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Triumph - Removing Paint Overspray

To: triumphs@Autox.Team.Net
Subject: Triumph - Removing Paint Overspray
From: Bud_Rolofson@nps.gov (Bud Rolofson)
Date: Mon, 17 Aug 1998 11:03:25 -0700
I had paint overspray (from one of the DPO's numerous paint jobs) on a number of
things in the engine bay.  

The engine was apparently out when it was done as the paint was only on things
like the wiper motor, the brake vacuum drum, choke cables, the relays and most
annoyingly the wiring from the firewall to the relays (which made wire tracking
very interesting...Dan Masters messages suddenly make a lot more sense to me now
that every wire isn't a "red" wire).

I decided that paint remover was a little too harsh (and dangerous to real
paint) but luckily I have a 15 year old daughther and seeing her using nail
polish remover gave me the idea that if her fingers could take the polish
remover then most everything in my engine bay could too.

I tried it and it worked wonderfully.  It removed the overspray without removing
the real paint (your results may differ depending on how long you rub) and
didn't eat the insulation off of my now multi-colored wires.  It also cleaned
off a lot of other gunk (that black wire was really a big brown wire) that was
confusing the wiring issues.

I pulled each wire off the relays one at a time, cleaned the connector and wire,
and replaced them so as not to reconnect something incorrectly.  I found one
suspect connection so it turned out to be plus that I repaired a "future"
problem at the same time.  

The whole process seemed to work good until I dropped the purple wire (which is
always hot) and it grounded to something and burnt out a 35 amp fuse which I
then had to go find at the local parts store.  Other then that I was happy with
the result.

Now can anyone recommend a way to get overspray off a vinyl top?  It's really
fine and can't be seen when I put on vinyl cleaner/conditioner, but is still
there and shows when the top isn't in "detail" condition.

Bud

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