Removing residue from protective wrap on canopy

Does anyone know of a safe way to remove the residue from the protective wrap on the canopy. Goo Gone seems to be a logical step, but are there any long term affects from using it on the plexiglass canopy?

lighter fluid

Lighter fluid works well, as in the Zippo lighters not the charcoal lighter fluid. I think it's made from naptha. Also does a good job on tape residue on the canopy.

Wrap on canopy

Kerosene or Stoddard solvent. Google any aircraft canopy manufacturer and read their recommendations. There are lots of products that will work to remove tape and adhesive residue. Most of them will ruin your canopy. Lots of them don't appear to harm a test piece of acrylic. Don't take a chance.

Denatured Alcohol works great, its mild and works great for cleaning all your aluminum parts before priming and removes Sharpie pen writing.

Lacquer thinner. Works great.

Cheers

Lacquer thinner will ruin your canopy!!!! DO NOT USE IT!! It will fog it and it will become brittle.


This is from a website of and aircraft finisher and restorer:

Don't subject the Plexiglass to the fumes or vapor from acetone, ethyl acetate, toluene or lacquer thinner. Lacquer thinner as used for thinning dope or lacquer is very often the cause of minor to severe crazing in Plexiglass. For example an opened can of dope or lacquer just sitting in the closed cabin of an airplane for a period of hours is enough to cause severe crazing in all the Plexiglas. The resulting damage to Plexiglass from exposure to lacquer or its fumes does not make itself immediately apparent but will show up as crazing in a few days to a couple of months depending upon the concentration of the exposure. In painting with dope or lacquer it is imperative that the Plexiglass be covered and sealed from the fumes as well as the paint.


Roberta

Hi Roberta

I'm not suggesting you leave the lacquer thinner on, just use it to wipe the canopy. I tested it on some scrap canopy material before using it on the canopy itself. I did this last fall and have had no indication of a problem on
the canopy whatsoever. While I only have 40 hours on the -8 so far, a lot of that flying was at below 0 degrees (it's cold in this part of Canada in January !)

Hi Mark,

You may have minimized any damage by the amount and time you used it to clean your canopy, but your original post does not indicate that. An uniformed builder may not be as cautious as you and could seriously damage a very expensive part that they have spent many hours fitting up. A light flicking with a slightly dampened cloth to lightly remove a small spot of glue or paint may not do any apparent damage, but a flooding of thinner over a large area may prove disasterous.

The only things I used were Dawn, warm water, and a good plexiglass polish. The canopy comes from Van's with a plastic wrap over it. Leave it on as long as possible. Don't leave tapes on so long that the glue hardens on your beautiful canopy. Use a good 3-M fine line tape on the canopy, then put masking tape over that. This helps keep your canopy free of the masking tape glue.

There are better, safer products out there to clean plexi with. Lacquer thinner is great on metal, but I would not get it near my canopy.

The Google search on cleaning plexiglass has many good products and many cautions on safeguarding your canopy.

Roberta

Roberta,

Yup, you are absolutely right. I didn't say that I just used it for wiping off spots of glue. Mea culpa. I guess I just assumed (yeah, I know) that if one were removing residue from the canopy, they would do it the same way I did.

Duh !

Oh, by the way, thank you for your input on HVLP systems a while back. I'm going to go the same way you did.

Cheers

Hi Mark,

Good luck with the painting. I'm sure you will be happy with the HVLP especially if you purchased the Citation. Mine is on it's third plane and has a lot of trouble free painting hours on it. Hope to see you at EAA in July.

Roberta

It's worth noting that the nature of plexi changes pretty dramatically with temperature, and possibly its ability to absorb solvents as well. The solvents themselves also behave differently with temperature. It seems quite unwise to let these things have any contact with the precious bubble, especially when they are specifically disapproved by plexi manufacturers.

Steve Zicree

Of all the things that can go bad and have to be replace, I fear the canopy the most. Mine fits so nice, the thought of having to ever replace it sickens me. The work involved in doing so......YIKES!! Actually it wasn't the work as much as the thought of screwing it up while I was doing it.

Roberta

Thanks Roberta. Now that the weather is warming up, I'm geting ready to start cutting my canopy. You have really instilled confidence in me.

Derrell

The canopy is not that bad. Make sure the room is warm (at least 75 degrees F), Use a small 3" cut off wheel in a diegrinder, Make your first cuts like dash dotted lines, then connect the cuts. That way your canopy won't be all floppy during the last little bit. I set mine on a large table and screwed wood all around it to keep it from collapsing as I made the final cuts. Some of the finish cutting and shaping was done using a Dremmel tool with 1/2" sanding drums and small cutoff wheels. Final edge shaping was done with a sanding block with 80 grit emery, then 150, then 220. And above all, leave the plastic covering on till the thing is completely cut, finished, drilled, bolted in, and ready for the fiberglass on the front. Longer if you can. I used as an anti chafe tape on metal parts that might scratch the canopy during installation. Go slow and take time. It will get done.

