Washing the car yesterday and noticed brown specs below the number plate and along the rear bumper.  Tried to rub them off but wouldn't shift.  Tried white spirit thinking it was tar - no joy.  Then realised they are very fine metal filings that have turned to rust and stained the white paint.  Closer inspection found more specks down the rear portion of the offside.

Thought it was maybe from drilling to fit the number plate but I've had the car 4yrs from new so surely I would have noticed before now.  I must have parked near to where some filing was going on.  Or maybe when it was serviced in April!

So...

what's the best way to remove it?  I can still feel some roughness where the particles haven't rusted away so don't want to rub too hard and scratch the paint.  It had the Autoglym treatment when new.

Fallout remover.

 

I use Bilt Hamber Korrosol myself, but quite a few products on the market - http://www.bilthamber.com/korrosol

 

Railway carparks or near sidings can often mean your car will come into contact with this sort of stuff, or near a factory or manufacturing facility perhaps.

Iron x 

 

Smells like **** but does the job 

As above, any fallout remover will rectify the problem.

 

Plenty to choose from - IronX, auto finesse iron out, gyeon q2 iron, gtechniq w6, autosmart red7.

 

Wash the car as you would normally, rinse and whilst still wet liberally spray the product over every body panel - you'll be surprised how much 'bleeding' you get which is the product reacting to the fallout on the surface, some of it would be invisble to the naked eye.

Leave to dwell as per product instructions, usually several minutes then a super thorough rinse to remove.

 

cheers

 

Chris

Many thanks for the replies folks.  Much appreciated.