. A reverse osmosis filter squeezes water through a very fine membrane that allows water to pass but catches most of the slightly larger hard water ions. Reverse osmosis will remove many, but not all, of the hard water ions. For many applications, this may be good enough.

4) Distillation. Distillation does not technically produce deionized water. Distilled water still contains many ions from the distillation plumbing and tankage, but for the case in point, the nasty calcium ions are left behind at the still. Essentially, destilled water has already been evaporated, so the distiller gets the calcuim and your car skips the spots.

5) Deionizing filters. Deionizing filters work by using a two step process where ions are exchanged and then trapped in a filter bed. Deionizing filters can make water so pure that it will pull the copper right out of your pipes. Obviously we don't need lab grade deionized water for washing a car - an industrial grade filter will work just fine. Commercial systems that use large amounts of deionized water usually start with an ion exchange water softener, then feed it to a reverse osmosis filter to remove most of the ions, then finish off with a deionizing filter. This may be overkill for your average car washer.

Here is my recommendation:

After washing your car, rinse with deionized water. Distilled water will work fine, but it is expensive and hard to use since in comes in bottles. Your best bet for deionized water is a system such as Mr. Clean's. The small deionizing filters are expensive per gallon compared to a commercial filter, but are pretty cheap to buy since they are small, plus they are convenient to use. You won't get a high flow rate through a small deionizing filter, but you shouldn't be using deionized water to blast bugs off the bumper. You want to do all of the washing and blasting before your final rinse. The deionzied water is only used as a final rinse to remove all of those nasty calcium ions, then you can just let your car air dry.

If any of you car wash nuts out there want to get serious about deionization, contact me and I can give you some sorces for larger deionization filters.

Hope this helps,
Tom

 

Uhh, as I recall about $20 at Target. The initial supplies lasted several months for me.

To reduce/eliminate swirls, launder your cotton wash mitt after each use. I store the whole kit in a pail inside a cupboard to exclude airborne dirt.

 

I guess it is not exactly distilled water, but during the summer months my basement dehumidifier cranks out gallons of "close enough" every day.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(ghostofjk @ May 1 2006, 01:56 AM) [snapback]247823[/snapback]</div>

Done.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(MichaelE @ Apr 30 2006, 10:40 PM) [snapback]247754[/snapback]</div>

It's going to be pretty close. With a dehumidifier you have an open distillation process: The water evaporates somewhere else, travels to your basement, then condenses in the dehumidifier. It differs from lab distillation in that some contaminates may be picked up floating around in the air. Same thing with rain - it should be completely clean distilled water, but it picks up stuff from the air. Even so, your dehumidifier water should be a lot softer than normal tap water.

Tom

 

I also sent this reply to you by pm...

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(ghostofjk @ Apr 27 2006, 11:38 PM) [snapback]246518[/snapback]</div>

LOL, I just now stumbled upon your reply. No, it was I who was washing my car these last 2 times it's been cleaned. Actually, the last time my husband said that when I was done, he would go get his car so I could wash it too. Then my brother suggested I wash his...my mom suggested I wash hers....and the neighbor across the street said I could wash his truck and his Harley. Yeah right!!

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(ghostofjk @ Apr 27 2006, 11:38 PM) [snapback]246518[/snapback]</div>

So far they've put the due date at Nov 30. Right now I'm at 10 weeks exactly...still very early in the pregnancy.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(ghostofjk @ Apr 27 2006, 11:38 PM) [snapback]246518[/snapback]</div>

I've only had mild nausea on some evenings thus far, which may or may not have been caused by me starting off feeling 'starved' then proceeding to stuff my face until I felt sick.

My odd cravings have included very random foods that I sort of group together into some sort of meal: cheddar cheese, jello chocolate pudding cup, handful of cheese popcorn, another piece of cheese, and some raisin toast. Followed by apple juice or fruit punch flavored gatorade. Go figure! I had previously gotten myself off of eating fast food for several months there-I was eating salad for lunch every day instead. Now I want nothing to do with salads-it's all Taco Bell and In N Out now!!

We are definitely finding out the gender, at the soonest possible moment. My doctor mentioned that I could have some bloodwork done if I so chose to, that would determine the gender sooner than an ultrasound could. I'm having a lot of bloodwork done in the next week or 2, so I figured I'll ask at the lab if they're able to do the gender test thing too...

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(ghostofjk @ Apr 27 2006, 11:38 PM) [snapback]246518[/snapback]</div>

That might be fun, to do a poll. But the husband and I have definitely picked some names out (boy and girl) that we really like, and will use one of them for sure.