I have tried many types of cleaners on both the inside and outside of the windshield and in normal light the windshield looks great but in direct sun light in late afternoon the windshield has small spots all over the outside. I have even tried clay bar, with no change. My question is : can the windshield be polished and with what product ?

Thanks for any help.

 

You have small rock chips and yes, they can be removed. There are several kits that you can buy online that are essentially a car paint polish kit with a much more aggressive compound. Diamondite glass work system and DP high performance glass restorer are popular kits. They remove as water etching nd scratches, but I'm not quite sure it will completely fix your issue. You may need something more aggressive.

 

ole VA Tech boy set him straight right there

 

... like a new windshield.

Unfortunately glass is VERY hard, relative to paint. Removing defects from glass can be incredibly time consuming, and often times impossible, even with the proper tools.

If you do in fact have tiny chips (pitting) all over your windshield, I personally wouldn't bother trying to polish them out, and would either live with it or get a replacement windshield.

If you simply have some common scratches from wiper blade movement, then that can be corrected. Use the info and pics in this article as a reference.

-Zach

 

You may want to try a glass coating. This won't remove the pits but it will fill them somewhat and reduce the sparkle effect. IMO, the only real solution is new glass. If you drive on freeways or highways a lot you will get these from small impacts. You can help reduce them by not following too closely.

I've used Pinnacle's Black Label Diamond Glass Coating on my 1991 MR2 with decent, but not perfect, results.

 

New glass. You can spend hours trying to fix it, but it's only going to be a bandaid on a gaping wound. Pitting is just part of the game of a car: you can live with it or you can fix it only for it to eventually occur again.

 

Polishing the windshield might save you money on new glasses if you manage to grind your prescription into it. Seriously, if you aren't careful with that you will have horrible distortions just as if you had a glass prescription built into the windshield.

 

No experience yet I always hear good things about the ceriglass. It can be used by hand or machine.

 

Read up on it, looks like insane amounts of work for minor scratches more than pitting. No thanks.

 

I've used it a handful of times with not-so-great results.

In one case it even damaged the glass, but that was actually the pad's fault and not the polish.

In the end, it is a tremendous amount of work for a minor improvement.