Classic Car: Water spots on single stage paint

[65Coupe]

I'm trying to remove some stubborn water spots from my 65 Chevy II Nova with single stage paint, not the original paint. I first tried the GG DA with a LC white pad with M80, then stepped up to orange pad. It helped, but water spots still visible. Stepped up to a few passes with Ultimate Compound, little change in results. I really don't want to go too aggressive, which is why I started light. The last pic shows the spots still apparent. Any advice? Thanks!

 

[65Coupe]

Just an update, after a few more passes with M80 on LC Orange pad, then again following with M80 on LC white pad, the spots are significantly diminished. They are still slightly visible, but for now I'm satisfied. I still would like to know if anyone has experience with this on single stage paints. Thanks! Here are a few after pics.

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

Sweet ride! :xyxthumbs:


Looking at the spot in this picture,

The spots look like imprint water spots, that is where water drops formed, then dwelled for too long, whatever was in the water etched the paint leaving an imprint etching around the perimeter of the water spot.

The only effective way to remove these is to do exactly what you did and that is to abrade the paint till you remove enough material, (paint), to make the surface level again.


The risk is that the single stage paint looks like a metallic paint? If so if you abrade to far into the paint you'll affect the appearance of the metallic finish and the results are to make any place where you've buffed too long a lighter color than surrounding paint.

Sometime you'll hear the term Tiger Stripes and this is a term used to describe two types of paint related problems.


Problem 1 - Tiger Stripes "in" the paint
If a painter doesn't use good technique when spraying paint, especially metallics, they leave patterns that mimic the way they moved the sprayer over the paint, usually in back and forth patterns. Here's an example from this thread,

Pictures + Video of 1932 Ford Highboy Extreme Makeover

Tiger Stripes in the paint

(The owner of the above 1932 Ford Highboy painted this himself in his garage and
he's just a do-it-yourselfer, not a pro-painter, so hats off to him for just trying)



Problem 2 - Tiber Stripes "on" the paint
These kinds of Tiger Stripes are like I described above and that's when a person buffs or removes too much paint on a single stage paint, usually metallics, so that you can see lighter and darker areas in the paint, usually in lines or stripes that mimic the direction they moved a rotary buffer back and forth over the paint.


I don't have a picture of the above although I've seen it in my earlier days when single stage paints were more common. Also to be honest, I don't ever want to see it, at least if I'm doing the buffing.

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

In this thread

How To Remove Sprinkler Water Spots


I have some pretty good pictures of water spot imprints


Here's an excerpt from the above thread...

These water spots look like they're established water spots, that every time it rains, or a sprinkler goes off, the water pools in the same place giving any corrosive substances repeated opportunity to etch into the paint.

Visually, I can tell the paint is likely etched in this instance but I won't know till I get the surface clean. The first step is to wash or wipe the finish, in this instance I'm going to repeat wiping process I used on the Mercedes-Benz with a spray detailer.

After wiping the paint clean, there are water spot imprints remaining in the paint.

The paint on this car is a basecoat/clearcoat finish but it still gets imprint rings like a single stage.

The more common water spot that you get with older single stage paints are the type where the paint looks faded or whitish where the water pooled and then dried, like shown in this article,


3 - Types of Water Spots - Type I, Type II and Type III


Type III Water Spots
Type III Water Spots are spots that look faded or dull and are found primarily found on single stage paints after a water source lands on and then pools on the paint and is usually left to dwell on the surface for some measure of time before it evaporates or is wiped-off the surface.

Modern clear coat paints tend to be harder and impermeable, that is non-porous, so liquids don't penetrated easily and thus stain spots tend to be topical, that is only affect the very upper surface and are easier and safer to remove with a compound or polish.

Older single stage paints tend to be soft and permeable, or porous, it's common for liquids to penetrate into the paint and stain the paint below the surface. Removing stains out of single stage paints can be risky because in order to remove the stains you have to abrade the paint and if the stains penetrated deep then you risk removing too much in an effort to try to remove them completely.

 

[Larry A]

Lacquer paint water spotted very easy , especially the newer lacquer. Before they did away with lacquer they improved it (ha ha). The only way to correct it is with compound. Hope you have enough paint on the car.

 

[65Coupe]

Thanks for the advice! Im pretty happy with the results compared to the initial condition. Before the spots were noticeable, now since polishing you really have to look for them. I think I will continue to experiment with waxes to mask the spots rather than try to remove them completely.

Ronnie