Bird/tree droppings
 

My car is regularly peppered with bird and tree droppings. The only way I have found to remove these without scratching the paint is to spray with a high-pressure hose, but it still leaves a dull patch on the paintwork. I now have a collection of such patches, in an interesting variety of shapes and sizes!

Does anyone know of (a) something that would remove the patches, and (b) a polish or glaze which would protect the paintwork from future droppings? I don't know whether it makes any difference, but the colour is black.

Charles.

You will need to clay and compound the paint to remove them and re-flatten the paint. Try Meguiars Ultimate compound. Easy to use and safe for the home user, but do the whole car, it will be obvious where you have been using it on a Black car. Apply with a firm foam pad such as this (or use a decent machine if you can borrow or buy one):

http://www.polishedbliss.co.uk/acata...-hand-pad.html

Its REALLY hard to prevent bird lime damage, most products just wont protect the paint for long, but a well prepped car will make it easy to remove. Synthetics are more resistant than waxes, with Nanos and Ceramics the most resistant.

Try Prima Amigo as a glaze, simply because its lovely on black, has cleaning agents and cures quite hard. Normally id recommend a natural wax for black, but if you want durability and resistance then try FK1000P, a synthetic paste wax. Use of the Amigo should mean you still get the darkness you want on black. For more darkness try Collinite 476S. Its about as hard as natural waxes get and should result in a darker finish and will still last and be resistant.

The other option is something like Wolf chemicals Seal and Shine topped with Wolfs Nano Body wrap, but they are like £45 for the pair and are best on really really well prepared, machine polished paint. The pair will leave a VERY resistant coating though.

The best way to remove them is to inject them with small lead pellets at high velocity .... from a 12 bore....... lmho.... :D:D:D

Dunno about the paint innit..... :shrug:
...

Thanks for the advice. I see there is a sticky by Empsburner on the use of clay and I'll give it a go when time permits.

I also need to try his method of removing swirls. The panels requiring treatment are the same: the roof, bonnet and boot lid. Does it matter whether I do the clay treatment before the swirl removal or afterwards?

And is there any support for my petition to make it mandatory for birds to wear nappies?

Charles.

Always clay after washing and before any compounding, polishing or waxing.

Sadly it does make a difference, for the worse. Not only will etchings to the clearcoat be more obvious on a black car, but the black paint of course absorbs heat better than any other colour and so in strong sunlight it will 'cook' new droppings into your paint more quickly.

The best thing you can do is clay, polish and use synthetic sealant or wax to give as much protection as you can. Beyond that, try to remove the droppings as fast as you can when you see them.

On my ZT I've just had to use a rotary and compound to remove stains on the roof which had permanently etched-in. Sadly either the p/o couldn't care less or didn't know how to remove them (I'm going for the former, considering the overall poor condition of the paint on the car). You don't want to have to do that very often if you can help it.

There isnt really any other option if they are bad this side of a respray. The use of a dual action polisher is the best bet.

If you can use a machine use a firm pad, a cutting polish or swirl remover like the poorboys SSR range then a ceramic sealant like Ceramishield. You can then wax over the top if you want after a few days. That will give as much protection as you can ever get.