Hard water stains...
 

Hi all. Hadn't drove my car for awhile and apparently a sprinkler has gone haywire where I live. My windshiled has crusty hard water stains now and they ain't comin' out. I've tried mothers chrome polish, an old remedy of vinegar and even lime away. Nothing is working, though the vinegar broke it down just a little. I bought something years ago in an auto parts store that was kind of like a rubbing compound for glass and that worked well but I can't find anything like it anymore.... Anybody got any ideas???

Thanks

I use maguires scratch-x. It removes light scratches and oxidation. I get all these weird brown spots that dry on that scrubbing wont get out. Mine comes from the leaves that fall on my car and sit there and eventually dry. THIS gets it out for me. It really shows on mine since my car is silver. Hopefully it works for you. Good luck. :)

That kinda works :) I did a small spot and it got alot of it but you can still feel and see the spots. I used maguires scratch-X on one of my mirrors awhile back and though it cleaned it well, water actually seems to stick to the mirror and dry now instead of run off so I'm a little hesitant to do my whole windshield...

Try Rainx after you are done. It should help.

you might want to try a paste of Bon-Ami and water, or some ceramic stove top cleaner. These are abasive (but mildly and made for heavy duty glass cleaning) so I would not recommend a power tool application. I have used it in the past to clean off a windshield in bad shape using a foam/terry-cloth wax applicator and a bit of hand rubbing.

Ohh... sorry I didnt read that you said windshield. I thought you were talking about the paint in general. Sorry!

But yea if you have hard water stains that turn brown on your paint use Scratch-x :).

Simple green
 

Just bought a bottle of the stuff and it works great, don't know about windows though. I'd try it on a window you don't care about (like one in your house for example ;) ) first, just to make sure.

P.S. Works great on engine gunk.

Go to the supermarket buy Lime Away and CLR. One of them should work. Be careful not to get any of either one on th epaint. I use either one full strength on a paper towel and rub it directly, let it sit for a few minutes then rinse it off. Good Luck.

Dip the cloth of your choice in a bit of brake fluid. Wipe away & see what happens. Let me know if it works. DO NOT get brake fluid on anything but the glass, & don't try to sue me if you do. You've been publicly warned.

Ron.

My recommendation is bon-ami. :)

Mike

I was always hesitant to use an abrasive or a polishing compound on the glass (except for the windshield). On my other cars I always used rubbing compound on the windows to remove small imperfections from the glass. Isn't there some coating on the side glass of the SVX that could get damaged or removed by using Bonami or rubbing compounds. I have hard water spots all over my side glass and could never get them off. I had a whole bunch on my driver side mirror that was so bad I couldn't see out of it. I used polishing compound on it and it removed the spots like gang busters but it also removed the blue tint from the glass and left it clear. After seeing that I would never have used anything remotely abrasive on the side glass. Any thoughts on this? I'm going to take Ron up on his brake fluid tip...CAREFULLY! :D

I ended up using a plastic bristled scrub brush and lots of simple green. It still needs just a little more work, but it definitely did the trick. You could see the spot where I used maguires scratch-x when I washed the car and watched the water run down the windshield. It just kinda sits there instead of flowing on the maguires spot. I'm going to do another round of scrubbing with the simple green then follow with Rain-x. I'll let you all know the final results as this seems to be the safest way to go.