Removing sail numbers

S

Saudek

New Member
I just picked up a used sail and want to change the numbers. Any tips on removing the old ones? They're standard adhesive stick-ons.
 
Try a hair dryer to ease up the adhesive. Be careful using goo gone or anything else like that as it may remove the resin in the sail cloth. If you have adhesive left on the sail after you have applied your new numbers you can put baby powder on the sail and it will cover up any left over adhesive and preserve the resin in the sail cloth.
 
Heat plus acetone. Just enough heat to soften the glue and the old numbers, not too much to cause the numbers to start tearing apart in your hands as they come off.

One the number is gone, a soaked rag in acetone, plus elbow grease, takes off the residue.

IIRC, it takes me a little less than 5 minutes per digit I remove.

You'll get the hang of it.
 
Goo gone is safe for dacron - it works faster then acetone and is much less damaging to skin/brain cells..
 
Thanks for the tips. I tried them all and here's what worked best for me: soaking the back side of the sail with a rag full of Oops (like Goo Gone), which loosened up the glue so I could peel the number off. The sail is more porous than the plastic number, which is why soaking it from the back worked. I didn't have much luck with the heat. Once the number was off, final cleanup was with the Oops and some elbow grease, then washing it with a sail detergent.
 
I just got a used radial sail and had to remove the numbers last weekend.

I have a heat gun, which works a treat. The main risk is not to get the sail TOO hot.

For glue removal solvent, this time I tried both acetone and goo gone -- the acetone worked better for me.

Additional tips:

Have a large number of small clean rags available, use one rag per number so you don't get adhesive build up on the rag getting wiped back onto the sail

Short fast strokes worked better than long ones

This sail had two additional numbers on it from a former life in a junior program, and those numbers were made out by cutting number shapes out of sail repair tape instead of the standard numbers. That glue was MUCH harder to remove. If you have some of those on your sail, think about just leaving them there.
 
Whilst sorting sail numbers earlier this year I was talking to a sailmaker about removing numbers (as I used to do it on Fireball sails and always ended-up with a mess). The sailmaker said acetone but soak it from the "wrong side" of the sail (i.e. through the sail to the number). He sail this disloves the glue from the sail rather than disolving the glue from the number and is much cleaner.

Not tried it but the guy was a professional so in the absence of better/conflicting advice I will use what he said when/if I have some numbers to remove.

Ian
 
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