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My husband got hit on the interstate by a piece of tire in the road. It left tire marks on the hood and fender of my car. How do I get it off without ruining the finish of the car?
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By Linda Shaffer from Norfolk, VA
Deanj
March 3, 20112 found this helpful
Best Answer
Today's cars have a clear urethane coating over the paint to make the finish more durable. If the tire did not abrade the clear finish you may be able to fix it your self.
First, I would wash the area to see if that removes any of the tire marks. If not, I would purchase a can of adhesive cleaner or tar remover at the auto parts store and rub that on the tire marks. The cleaner will not harm the finish.
If the tire marks are still there then the area should be compounded. You can do that yourself or an auto detailer can do the job. Every car dealer should have a detailer on staff or you can find one in the yellow pages.
Reply Was this helpful? 2
Barbara
March 4, 20112 found this helpful
Best Answer
Take a soft cloth and pour a little cooking oil and apply it to the tire mark. This will not harm the paint of your car.
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It worked for me. Then wash spot where tire mark was with a little water and Dawn dish soap. Hope this works for you!
Reply Was this helpful? 2
Beth
Silver Feedback Medal for All Time! 407 Feedbacks
March 5, 20110 found this helpful
Best Answer
An item sold for campers is called Black Streak Remover. I think you can even get it at Wal-Mart near their automotive department where they sell camping related products. I used it on my white car when something got streaked along the side. I think it was a bicycle handle.
Whatever it was, this stuff took it off without ruining the finish.
Reply Was this helpful? Yes
Jackie
April 5, 20110 found this helpful
Best Answer
WD-40 will remove tire marks from paint, just spray it on and wipe it off. I have been a mechanic for 34 years and have used that on near everything.
Reply Was this helpful? Yes
Mark J L.
July 3, 20121 found this helpful
Best Answer
Here's an easy and cheap way I removed my problem. I used a paper towel and rubbing alcohol, and it came right off!
Reply Was this helpful? 1
Ask a QuestionHere are the questions asked by community members. Read on to see the answers provided by the ThriftyFun community or ask a new question.
I was hit while traveling on the highway. My car was left with a big tire mark on the passenger side.
My car insurance is not going to pay, so I would like to remove the ugly black mark.
Please help me.
Thank you.
poehere
Bronze Post Medal for All Time! 105 Posts
January 11, 20201 found this helpful
Best Answer
Here on Thrifty Fun they have a post that waswritten just for this. They tell you how to remove the tire marks from the car paint.
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I think this should help you out and get your car fixed for you. www.thriftyfun.com/
Reply Was this helpful? 1
cybergrannie
Gold Feedback Medal for All Time! 949 Feedbacks
January 13, 20200 found this helpful
Best Answer
It's nice to hear that you will have your problem fixed by professionals.
Should you have similar problems in the future try cooking oil or WD-40 and I think it will work without doing damage to the paint.
Reply Was this helpful? Yes
A bicyclist scraped the fender of my new black VW with his rubber handlebar. It is not scratched, but there is a streak of rubber about 5" long on the side of my fender.
How can I remove it without damaging the paint?
Mary Lou
September 2, 20150 found this helpful
My husband says just wash it off without using anything abrasive, rub it with your thumb and a little water and mild soap or even just water.
Reply Was this helpful? Yes
Try some WD-40.
Reply Was this helpful? Yes
Louise B.
Silver Feedback Medal for All Time! 337 Feedbacks
September 7, 20150 found this helpful
I agree with other posters. I think it would rub right off with a soft cloth.
Reply Was this helpful? Yes
Harlean
Bronze Post Medal for All Time! 148 Posts
January 15, 20160 found this helpful
Try some Awesome cleaner on a paper towel.
Reply Was this helpful? Yes
Anonymous
April 11, 20160 found this helpful
use wd40 and paper towel
Reply Was this helpful? Yes
msjelo99
July 21, 20160 found this helpful
I had two small nail polish marks near the door handle on my 2016 Toyota. I am sure I scuffed it with my nail when getting in my car. I wet the end of a cotton swab and dipped it in baking soda.
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I rubbed it gently on the surface and then rubbed with a little more pressure with my thumb. Then I just wiped with a damp soft paper towel. It took the polish right off.
