Water Marks Leaded Light Window

[Dabber]

Did a first clean on this house, no problems. Did a second clean and got called back so went over it again and still these water marks are visible. Any ideas ?

 

[Cleanco]

unger rub out and plenty of elbow grease should sort it out. Charge well for it though as it may take a while. It would’ve been better for you if you could’ve pointed it out on the first clean though as they could suspect that you’ve caused it and may want it included in with your regular clean price.

 

[Dabber]

unger rub out and plenty of elbow grease should sort it out. Charge well for it though as it may take a while. It would’ve been better for you if you could’ve pointed it out on the first clean though as they could suspect that you’ve caused it and may want it included in with your regular clean price.

 

[Dabber]

Everything was fine on the initial clean so didn’t expect any issues going forward. He’s going back to cleaning them himself now so no bad feelings but I just wanted to understand what’s happened with the marks/ stains.

 

[clearview]

Looks like someone’s been outside with a pressure washer or hose pipe as that looks like limescale spots to me.

 

[Scrubsy]

Hard water stains. Hosepipes, pressure washing, hanging baskets all cause it.

 

[Chris34]

It's the lead on the window, it's supposed to have a coating on the lead but on some leaded windows the coating has been removed exposing the lead, when you clean with the purified water it absorbs the minerals in the lead and the water is no longer clean, it's contaminated and therefor dries as if you have just cleaned them with tap water, actually it's worse than tap water...

You can use bar keepers cream to remove it, I've never used unger rub out but you can try it. But moving forward this window will do this every time you try and clean it. I've got one on ground level, just two windows and I clean them normally but dry them immediately after using kitchen roll, if I don't dry it thoroughly and carefully then they look terrible.

If I had a whole house like that then I'd just tell them it's not possible and explain the reason why.

 

[Pjj]

It's the lead on the window, it's supposed to have a coating on the lead but on some leaded windows the coating has been removed exposing the lead, when you clean with the purified water it absorbs the minerals in the lead and the water is no longer clean, it's contaminated and therefor dries as if you have just cleaned them with tap water, actually it's worse than tap water...

You can use bar keepers cream to remove it, I've never used unger rub out but you can try it. But moving forward this window will do this every time you try and clean it. I've got one on ground level, just two windows and I clean them normally but dry them immediately after using kitchen roll, if I don't dry it thoroughly and carefully then they look terrible.

If I had a whole house like that then I'd just tell them it's not possible and explain the reason why.

We clean loads of leaded windows with some really poor lead on them and never had a single issue with any mineral deposits on the glass . But here’s the strange thing we have many conservatories that have lead flashing going onto the glass roof and the mineral deposits on the roof are horrendous, but it’s not sports it’s dark long lines that you can feel raised on the surface of the glass

 

[Chris34]

We clean loads of leaded windows with some really poor lead on them and never had a single issue with any mineral deposits on the glass . But here’s the strange thing we have many conservatories that have lead flashing going onto the glass roof and the mineral deposits on the roof are horrendous, but it’s not sports it’s dark long lines that you can feel raised on the surface of the glass

I think it is down to the manufacturer, it's a common problem around my way, they are damaged and cause the above results, when I say common it's probably 1 window out of 20 leaded window houses.

I think it's probably down to the manufacturer but I also wonder whether it's harsh chemicals that have been used on them in the past which has removed the coating, The strange thing is one window might cause issues but the rest can be fine even though they were installed at the same time by the same manufacturer.

I had a new customer last year that had bi-fold doors, 5 big panes of glass with a balcony above. They were filthy on the first clean and took ages to clean. The next clean they seemed a lot better, they were scratched but cleaning wise they looked pretty much spot on. The third clean (I think it was), half an hour after leaving the customer contacted me and sent me photo's, he wasn't happy, really bad spotting and they looked really bad. I went back to try and find out what had caused it. They were black pvc and I noticed at the top just where they meet the brickwork there was a thin line of rusty corrosion. Straight away I suspected that was the problem, exposed metal of the lintel contaminating the water and dripping down on the glass.

It took me forever to remove the marks, think I spent about an hour and chucked everything at it, I could only reduce it but told the customer what I thought the issue was and he then painted the exposed metal, once that was done then the marks disappeared quite quickly over the next few cleans and now they look perfect every time. I don't touch water on the bit that he painted and because of the balcony it's pretty much sheltered from rain etc.

It's definitely helpful to have these problems because you learn a lot. If I hadn't have had that problem with the leaded window then I would have struggled to diagnose the problem with the black bi-folds.

I've never seen lead build up on glass but can definitely imagine it. It must just be dodgy builders / manufacturers operating in certain areas at some point in the past and causing all these problems that only affect certain areas of the country. Like the leaded windows that cause me problems are all very similar, the lead probably comes from the same supplier...