The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Paint and Body Shop Neat tip on removing glued on rubber mouldings or weatherstrips.

A while ago I learned such a neat trick, I just had to pass it on. Most of us have removed some sort of "adhesive" moulding or rubber weatherstrip. We will pull it off, scrape or cut off remainder of the adhesive tape and then use an "eraser wheel" or something to remove what is left. We do new Toyota Camrys for Toyota Motor comany on a regular basis that are damaged in shipment. The front bumpers are commonly replaced or repainted. They have this very rubber seal across the top to seal the hood that you see in the photos. We would pull them off tearing the darn thing all up leaving adhesive tape and torn up rubber on the bumper to remove with the eraser wheel. Then one day, one of the guys removed the bumper and it was in paint looking like it had never even had the darn rubber on it. I asked him how he did it, and a new way to remove items like this was introduced to me.

What you do is stretch it instead of pealing it off. The first photo shows how you would peel it, the second photo shows it being stretched. We now pull them off and if we had to they could be reused! The one in these photos was in perfect condtion and could have been reused (we never do, Toyota wants new ones) if we wanted. The harder you stretch, the better it works. Even hard plastic mouldings it works like magic. It isn't going to get every one of them off as clean as this, but it will work a lot better than peeling it that is for sure.

Brian

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa167/BasicsofBasics/Incorrectrubberremoval.jpg

http://i200.photobucket.com/albums/aa167/BasicsofBasics/Correctrubberremoval.jpg

Brian..another effective method is to use a heat gun or hair dryer...get under or on the other side of the metal that the moulding is adhered to, apply heat judiciously and pull off the moulding.

Thanks for sharing the tip, Brian. I'll add that to my mental rolodex.

Bill

Steve, this is something you use IN conjunction with heat or what ever. You are right, warming something up, even just letting it set in the sun a while makes all the difference in the world.

Brian

Thats great Brian! I also was shown a neat trick when working in the northern area of my wonderful province,where temps regularly stay below 25 degrees c".remember those older ford moulding's with the aluminum backing under the glue,once you get all of the tape removed the aluminun was all distorted and looked like crap if you dare try to re install it.well I saw this guy huck the mldg into the snow for about twenty minutes then he grabbed one end with a pair of vise grips aluminum and glue and the whole shebang peeled off in seconds!he then retaped the mldg with out the aluminum and installed them.

Bent, that is WILD. One problem, we don't get any colder than 40-50 with no snow. Darn it!

Brian

try the deep freeze