Reply Was this helpful? Yes
kishor0369
August 26, 20160 found this helpful
I have a issue related to wooden polish felt on my car exterior (on main screen mirror & left side body). How can I remove it without damaging the paint? Please arrange to create the solution on urgent basis.
Reply Was this helpful? Yes
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Vehicle maintenance is one of the most important things to you, as a car owner.
You need to check different parts of your vehicle every now and then because safety depends on it.
With the tires being one of the significant parts, there is no need to slack at all.
A likely problem you could encounter from its use is tire marks on your car or on concrete.
The purpose of this article is to describe what tire marks are and give comprehensive information on how to remove them from your vehicle.
Page Contents
Tire marks are formed when you spin your wheels on a driveway (or road) when pulling out, OR when your tires rest on hot surfaces for a long time.
They often leave tread marks on a surface, and can sometimes stick to the paint of your car.
This phenomenon is called “Plasticizer Migration.”
It is because it involves the migration of polymer compounds (plasticizer) on rubber, glue, and plastic which are responsible for flexibility, to another surface.
This plasticizer helps in improving tire traction for different surfaces.
So, when tires heat up, the plasticizer leaches out of the tire and the sealer discolors.
Unfortunately, tire marks are difficult to remove because tires generally are made from petroleum and are water-resistant.
It then becomes impossible to remove them without using harsh solvents or cleaners.
Black rubber marks are inevitable from your car’s tires.
They may take different forms depending on how they occur – for instance, they may rub off on car paint, concrete, driveway, garage floor, or epoxy surfaces.
With these different forms come various ways to tackle them.
Below are descriptions of ways to remove tire marks from different surfaces.
No one wants to see their car paint stained with rubber marks – it is an eyesore.
However, getting them off your car isn’t difficult and you don’t also have to worry about scratches or marks.
The reason is that rubber is a soft material that doesn’t damage the paint; instead, it leaves a mark on the exterior.
An effective substance to use for removing tire marks on car paint is a clay bar.
Chemical Guys Clay Bar & Lubber Synthetic Lubricant Kit
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Step 1: The first step is to wash your car with mild soap and rinse thoroughly with water.
Then leave your car for some minutes so the water could dry off.
Step 2: Apply a few veils of the mist of the clay bar on the affected area, and keep wiping the marks off until you are left with a clear surface. Rubbing alcohol might also work.
Step 3: Finally, clean the work area with a microfiber towel or cloth. By now, you should have your painted area back.
Another substance to use for tire mark removal on paint is a WD-40 lubricant.
WD-40 490043 Multi-Use Lubricant Spray
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Step 1: Wash the car thoroughly with mild detergent and rinse with water using a light pressure nozzle.
Step 2: Apply WD-40 lubricant either on the paint or on a rag/piece of cloth.
Step 3: Wipe the tire mark with the rag subsequently until you can hardly see the mark.
Step 4: Apply automotive spray wax to the scrubbed area and buff it into the paint until the paint area is clear.
If you have a concrete floor, there is also a good chance that tire marks would be on it when cars are parked on it. Concrete is one of the surfaces that gets heated up easily, making it cause plasticizer migration.
Nonetheless, there is a simple way to remove tire marks from concrete.
Zep Heavy-Duty Citrus Cleaner
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Step 1: Apply a cleaner like Elbow Grease, SunSpot, Automotive Brake Cleaner, or Citrus Cleaner to the concrete.
Step 2: Leave the cleaner on the concrete for some minutes to soak in.
Step 3: With a stiff-bristled brush, scrub the tire marks on the concrete thoroughly.
Step 4: Rinse the scrubbed area with water using a nozzle.
Step 5: Continue the process subsequently until you have a clear concrete floor.
The driveway is another place very much likely to have tire marks. There are different reasons why that could happen because the area also gets heated up, affecting car tires.
If you would have to remove marks from a driveway, the best substance to go for is any of the best tar removers.
Chemical Guys Concentrated Bug and Tar Remover
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Step 1: Apply the tar remover on the driveway spot.
Step 2: Let this solvent soak in for some minutes before doing anything else.
Step 3: Use a stiff-bristled brush to scrub the affected area soaked in the tar-removing substance.
