Hi WCR fans, We, by accident made a discovery that bronze wool can change glass to water loving instead of water hating, or can it?
We put it on video, you decide, or tell us what is going on, please!
Thanks for your input,
Matt
Interesting! I can def see a difference! Great video.
Nice Matt, Thanks for posting. I’m willing to give it a try. If it works good all the time, it might be worth having a piece of bronze wool on the reach around at the top of my WFP.
Like I said, we kinda stumbled into this by accident, and as I started to use the bronze wool on the door, I stopped and had Dewey my son in law to get the camera. The door was in the sun and I thought it might show well on video. The door was all hydrophobic before I touched it.
I will try this out on some more windows for sure.
Matt
This is very interesting. I am going to try this next time I run into the problem. Thanks for the video.
any of our experts gonna weigh in on why this happened?
Where’s Shawn Gavin and his flip flops when you need him???
I will take a shot at this. What makes a window hydrophilic is explained very well in Nanophase website and how their product works to change a window from hydrophobic to hydrophilic. The bronze wool is doing the same thing. This will not work as easy and fast as Nanophase Ultra
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In my experience the bronze wool does not change the property of the glass, to hydraphilic, often enough. Has not proved to be a sure thing.
Very interesting Matt. I’ll take that to the bank somewhere sometime. I’m a fan of bronze wool. I always have some with me.
I see on an older thread that CC550 has the same effect on Hydrophobic Glass when applied to the glass.
And also it would appear that One Restore has a similar effect when it is applied to the glass.
So would it be something that is in or out side the glass itself ?
Or is it a by porduct of the glass making production, on the surface?
To add to the above questions:
Does glass being hydrophobic ever have a benefit, intended or not?
The glass when it does not like water(hydrophobic) makes the glass harder to rinse thoroughly as it fingers out in little rivers and streams. So with a WFP you use more water to be sure of a good final rinse of every part of of the glass and this can take longer as well.
With glass that likes the water (hydrophilic) runs down in a sheet or wall of water, making it easy to see the glass being thoroughly rinsed and easy to notice any specks of debris left on the surface. This saves water and time.
Maybe somebody that may be able to share a little more information.
In regards to weather if there is a reason the glass is hydropohobic.
- Is this just some thing that happens in the glass making process?
- Is this how it is meant to be?
- Is it like a protective coating of some sorts for the glass in general and is not meant to be removed ?
Maybe somebody that may be able to share a little more information.
In regards to weather if there is a reason the glass is hydropohobic.
Glass coming from a float process is pristine and sheets perfectly. The suppliers then clean (usually a petroleum based polish)or coat it in something that absorbs into the glass surface at the micro surface level
- Is this just some thing that happens in the glass making process? Not usually- as above
- Is this how it is meant to be?
Its down to our industry to ask for sheeting glass but will take a few generations. - Is it like a protective coating of some sorts for the glass in general and is not meant to be removed ?
Polish can never be removed its soaked into the absorbant glass surface and there is not anything in the universe that can remove it. You can coat it with a nano coating to make it sheet again but its hands on and labour intensive.
Just tried this today, though i used a fine grade steel wool as that’s all i could get hold of. It worked very well. I just soaked the glass with water, then kept rubbing an area of the glass until the water ‘stuck’ to the window, and kept repeating that process until all the window was covered. Afterwards the entire piece of glass was 100% hydrophilic. Great discovery Matt! This will really help my brother-in-law who uses the wfp. I just wonder how long the glass will remain hydrophilic.
The Most,
Good question…do you think it might be permanent ? Hopefully !
Oh and by the way you should use FINE steelwool 0000 4 ought, you might get away with 000 3 ought but 4 ought is the industry standard !
Say have you sent me that soap yet, really looking forward to it !
Dange
Hey,
Don’t worry I did use FINE steel wool :), and I realise I will probably have to throw the used pieces away due to rust. I need to get hold of the bronze wool really. It won’t be permanent, unfortunately. Weathering will cause the glass to become hydrophobic again, but hopefully that will be a slow process. If it lasts a few months then that will be useful. I might ask matt perry actually if he has been back to that store they discovered this technique on. Would be interesting to hear if their windows are still hydrophilic. I haven’t sent the soap yet for the simple and annoying reason that it is still out of stock in the store I buy it from. I have been promised that it will be back in stock this week. Rain stopped work today, kind of annoying, but on the upside I just picked up a £50 ($80) a month contract this morning 
Hey WCR fans, here is an update / follow up on the bronze wool door.
We were asked to clean the outside only of this building again. It has been a little over 4 months, but the glass gets a lot of insect grime, as the company leaves on a lot of lights at night and is in a natural prairie and water surrounded area.
We made a video of the follow up cleaning and I combined the first video with the second to remind and compare.
For what its worth, here it is.
Enjoy
Matt
Nice video.
Where I can purchase bronze wool?
Is there something like #0000 bronze wool?
WCR carries it as well as my local Ace H@rdw@re.
You want to use the fine, (I believe it comes in 3 different types/course,medium and fine)
Fine is pretty close to 000 or 0000 steel wool. I use mine for dry touch ups only because of the price, and use steel wool wet and toss at the end of the day.
