Had car less than 4 hours, bird cr*p ruined paintwork already!

[/dev/null]

Had my Formentor delivered yesterday at about 1pm. All good, went to fill up with fuel then back home to work. Came out at around 5 and it was absolutely covered in bird crap! Like literally about 20 big splats, all dried rock hard in the sun. Tried getting off straight away with Poorboy's bug splat remover (all I had), after a lot of work got the solid off, but it's etched into the clear coat in about 5-8 different places, mostly pretty noticeable like on the bonnet. Gave it a full wash today, tried tar remover, even tried t-cut, but to no avail. You can see in the sunlight that it's well into the clear coat. Gave it a wax so hopefully will minimise in the future, but I'm pretty gutted and pissed off this has happened on day 1 in such a short space of time.

 

[Supa Koopa]

Wait till you get some sun on it and hopefully it will fix it. Basically it needs a couple of heat cycles. You can buy autoglym bird etching removers which are basically heat pads

Reflow

Reflow is a ground-breaking solution in removing bird dropping damage without equipment. An extremely quick, easy and safe option to use on all paintwork surfaces.

www.autoglym.com

When paint heats up it expands and the bird crap spots it expanding and contracting at the same rate leaving a mark. Once you've cleaned it off the paint is free to expand and contact at the same rate again and can fix itself. You can do it with a heat gun if you're careful but the sun is safer.

 

[Supa Koopa]

The other trick is a soaking wet paper towel folded over so you can lay it on the crap, this then rehydrates it and it comes of much easier. Obviously don't wipe it with the paper towel thigh as it'll scratch the paint.

 

[TheSwede]

I have never experienced that trace of a large thick bird crap disappears by itself after cleaning and days /weeks of sunlight . Last time I got one was on the roof of my Golf Alltrack a couple of weeks ago. I removed the traces this Wednesday. It’s red with clear lacquer, not matt.

This is what I use to do each time, manually, without machines. Perform the actions in the shadow, not in the sun. The method just works for glossy paint.

1. After cleaning of the surface I take a small piece of wet sandpaper e.g. grit 2000 and sand the area in wet. Just the part with uneven surface. After every trace of the unevenness is removed clean / wipe the surface.

2. After sanding you must polish the surface with mid coarse rubbing compound, just the part you have sanded.

3. Then wipe the surface and polish the surface with fine rubbing.

4. Finally wipe it and take some car wax on the area.

If you are unsure about what to do get a professional to solve the problem for you. Could be expensive if you don’t do it the right way.
If the traces are small skip the point 1 -sanding, go to point 2 -rubbing.

(Fyi I have worked with car painting for 10 years when I was young therefore I’m a bit used to adjust surfaces, now I am old !)

 

[SRGTD]

The joys of modern water based paint……..

I don’t think I’d be brave enough to wet sand the paintwork on a brand new car, in case I sanded through the clear coat!

A few years ago, I came back to my parked car on a hot sunny day, and a bird (or some birds) had used the rear offside quarter panel for target practice. The bird poo was well and truly baked on in the sun. I went straight home soaked the bird poo to soften it (wet paper towels laid on it as @Supa Koopa has suggested above) and it then came off easily but left some quite bad etching into the clear coat. Fortunately I have a dual action (DA) polishing machine as I’m into car detailing, and a half an hour or so of trying various combinations of polish and polish pads I was fortunate enough to be able to polish out the etching.

@/dev/null; if you know someone with a DA polisher, have a word with them and hopefully they can sort it for you. Failing that, a professional detailer should be able to correct it for you fairly easily.

 

[/dev/null]

I've seen those autoglym pads before, might give them a go. Though I'd need about 3 packs! I'm certainly not confident enough to start sanding stuff...

Other than ceramic coating, is there anything I can do to avoid this? I've never had it happen on previous cars. Wonder if it's just because it's pretty new paint? I was massively surprised it spoiled the paint within a couple of hours of being on. If it etches so badly and so quickly the car is going to be a right mess within a few months as we live near loads of trees which obviously come with plenty of wildlife.

 

[Peyton]

Which color do you have? Metallic or matte?

I've done a ceramic coat early on. Seems to have helped.

 

[TheSwede]

......I don’t think I’d be brave enough to wet sand the paintwork on a brand new car, in case I sanded through the clear coat!

A grit 2000 paper on your thumb by hand does not dig hard into the clear coat. It feels like a newspaper on the grit 2000 side. A machine removes some of the coat to…

As I said I don’t recommend this method to a “newbie” but it works if you know how to do it. Do a test on another surface than the new car…

 

[TheSwede]

...And if you have 5- 8 places it will be a big job to do manually. Perhaps contact a pro instead.

 

[/dev/null]

Which color do you have? Metallic or matte?

I've done a ceramic coat early on. Seems to have helped.

Asphalt blue.

 

[Supa Koopa]

One example of using heat -

I would've honestly thought it was crap if I hadn't have seen it myself on one of my own cars.

 

[Ninjakebab]

I've heard about seagull poop messing up the paint on cars for probably 15 years, but never actually experienced it myself.
That is some royal bad luck!

I did have my dog scratch the paint on mine within the first week of having the car sandy paws and excitement when dad is using the magic water hose is a bad combo (he loves water)

 

[ChrisM75]

I had a nasty etch on the roof of my Leon Cupra, magnetic grey. It did disappear by itself mostly after a few months. The heat pads do work, as does a hair dryer on hot, but be careful its not so hot it burns the paint, or melts something underneath.

Im my experience the issue is caused by uneven heating under the poop, not the chemicals in the poop, so waxes, ceramics coating etc dont really help. I always keep some waterless wash and a few microfibres in the car to remove poop as son as I see it.