Step 4: Use a light pressure nozzle to rinse the area thoroughly until there are no tire marks.
If your garage floor is covered in the epoxy finish, you might also need to look out for tire marks because they are not spared.
An epoxy floor might need a little more effort because of the quality of the surface.
In this case, what you would need is a magic eraser.
Step 1: Apply the magic eraser to the affected spot on the epoxy floor. The magic eraser could be a non-filming detergent like 409, SunKleen, or Fantastic.
Step 2: For some minutes, let the solution soak into the affected area.
Step 3: With a soft bristle brush, scrub the soaked epoxy spot.
Step 4: Use a high-pressure nozzle to rinse the spot with water.
Step 5: Repeat the process until you have a clean spot.
Due to the quality/texture of the epoxy finish, you should avoid using harsh substances trying to get rid of tire marks.
If you’ve tried out the various methods above and considered oil lubrication or rubbing alcohol and the marks remain stubborn, that leaves you with only two options.
You can either strip and reseal the affected area on your concrete or driveway, or resurface with a coat. Polishing the area might help cover the marks.
If you are wondering what you can do to prevent tire marks, the truth is: they are inevitable.
Your car would always have to come in contact with heated surfaces one way or another.
So instead of preventing tire marks, what you can do is prevent the build-up. If the marks are too much, it can be very difficult to clean.
You can also try to park your car on the road for a few minutes if you’ve been driving the whole day.
By parking, you are allowing your tires to cool and whatever leaching has to happen, it won’t happen on your garage driveway or epoxy floor, or concrete floor. Once your tires have cooled down, you can now move your car into the driveway.
Another thing most people try out is to place floor mats in the garage so that their tires can rest on them.
Yes, you can. Oxygen bleach is a great cleaner for concrete and brick surfaces. It can be used to remove tire marks, simply by following these steps.
First, wet the concrete area with tire marks with water, and apply the oxygen bleach. Next, use a bristle scrub brush to remove the marks and rinse with water until the area becomes clean.
Other substances you can use are Trisodium phosphate, acrylic sealer, and citrus solvent.
Removing tire marks isn’t a difficult task as long as you have the right materials or substances for different surfaces.
Another thing to take home from this article is that: tire marks are unavoidable, so you should do your best to make sure you clean them whenever you start noticing them in your garage or driveway.
Immediate cleaning would leave you with little work to do.
Category: Operation and maintenance Technical information
Article reading time: 3 minutes
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The right technology and the right detergents will help get rid of brake dust and gravel stuck in the tread, improving the safety of the car, driver and passengers.
How to wash tires we will tell in this article.
To clean the wheels from dirt, dust and oil residues, you will have to act according to the following plan:
The wheel should not be treated with the same napkin as the car body. Traces of solvent or oil will stain the cleaned rubber. In the final, the wheel is applied with a protector that protects the tires from the harmful effects of ultraviolet radiation.
To clean dried-on dirt from rims and wheels, you will need a machine that generates high-pressure water. Such installations are produced by American and European companies, so they are quite expensive, but they can be replaced with an ordinary hose and a special nozzle that accelerates the water jet to a pressure sufficient to clean the car.
To remove residual dirt, you will need a medium-hard bristle brush and a cleaning solution that is used to treat wheels and rims. This solution can be prepared from household chemicals found in the kitchen or bathroom, or bought at an automotive store. Moreover, store products are divided into universal foam cleaners and solutions based on weak acids, which can only process car rims.
By the way, if you don’t know how to wipe rubber off a car, try this solution.
To wash the wheels of cleaning products, you need the same high-pressure apparatus or a hose with a nozzle. But as a napkin that will wipe off the remaining water, you need to use only clean microfiber from the package.
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To prepare a solution that can clean dirt from tires, dilute in a small amount of water to half a standard bottle of dishwashing detergent.
Pour the resulting concentrate into a container into which it is convenient to dip a car brush. Thanks to the abundance of surfactants found in dish detergent, a homemade solution will clean tires as well as a factory cleaner.
Rules for the use of home remedies that can clean wheels are similar to the recommendations of manufacturers of commercial drugs. Before treating tires and rims with home remedies, make sure you wash the tires. Otherwise, brake dust and gravel residues will turn into abrasive particles that can scratch the tread when you scrub it off dirt with a brush or sponge. Do not try to clean the wheel with an old cloth that has been used to clean the engine compartment or bodywork - it will stain the wheel with oil or gasoline.
