And for as long as there have been water spots, owners, drivers and maintenance personnel have been trying to get rid of them -- without much success. No matter what's used to attack them, water spots always return. They also tend to get darker and, worse, they appear to have some kind of memory, coming back in the same places. Eventually, if an operator keeps a coach long enough, the windows have to be replaced when they become foggy from water spot build up.
Everyone thinks they know what causes water spots: Hard water. However, there those who contend the water doesn't matter. The key, they assert, is to not let the water dry on the windows; the sun bakes on the spots. Then, there are those who say spots are the result of washing buses too often. Finally, there are experts who say spots are caused by using too much soap or soap with high acidity or alkalinity.
To ameliorate these problems, every solution in the book has been tried. Hard water? Switch to soft. That doesn't work? Try a rinsing agent. Or, use a little more (or less) detergent. Nothing works for very long; spots always reappear.
 Next, operators have tried blowers to blow the water off after washing the bus. Unfortunately, blowers make a lot of noise, offending neighbors. Toweling or squeegee the water off was abandoned as a solution long ago because of cost. It can take 10 minutes or more for an individual to squeegee a 45-foot bus, and if you've got a fleet of 50 coaches, that's 8.3 hours, or one person working full time all day to do nothing but squeegee windows.
Washing buses less often doesn't work because of complaints about appearance, and there isn't an operator around who hasn't experimented with detergents. Some operators have even tried special waxes on their windows. The waxes usually work fine -- for a couple of weeks.
So, what's an operator to do? Before we answer that, let's have a quick lesson in glass chemistry.
Glass, as everyone knows, is made of sand that is melted, purified and mixed with a handful of ingredients. The major reactive chemical in glass is oxygen, which is the enemy that opens up glass to invasion by other chemicals. While glass appears to be smooth and impervious, in reality glass surfaces have microscopic hills and valleys. As water runs over glass, the oxygen interacts, leaching out potassium and lime within glass. These lime deposits appear white; in other words, water spots.
Over time, a glass surface erodes. Minuscule river beds are created, resulting in spots returning to the same places time after time. So, it isn't your imagination telling you the spots are in the same place.
 New
to the bus industry is the TekonUS glass repellant system
that changes the molecular structure of glass, converting
oxygen to carbon and creating hydrophobic positively charged
glass that repels water and dust. "With Tekon A TM
, minerals will not adhere nor be leached out to form deposits,"
explains James Aiken , vice president, TekonUS of Tustin,
Calif.
For new glass, the system is a three-stop process.
A basic chemical treatment applied to the glass transforms
the surface, making it hydrophobic and resistant to foreign
materials. A co-polymer is then applied, filling the valleys
and smoothing the surface. Finally, a cleaner used in periodic
maintenance replenishes the repellent surface.
For old glass, there is an additional step. Before the chemicals are applied, the corroded glass must be polished to its original surface. Think of it as sanding furniture to the original wood.
"New glass can be protected and enhanced for an unheard of service life," says Aiken, and "glass already in service can be restored to a new longer life. For motor coach riders, the result is a travel experience enhanced with bright, stay-clean windows."
For
more information, contact Tekon at 888-749-8638. www.Tekon.com
DESTINATIONS September 2002 Bruce Sankey is the principal of Bus News Media Services. Contact him at BusNews2002@aol.com
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The TekonUS System protects the glass, metal and paint with a tough super-hydrophobic coating that resists water spotting and contamination of all kinds. 
TekonUS has developed a complete system of innovative treatments and coatings for improving transportation and architectural surfaces for beauty, for economy, for life. 
