Several months ago I masked an area of the worktop in our bathroom in preparation to cut out the whole for a sink.
For various reasons, I didnt quite finish this and have now got round to doing it. I have tried to take off teh masking tape and it is leaving marks.
I cant tell whether this marks is adhesive or whether it has actually damaged the surface of teh worktop but the usual bathroom cleaners and vegetable oil havent moved it.
It sounds odd, but sprinkling sugar on the vegetable oil, then rubbing firmly with a cloth, works quite well. The sugar is just abrasive enough (but softer than the surface) to shift the adhesive, and the oil stops it from sticking again.
I did find that CIF (or JIF or whatever its called now) works but it is slow going.
Incidentally, my wife is South African and apparently the word CIF in Afrikaans means dirt, filth or "minging". She finds it hilarious that she could take a bottle back home and clean her house with filth !
I clean control desks and where customers have put up little reminder notes months previous often all the solvent has long gone just left a crust of adhesive. I find "Label cleaner" made by electrolube, available at Maplins, applied at 20 minutes intervals a few times softens it to the extent it can then either be scraped off with a thumbnail or attacked by an aqueous surface cleaner.
It also seems ironic that they renamed it to CIF from JIF as apparently some European countries had difficulty with the J (and they wanted a common name throughout markets). Obviously they didn't think globally... ;)
Now that it matters now, but most masking tape says to remove within 24 hours or so, and you can buy more expensive ones which can be left longer (28 days or so I think).
One other thing not to do with masking tape - put it on the feed/return pipes directly above the boiler. I did this to use an IR thermometer on them as the bare copper was too reflective to give accurate readings. Consequently, 1 year later they're stuck and dried solid. I'm sure I'll found a suitable tu-it sometime.
I've found Tim Clean from Asaka which is a CPU & Heatsink cleaner cleans absolutely anything. It is a citrus based solvent and hasn't harmed anything I have put it on.
I've had to start to hide my bottle as my wife has started to use it for the odd bit of housework ;o)
CPU cleaner, now I've seen everything, my fave in this arena is citrus cleaner for snowboards (Red brand incidentally), used to deep clean wax out of the pores in the base. Store with caution as contact with spotty youths has been known to cause them to shrivel to nothing .
But I'm allowed 2 hours to clean 2x 250 feet of transparent conveyor belt to medical diagnostic imaging standards. The clean up of the control desk area is a bonus for the users.
I have the label cleaner with me, gallons of it, as meths just makes a purple dyed pudding (which then gets dirty) of the other adhesive residues I have to deal with, ones where the adhesive hasn't dried out/fossilised. In these cases it is also vastly superior to (much faster than) ethanol or isopropanol.
Although I have to agree meths has worked for me on masking tape residues at home. But sparks had already suggested it.
I *like* label remover, the customers like the smell, so they remember my visit favourably. It has a higher molecular weight and evaporates more slowly, reducing the need to re-moisten. So I damp the adhesive residues with it first and then come back to them after 20 mins, plenty of other things to do, moistening with it again if necessary.
Once t' job's a good 'un, wiping over with an isopropanol swab, or "RS electronic cleaning spray plus" removes all traces of the oily label cleaner.
replying to Tim Smith, Mr Whyles wrote: Stuart - had the same issue and found a solution - real hot water worked then i found a tape from Walther Strong - its Orange and called something like Cleanroom Construction tape - leaves not residue and worked very well,
Its quite difficult from that to discern the profit and incomes. Anyone operating a small company with net worth has paid more corporation tax than necessary.
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