How to remove old stickers?

[silent bob]

That was slightly amusing the first time a couple of decades ago.

And yet they keep looking for a simple solution to a complex problem. Those stickers are meant to STICK! Use a razor blade, scratch up the gel coat. Use a strong solvent, melt the gel coat! There is no easy way out!

 

[Ukuri]

And yet they keep looking for a simple solution to a complex problem. Those stickers are meant to STICK! Use a razor blade, scratch up the gel coat. Use a strong solvent, melt the gel coat! There is no easy way out!

Beg to differ.
See post #20 above.

 

[guerdon]

WD 40 with a new clean single edged razor at the proper angle. Spray as you slowly go along keeping the sticker in one piece.

 

[fukupananvil]

I have those decades-old stickers that once showed the flag alphabet on my cabin, stb and port of the companionway. UV, water and salt had them bleached and cracked and I want to get rid of them.

Does anybody know of a good way to get them off the gelcoat? (If possible, with products that are available in the EU?)

Googone available in USA office supply stores applied so it gets under the sticker edges, mild warmth or heat, light scraping and slow lifting recommended. Slow sustained pull using blade and thumb at shallow angle with refreshed supply of googone squirted underneath Is your friend. A saturated paper towel laid on the edge of sticker can be used to introduce googone for some time to initiate lifting. Sold in squirt cans like those old lighter fluid cans.

 

[silent bob]

Googone available in USA office supply stores applied so it gets under the sticker edges, mild warmth or heat, light scraping and slow lifting recommended. Slow sustained pull using blade and thumb at shallow angle with refreshed supply of googone squirted underneath Is your friend. A saturated paper towel laid on the edge of sticker can be used to introduce googone for some time to initiate lifting. Sold in squirt cans like those old lighter fluid cans.

 

[slug zitski]

Butter is the classic adhesive removal product for delicate surfaces

 

[10thTonner]

Thanks gentlemen! The diversity of suggestions somehow tells me none is perfect. I think I’ll try WD40 and razor blades firsts because that’s what I have around already. Will work my way up to eraser wheels, paint remover, explosives and butter if necessary.

 

[CriticalPath]

Why remove 'em at all? My daily driver Taco's a work-in-progress - helps distract the general public from the truck's obnoxious colour and ratty condition!

 

[Varan]

The owner of a boat I raced on put bullet hole stickers over ever little ding. Looked pretty cool until years later when he decided to repaint. Removing the stickers was one thing, but then the realization that there was a ding under each one that also needed repairing.

 

[SloopJonB]

Thanks gentlemen! The diversity of suggestions somehow tells me none is perfect.

That's because there are different adhesives used on different stickers/labels.

I've had WD40 just wipe some off and not even moisten others. I've had glue residue that resisted everything but MEK.

 

[10thTonner]

Why remove 'em at all? My daily driver Taco's a work-in-progress - helps distract the general public from the truck's obnoxious colour and ratty condition!

View attachment 568930

The stickers are just where I want to cut a hole to install a speed/depth display. Else I would just put a fresh one over the old ones and call it a day.

 

[Marcjsmith]

Mottsenbockers liftoff. Works great for getting the last bits of adhesive off

 

[DDW]

WD40 is Stoddard solvent mixed with light oil. It has some dissolving effect on some adhesives. The main reason it improves your success with a razor blade seems to be that it lubricates the blade and keeps it from sticking to the sticker and the remaining adhesive still stuck. Acetone or lacquer thinner has much more solvent effect but evaporates quickly. Varsol works pretty good if you are Canuck. Here in California, the solvents we can get are basically water. In fact, even water here carries a Prop 65 warning. MEK, methyl alcohol, traditional paint thinner are all outlawed. Whenever I'm in Canada I smuggle a couple of gallons of Varsol back.

 

[mal5033]

+1 on the rubber decal erasers from amazon. I struggled with the nearly 30 year old stripes until I bought three of them. Did the job great and I still have two (and a half) of them in my barn for the next go round. As said prior, you can overheat your work so take your time. I took the remaining glue off with a quick wipe of solvent.

amazon link

 

[The Q]

At work we use this,

 

[Bull City]

@10thTonner Whatever you do, let this be a lesson, learn the signal flags by heart!

 

[mckenzie.keith]

WD40 is Stoddard solvent mixed with light oil. It has some dissolving effect on some adhesives. The main reason it improves your success with a razor blade seems to be that it lubricates the blade and keeps it from sticking to the sticker and the remaining adhesive still stuck. Acetone or lacquer thinner has much more solvent effect but evaporates quickly. Varsol works pretty good if you are Canuck. Here in California, the solvents we can get are basically water. In fact, even water here carries a Prop 65 warning. MEK, methyl alcohol, traditional paint thinner are all outlawed. Whenever I'm in Canada I smuggle a couple of gallons of Varsol back.

You can buy acetone and denatured alcohol at home depot in california. You can also get 99 percent IPA online (it works well for some things). Not sure about methanol.

 

[DDW]

You can still buy acetone, but not denatured alcohol, or methanol (denatured alcohol is ethanol mixed with a little methanol to make you go blind it you drink it). You can't buy decent paint thinner, the mineral spirits now on offer is so low in volatility that it takes a day to evaporate from a surface, a cloth moistened with it will be damp for a week. You can still buy lacquer thinner, for now.

 

[mckenzie.keith]

You can still buy acetone, but not denatured alcohol, or methanol (denatured alcohol is ethanol mixed with a little methanol to make you go blind it you drink it). You can't buy decent paint thinner, the mineral spirits now on offer is so low in volatility that it takes a day to evaporate from a surface, a cloth moistened with it will be damp for a week. You can still buy lacquer thinner, for now.

Oh, wow. We have a can of denatured alcohol at work, so I thought it was still available. Probably it is just old. I did buy some methanol hand sanitizer during the pandemic, but that was just a screw-up. I am sure it is not available anymore. I wonder if they will make the 99 percent isopropyl alcohol illegal. I hope not because I find it pretty useful as a solvent. Works much better than 70 or even 90 percent from the drugstore.

 

[silent bob]

That's because there are different adhesives used on different stickers/labels.

I've had WD40 just wipe some off and not even moisten others. I've had glue residue that resisted everything but MEK.

WD40 is Stoddard solvent mixed with light oil. It has some dissolving effect on some adhesives. The main reason it improves your success with a razor blade seems to be that it lubricates the blade and keeps it from sticking to the sticker and the remaining adhesive still stuck. Acetone or lacquer thinner has much more solvent effect but evaporates quickly. Varsol works pretty good if you are Canuck. Here in California, the solvents we can get are basically water. In fact, even water here carries a Prop 65 warning. MEK, methyl alcohol, traditional paint thinner are all outlawed. Whenever I'm in Canada I smuggle a couple of gallons of Varsol back.

Yeah, can’t fucking get MEK in Califukistan! You can still get Denatured Alcohol at Worst Marine. It’s labeled as Stove Fuel, and now costs three times what it used to!

Inmate #1: What are you in here for?
Inmate #2: Smuggling Nev-R-Dull in from Nevada!