Article author: The Goodyear team
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You don't have to go to a car wash or a spare parts store to get your tires back to a deep black color. You can get by with improvised means, and some of them are sure to be found in almost every home.
There are several ways to blacken tires that are safe and do not affect traction. In the absence of special means for restoring color, for example, shoe polish, glycerin, silicone oil, and even laundry soap and household chemicals are used. Each substance has its pros and cons, but it should be remembered that none of them fully possesses the qualities inherent in special solutions: neither long-term effect, nor protective properties, nor ease of use.
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Blackening tires with shoe polish or other shoe care product is the first thing that comes to mind. At the same time, the processing process itself is no different, only instead of a brush it is better to use a sponge so that splashes of shoe polish do not stain the body. We simply rub the sidewall of the washed and dried tire with shoe polish and let it dry.
To be honest, the result does not look very good, even when using the product with wax: there is neither shine nor color depth. The application process itself is also inconvenient - imagine what it would be like to process four wheels. The downside is that you have to wait for the shoe polish to dry completely before driving. Otherwise, road dust will quickly stick to the treated surface, reducing all the efforts made to nothing. Of course, there are also quick-drying paint creams, but their cost is such that it will still be cheaper to buy a special product for blackening tires.
Due to its consistency, glycerin creates a stunning jet-black shiny tire effect, and the degree of "greatness" can be adjusted by diluting the product with plain water. For one procedure, only one hundred grams of glycerin and the same amount of water are enough. We mix them, taking into account the fact that the less water in the composition, the more "fat" the effect will be. But it’s better not to spare water, otherwise dust will stick to the tires, as in the case of wet shoe polish. The composition is applied with a simple sponge without rubbing. By the way, unpainted black plastic body parts can also be processed with this compound.
The advantage of this method is its low cost and the availability of glycerin in any pharmacy. The disadvantages overlap all the advantages: glycerin quickly ages rubber, causing it to crack. In addition, the composition is very well washed off with water - the very first rain or driving through a puddle will not leave a trace of glycerin.
In dry weather, tires will only stay black for a couple of days.
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Blackening tires with silicone oil is not the cheapest way because it is not sold in small containers and you will have to buy an annual supply of funds right away. This method is the simplest, most efficient and less labor-intensive than the others. It is better to use medium viscosity oil, which will also come in handy for treating tires before winter or summer storage - this is the only substance described that somehow protects rubber from cracking, drying out, ultraviolet radiation and moisture.
The effect after treatment with silicone oil is long-lasting and the tires look blacker than new. Silicone oil is also treated with door seals and trunk lids so that they do not freeze.
Laundry soap is probably the cheapest product available for blackening tires.
It can be applied with a pre-soaped brush, or by dissolving a crumb of soap in water, apply the composition with a sponge. There is no need to rinse off the soap: when it dries, the rubber will acquire a beautiful and deep black tint. Like most artisanal methods, blackening tires with laundry soap has its drawbacks. Rubber because of it, as in the case of glycerin, ages faster and may begin to crack, so we do not recommend this method of blackening.
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Household chemicals are often used in car washes. This is a cheap, effective and harmless method for rubber and its adhesion to an expensive method, which can be offered as a bonus or "gift". It is mainly used for washing glasses, as well as dishes. The first is sprayed onto the sidewall of the tire and rubbed quickly, while the second is applied with a damp sponge. It is not necessary to wash off the compositions.
Also on the forums it is advised to blacken tires with drinks. More often than others, Coca-Cola is mentioned. But because of the sugar in the composition of the cola, it creates a sticky layer, on which dust quickly settles, and is easily washed off in the first puddle.
***
All of the listed products, of course, are inferior to the special compounds sold in auto chemical departments. Their blackening effect is short-lived and does not look so beautiful. In addition, most of them can harm rubber by affecting its chemical composition and reducing its service life. Nevertheless, the described methods are in demand due to their availability and spontaneity, because most motorists do not need to blacken tires every day.
However, the safest alternatives to professional tire blackeners are silicone and household chemicals. The latter is usually also cheaper.
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