Whats your favorite method for removing 30+ year old factory striping? Decal's, not painted.

 

let the truck sit in the sun for a while then take a razor blade to lift a corner and then try to pull them off by hand. Probalby won't work, but sometimes you get lucky. Then use a good adhesive remover and alot of elbow grease. I've never used it, but there is an abrasive disk (3M I think) that is just for this. You put it on a drill or an air grinder and rub the vinyl off. Depending on the color, expect to have some serious fading of the paint.

 

Not worried about the paint, just looking for the easiest way to get it off before I repaint. I've seen too many botched jobs were it shows thru on repaint. Don't want to strip to bare metal.

 

Usually razor scraper, if they are stuck well from 30 years in the sun, and you are repainting. I use lacquer thinner to remove the glue residue, but this would likely soften and remove a lacquer or un activated enamel.
gfw mentioned other good methods, but stripes that old likely will just keep breaking off heating up and trying to remove. That little pinstripe removal wheel works pretty slick as well, and by looking at them you would never guess it.
Also if you are repainting, some also just sand off remaining decal or adhesive, but if end up using a courser paper to get anywhere, you would either have to go over well with finer grits, or shoot some primer on the area.

 

I've used the wheelon both decal type and painted stripes, and it works really well.

 

Eastwood sells vinyl decal remover, although purchase 1 few months back have not had opportunity to use it yet.

Eastwood Company: Search Results for decal remover

http://search.eastwoodco.com/search?...%20eraser&rk=1

 

any auto body supply shop will have a eraser for stickers and pinstriping they work really well pinstripes should ony take a few minutes. they cost around $15.00

 

I just removed the decal stripes off an 87 Bronco I just bought. Used a hair dryer to soften, pulled SLOWLY, and removed remaining adhesive with goo-gone a plastic bondo knife and a clean rag.

The trick is going SLOW while applying enough heat to keep the decals from breaking.

The real work comes in removing the adhesive. Takes quite some time and just as much effort.