Every time you take your car out of the garage, you are exposed to potential paint damage hazards. Some of the most common problems are acid rain, insects, battery acid, and stones on the roads. There is another hazard that is particularly messy and harmful, and that is bird poop.
Bird poop is essentially an acid. It can have a pH level between 3.5 and 4.5. That means it will burn delicate surfaces unless removed relatively quickly. In automotive paint, particularly clear coat finishes, bird droppings burn the surface and cause a permanent etch mark.
It’s not uncommon for a large drop to cause paint damage 2 mils deep or more. To understand what that means for your car’s clear coat, a good laser printer paper is about 2 mils thick. More importantly, a quality clear coat finish is typically 4-6 mils. That means a heavy-duty bird pump won’t leave much of a clear coat in the area that needs repair. The good news is that paint etching from hard water stains and bird droppings is an easy repair you can do at home. Most repairs like this take less than 5 minutes.
Bird Poop Paint Damage Repair
The only way to repair paint damage caused by a bird is to buff the affected area with a fine-cutting rubbing compound. The basic procedure is to use the compound to cut away the damage and re-polish the surface to make it look like new again. This is exactly the step that professionals and the factory take when removing paint defects. Your only concern is over polishing. Be careful not to overdo it and buff the entire top coat.
The best car polish to use is one that is formulated to remove paint scratches or restore rusty paint. The product I highly recommend is Meguiar’s Ultimate Compound. It is available at most auto parts stores and works great by hand or with an electric car polisher.
If the damage covers an area larger than 1 square inch, a polishing compound alone might not be enough. For larger areas of damage, you can make the repair quicker and easier by first removing the damaged paint with 2000 or 3000 grit wet sandpaper and then re-sanding the area with the compound. This may sound harsh, but it is not. It is a safe procedure used by professionals in paint and body shops.
Bird Damage Prevention
Although it is difficult to avoid being splattered with bird waste, it is not difficult at all to avoid damage. The sooner you remove the clutter, the less likely your paint will be damaged. Conversely, the longer the mess remains on your vehicle’s paint, the more damage it will create.
If you live in an area where you are prone to pooping, I recommend keeping a small bottle of car detailing spray and a microfiber cloth or two in your vehicle. It will come in handy for all kinds of spills and emergency cleanups. Meguiar’s Quik Detailer is very inexpensive and easy to find. When you need to clean up bird droppings, simply give the bird droppings a few drops of the spray, let it soak in for a moment or two, then wipe it up.
