Front plastic peeled off

Margaritaville wrote:
We have a friend with an older motor home where the plastic covering on the front has yellowed and looked very bad. They got the plastic stripped off but half of the underlying glue lremains. Anyone know what they can use to get that remaining glue off the coach? Tried Goo Gone, Awesome, and nail polish remover but nothing touches it. Thanks for your help!

What's the underlying structure? Try Acetone, if no good, try toluene. small spot first.

Take it to a tint shop.
Most have steam and other materials.
I have spent half this week in installation shops as a result of getting a new car and going to have the film put on it.
The new films are completely different and much easier to put on and also take off if necessary

Nail polish remover is mostly acetone.

What is sold as lacquer thinner also has methanol, toluene and some other organic solvents. Depending on the adhesive, that may or may not work, but depending on the finish, lacquer thinner can make a real mess of what is underneath, can act as paint remover for some finishes.

A whole lot depends on what is the adhesive, and what is the finish under the adhesive. Sometimes adhesives are susceptible to petroleum distillates (like tar and bug removers) that have no effect on modern automotive finishes, or pine oil solvents (e.g. natural turpentine).

A caustic paint remover would almost certainly get the adhesive off, but would probably also remove the finish, and if what is underneath is not steel or aluminum, eat into that as well. When refinishing aluminum, we would eat down to the metal, but I don't think that is what you want here.

But I don't know the finish, I don't know the adhesive, so solvent suggestions for your case are just a WAG. You've tried citrus oils (GooGone) and acetone (nail polish remover) with no effect, and probably no damage. I would be inclined to move toward heavier hydrocarbon solvents (naptha, turpentine) in my experimentation, because these are less likely to damage the finish, but a shop that does these coverings probably knows a lot more about what might have been used.

I would use a heat gun and a plastic scraper to get the majority of it off. This will be slow going but you need to physically remove most of the glue. Xylene paint thinner should get the rest but if you use too much for too long you'll get the paint too. Try a small area and Home Depot sells Xylene.

While helping a friend remove his cracked and moldy Diamond Shield, we tried almost every chemical on the market including stuff from auto body supply shops. One that did work was "Wyricks sticky substance Remover" that would dissolve the surface of the adhesive that could then be scraped off with plastic putty knife. This process took 5 or 6 applications which took a lot of the chemical and time. So back to Lowes and talked to a women in the paint dept. who said she removed the pallet racking labels. She took me down to the air freshener sprays and handed me a bottle of "Orange Squeeze" air freshener from a company called California Scents. I said I didn't to freshen the air but to remove adhesive thinking she misunderstood my question. She said they use it all the time, that it's 100 per cent citrus extract and works. So for $3.50 what the heck if it doesn't work put it in the bathroom. Well I sprayed it on a 1 ft. square area waited about a minute and scraped it off, amazingly with 2 applications all the adhesive was gone.
Recommended it to another friend and he couldn't believe the results either. Also works well for bottle labels. But I found its safe on clear coat paint but not all plastics as it will melt some plastics so try an small area first. PM me if you have any questions.
Blessings; kdk

3M eraser wheel chucked up in a corded electric drill motor.

Solvents by strength typically are lacquer thinner, acetone, xylene, toluene, and MEK. Use all carefully with good ventilation.

Plastic razor blades, soften adhesive with mineral spirits, scrape off what you can. Repeat until you have removed all you can. Then use lacquer thinner to get remaining adhesive off. Finish with a good cleaner wax.

Worked for me when I removed the Diamond Shield******from front of my coach.

kdk said ""Orange Squeeze" air freshener from a company called California Scents"

I'm gonna give that a try on glue left from "Gorilla Tape"

We used to use women's hair spray to remove ink from computer printers in the old days.