Roberta

clear tape glue removal

so can I use naptha to remove the stick part
of the tape? I didn't take off when I fiberglassed
the windscreen, I just now pulled the plastic
and tape and I need to get that sticky stuff
off and need to know what works without
causing damage.. whats the best tape/sticky
stuff ie: duct tape / clear packing tape sticky
stuff / masking tape stuff off the canapy ?

Danny..

As far as tape for the canopy, try pipe tape. It's about 2 inches wide and comes in 10 and 20 mil thicknesses. Most aviation departments in plumbing stores carry it. It adds a nice safety buffer when sanding that masking tape doesn't.

As I've said before, I've used naptha and I know of at east 3 other canopies that naptha has been used on without any trouble. Still, you may want to try it out on a scrap of plexi.

naptha

thanks Cam , I work in a refinery so pure naptha
is pretty easy to come by, headed to work today
I suppose I will try it tonight if I don't see anyone
posting it will melt the plastic I have some
melted clear tape that needs removed..

Danny..

Canopy residue

Here's a bit of info from a post I found on the RV-list a while back (http://www.rv8.ch/article.php?story=20040514190656552). Bottom line: Kerosene

...
2. Acrylic plastics are long chain polymers. You can reduce them to
short chain polymers and monomers by "cracking" them with heat and a
solvent. In this sense "cracking" has the same connotation as "cracking"
in a petrochemical refinery.

3. The crack resistance (in a mechanical sense) of acrylics depends on
their being long polymers. When you reduce them to short polymers they
will then lose their crack stopping properties and allow cracks to
propagate from any tiny surface imperfection.

4. Both vinylester and polyester resins may or may not contain solvents
that will depolymerize acrylics. The composition of either is quite
variable and dependent on the local manufacturer. This explains why some
people have got away with both polyester and vinylester resins on occasion.

5. The more aromatic (lighter fraction in general) the solvent the worse
it hates plexiglass. If you have to clean plexi it is best to use heavy
(non-aromatic) hydrocarbon fractions. The safest are kerosene or mineral
turpentine. There is a fraction called X95 which is slightly lighter and
still safe. This is the chief component of WD40 and most other
penetrating water displacement agents. Anything based around the benzene
ring (benzine, toluine etc) is bad, bad, bad.
...

Click to expand...

I used kerosene when I couldn't get OLD masking tape residue off my canopy. Worked great, no ill effects.

Googone??

Just a suggestion here----------a product called "Googone"-----(no, I am not joking, that is the real name). Although I have never used it on plexi, I have used it on many surfaces, and never had a problem.

I would also suggest keeping your trimmed off scraps from the canopy to test various chemicals on, from glues to cleaners.

Mike

sticky stuff

Well I brought home naptha , but it sounds
like not such a good idea, I will get some kero
or lighter fluid.. its been on there a while
so another couple days won't hurt and I don't
want to ruin the plexi too much trouble putting
in and fiberglassing a slider.. but I am sure
the tip up is too much trouble to redo also..

It can wait..

Danny..

Mike S said:

Just a suggestion here----------a product called "Googone"-----(no, I am not joking, that is the real name). Although I have never used it on plexi, I have used it on many surfaces, and never had a problem.

Click to expand...

GooGone is great but I did have a problem with it one time. One of the Windows/Intel stickers on my laptop was coming off and I successfully wiped off all the goo. Months later another one came off and I confidently went to clean it up with GooGone. It ruined the powdercoat finish. Only after the fact I remembered that I just used water on the first one.

Boris

aliphatic naptha should be ok

I remember from A&P school that aliphatic naptha can be used to clean plexiglass. Just be sure your naptha is aliphatic and not aromatic naptha.

That's about all I remember about it, and it's amazing to me that I remembered that much since it's been 30 years!

Please do some research before you try it though.

6 year old masking tape removal

This discussion was very timely for me. I have a slow, slow, slow build project (12 years and counting) that I am making an effort to finish before my buddy Mark Burns catches up with me after only 2 years. Approximately 6 years ago I fitted most of the parts to the canopy after pulling away some of the clear mask and taping the edges of the clear mask to the canopy with masking tape. I have just finished painting the interior of the cockpit and I want to finish the canopy.

The masking tape was very brittle and impossible to remove. Van's instructions stated that Naphtha (this is the correct spelling) and kerosene could be used on the canopy. I found VM&P Naphtha Pure at the Ace hardware store. I do not know what the VM&P means so I tried it on a scrap pcs with no ill affect. I found that it did a great job taking the glue residue off but would not soak through the paper of the old masking tape. I started to slowly scrape the paper away with my fingernails. This was taking way too long (as if I am in a hurry).

What worked for me is the following. In a spray bottle I put warm water and dish soap. I sprayed this on the old tape and then used a 2 x 3" stiff plastic squeege scraper to scrape a layer off of the tape. I repeated this several times, each time taking more of the masking tape paper off as the water soaked into it. When I was down to the glue, I put Naphtha in another spray bottle and sprayed it on. I was able to scrape off the glue residue. Finally I sprayed on the Naphtha and wiped off the last bit of resideue with a paper shop towel.

I did have to work the hardened edge glue with my fingernail to get the final bit of glue off. I completed the work by washing with warm water to get all the Naphtha off. The Canopy looks like new and I didn't have to resort to the Canopy fairy in TX.

RV-6