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paint underspray on plexiglass

freegespeed

Active Member
I have a question regarding how to clean off some spray paint from my RV6A's

plexiglass canopy. I tried cleaning a small section with lacquer thinner and it worked well.

My question is can rubbing this kind of solvent on the plexiglass due any damage to the plastic from a chemical reaction?

If there is a better way I would like to try that. Thanks.
 
Just about any solvent will ruin your plexiglass and cause it to be brittle. DO NOT USE ANY SOLVENTS!!! Unless you want to buy a new canopy.

Your best bet is to try and polish the paint off with a good plastic polish and scratch remover. Not very fun, but safe. More lacquer thinner will fog your canopy and probably ruin it.

I bet you keep it well covered now.
 
I'll second that about using solvents on Plexiglass. While there are some benign solvents that "might" not create a problem on the plastic canopy, it's not worth the risk.

To take paint overspray off of anything, you first have to know what kind of paint the overspray is made of. If it's an uncatalyzed enamel, then there are some mild solvents that might cut the overspray and not hurt the canopy, but I still wouldn't take the risk. Just polish it with a plastic polish over and over and over and over... until it comes out shiny and clear.

If the overspray is a urethane, then just polishing it with lots of elbow work and a plastic cleaner/polish MADE for plexiglass is the way to go, but it will be a LOT more work than if the overspray is enamel. There is usually a mild abrasive "cleaner" made for Plexiglass that you would use until the overspray is gone, and that would be followed with a non-abrasive polish, again, MADE for plastic. Again, lots of hard work.

If the overspray is epoxy primer, and you've allowed it to cure for a few days, then you are in for some REAL work. You would probably have to hand sand the canopy with a 1200 grit "wet" sand paper to get rid of the overspray itself, and then you would change to 1500 grit wet sanding to get rid of the 1200 "scratches" (you don't really see individual scratches at that magnitude of grit), and then change to 2000 wet sand paper to get rid of the 1500 scratches. Plus, you have to pretend that you are working in a hospital environment and make sure that absolutely no dust or dirt (blowing dust from your driveway?) gets in the water or on the canopy. If that happens, even small pieces of dust will leave deep scratches on the canopy that will polish out, but will add lots of work to the process. Keep sloshing clean water over the area you're sanding. If a piece of grit gets between your sandpaper and the canopy, you'll feel it. Make sure you use a clean sanding sponge and not your bare hand to sand or you might actually end up sanding grooves into the canopy that will show up as ripples when looking through it later.
Finally, you use a very fine plastic polish with a mild abrasive to get rid of the scary looking fogginess you created by sanding the plexiglass, and then finish by using a non-abrasive polish to bring it back to like new condition.

You can use a machine polisher with a lamb's wool pad to polish the canopy with (keep it clean at all times), but be VERY careful to run it VERY slowly and do NOT let it heat up the plexiglass or you'll screw it up big time where it can't be fixed. If you've never used a machine polisher before, it would be safer to do the polishing by hand, but be sure as well to use "real" polishing cloths, not those red mechanics towels because using the wrong kind of fabric for polishing can cause damage as well.

Using either a nasty solvent, OR heating up the Plexiglass with a machine polisher too much will cause crazing where you can see lots of teeny little cracks within the Plexiglass. If you see that, you're done; get a new canopy.

Go slow, be careful, DON'T try to shortcut by using any solvents, and DON'T get overspray on your canopy ever again. ;)

Vern
RV7-A
 
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Thanks for the info

Thanks for the good information. I have a full buff and polish set up so I just have to get some plexiglas cleaner. I will give it a try and report my results.
 
elbow grease works

Just to follow up on my canopy over-spray problem, I pretty much rubbed it into submission with distilled water and a rag. I also used some plexiglas cleaner (Plexus I think) but I left the solvents in there cans. It does take some serious rubbing(about a half hour straight for and 8 inch by 8 area. There are some microscopic specs here and there but for the most part its all cleaned up.

By the way I just finished painting my RV and it came out quite nice. Painting is a stinking hard job but also very satisfying when you stick with it.
 
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