I bodged my wing mirror with sellotape, and foolishly left it like that for months. There's now a sticky residue left on the paintwork.
Can I safely use methylated spirit to remove that? (Safe for the paintwork - I won't be drinking it.)
Removing sellotape residue from car paintwork
Aug 15, 2017
17 Replies
Test it somewhere it won't show if it hazes the top layer coat. Most of the modern paint finishes are base coat with clear varnish on top. The modern eco friendly varnishes are nowhere near as resilient against solvent attack (and I have had problems with masking tape residues).
Swarfega is a lot more benign and will usually soften sellotape tack.
I hadn't thought of swarfega. What a good idea.
Still try it somewhere out of sight. The finishes are easily damaged.
Pigeon poo is particularly corrosive at this time of year.
With a similar problem, where old cellotape had left a residue on a painted cabinet, I found that it could be removed without damaging the surface by repeatedly dabbing with fresh sellotape. It also works for removing the sticky residue from hard plastic packaging after taking off the price label.
Alan Alan
We used to have a kit for removing label residue from magnetic media. It used eucalyptus oil as its solvent.
on 15/08/2017, GB supposed :
Try WD40
My mum used to use that to remove beach tar from children some 55 years ago. Luckily, there were no Koalas in Cornwall.
Cheers
RS and the likes sell Label Remover which smells like oranges. That's worked OK on modern car paintwork for me.
Limonene - extracted from citrus peel.
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Probably OK but always test on a place where any damage will not show.
Oh, I'm pretty sure there were. Plenty of zoos in Cornwall. :o)
Yes and IPA I don't think that melts car paint, just don't use acetone containing stuff like nail varnish remover or stuff like that. Brian
Well good luck with that CPC used to make a glue remover that claimed to be safe on car paint but if it has changed recently then I'd have imaginined many more people wouldbe having troubles by now. Brian
+1 WD40 followed by alcohol to remove the wd40 !
or fortify you while you cleam up
I'd use white spirit.
I assumed that the India Pale Ale (IPA) suggested by Brian Gaff was intended to do that :-)
Alan
Racist ;-)
But where did this term come from originaly and why not clear spirit.
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