Tail light housing refurb

I got my tail light housings apart, now what is the best product to get the gooey adhesive between the housing and lens off with? I tried wax and grease removed but it just seems to smear and spread it out. Ryan

Hi,

For my tail light housings, I used paint thinner and a scraper+ rags to remove as much of the goo off of the perimeter of the lens and housing. Takes a while, but the result is pretty good. It didn't affect the plastic on the lenses but I was also being very careful about it. Then rinse and clean with soap to remove the residual film left by the glue mixing with the paint thinner.

Make sure your in a well ventilated environment or wear a mask, don't make the same mistake i did breathing in paint thinner for 30min before realizing putting on a mask would be a great idea.

Maybe someone has a different suggestion also to propose.

Hope this helps you out!

Marco

try ronsonol lighter fluid and a mesh cloth. yup the stuff in the yellow bottle, it dissolves different adhesives and it evaporates fast.

manually remove as much as you can then soak an area with ronsonol and soak your mesh cloth and start rubbing to remove.

after that would be plastic safe paint stripper.

I used Goo-Gone and some elbow grease, it did the job.

As mentioned above, I like paint THINNER (mineral spirits) for a job like this. Always test the plastic, but I can say over many jobs of cleaning adhesive off of boats, cars, aircraft, etc., thinner hasn't let me down and attacked any surfaces that I've cleaned. Not the fastest, but safest IMO. Wipe in one direction, turning the cloth regularly. Use a small cloth folded into a 2" square, keeping it wet. Wax and grease remover kinda feels and smells like it would work, but it just is not aggressive enough.

Anything more aggressive (stripper, acetone, lacquer thinner, etc.) is positively not recommended for that job. Don't even think about it. Any old "dry" adhesive will need to be scraped off.

After all adhesive is removed, clean well with dish soap and water to remove contaminates so any new adhesive will stick. Trust me on this step.

I soaked mine with WD40 for days. Every time I walked by them I sprayed more WD on them. They peeled right apart and cleaned up with wipes "tub of towels"

Ended up using Goo gone, worked great. Thanks everyone for the advice. Ryan