I use Goo Gone for sticker adhesive removal. Works fine on various surfaces in my experience.
this post was submitted on 28 Jun 2023
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I've never used it myself, but i can say I've heard it praised many times.
The only time it's disappointed me was when I was trying to use it -- among a variety of other substances -- to deal with something other than sticker goo.
A few years back, a bunch of electronic devices were sold in the US that used some sort of rubberized coating that gave them a nice grippy feeling. Unfortunately, it turns out that after a couple of years, the coating degraded and turned into an incredibly sticky mess. I had a Grundig G6 Aviator shortwave radio that was affected, as well as a few other devices. It felt a bit like sticker adhesive, but trying to clean the stuff off with Goo Gone didn't work well (ultimately, isopropyl alcohol and a lot of elbow grease wound up being my most-successful combination).
But for what it is actually billed for, adhesive residue, I've had good experiences.
Note that Goo Gone, or at least the variant I have, has a quite-strong citrus smell, which I assume is there to mask some less-pleasant smell that the active ingredients have. So when I use the stuff, everything nearby smells like oranges for a while. Haven't had a situation where that's a problem yet, but thought I'd mention it in case it would be an issue for anyone else using it.
I fucking hate that coating. It's the bane of electronics casings.
I hope it's never used again, but I still keep seeing it, especially on third party game controllers.
If it's a rubberized coating on new devices, it may be a similar formula that doesn't have the degradation problem. I haven't personally had any devices do that in several years (not saying that there aren't products that do, mind).
And I remember that when the coating was new, before it broke down into a horrible sticky mess in a few years after purchase, it did feel pretty good to me. And it seemed pretty durable -- like, it didn't wear through or anything.
Just that when the Stickyocalypse did happen, it was awful.
I remember reading on Reddit once that people who bought a variety of dress shoes with a particular type of substance used in their soft soles had something similar happen. For a few years, many types of shoes from different manufacturers would break down and degrade in the closet. You take them out after a couple years, and they just crumbled apart. Wasn't a sticky mess, but I bet that people who rarely wore those shoes were pretty irked.
googles
Here's an example of one manufacturer that sold affected shoes. Apparently the problem was polyurethane being affected by hydrolysis.
Anyway, point is, the industry moved away from that particular fiasco after a couple of years when the problem came to light, switched to similar substances without the problem. I wouldn't be surprised if the electronics industry has done the same.
There are solvents/cleaners made from citrus peel, so the smell might come from the active ingredients, I don't know goo gone though.
Just use alcohol or white spirit. That stuff is an expensive gimmick.
Olive oil does the trick.
Or any kind of oil. Even WD-40, if you have it. Put oil on the adhesive residue, then scrub it off with a cloth. You can then remove the oily residue with soap.
This is the way. Olive oil or any oil will prevent the glue from re-adhering to the bottle after you've scraped it off.
Depending on the adhesive, rubbing alcohol or a vegetable oil.
Lots of good suggestions in this thread already, but long ago I used to work at a company that sold second-hand stuff where we often had to deal with stubborn labels and I haven't seen our "nuclear option" mentioned yet. Brake cleaner, which is basically an organic solvent in a spray can, should be great on glass. Be careful with it, though, it melts some kinds of plastics. And ensure it's used in a well-ventilated area.
Try that if the usual GooGone type stuff doesn't work.
We also used WD40, it tended to be gentler on plastics. Though it left a greasy residue that we'd need to clean off afterward and it was pretty slow.
Brake cleaner will not only take the paint off your wall, it will start to eat it.
Aceton usually does the trick.
As others have said, isopropyl alcohol works great to remove adhesive residue. Just don't use it with certain plastics.
I have had great luck removing labels by filling bottles / jars with boiling water and letting them sit a few minutes. I mostly do this to save wine labels I like or want to remember. When doing this it is also very easy to wipe off any residue.
I suggest, if it's not too gooey, grab some packing tape, and press it on the adhesive. Then, pull it off quickly. You might have to do this a few times, but it's the best method I've found that doesn't leave residue, and also works with most sticky adhesives.
Isopropyl alcohol works. I used IPA for cleaning car windows from sticker residue.
I normally just put it in the dishwasher alongside everything else and the heat and the steam do the job.
Depending on the dishwasher, that may not be a good idea as the label can clog the dishwasher filter though.
Heat and peel (slowly). You can pop some hot water in it or use a hairdryer.
Strong alchol on a cloth or papertowel to remove what remains.
If all else fails WD40 also works.
This is from removing labels from cars, where you have to be careful to prevent damage to the paint/clear coat.
With glass you can use a razor to scrape off whatever remains, but mostly it's not necessary.
There's a citrus based cleaning spray that usually does the trick for me, or isopropyl alcohol could work as well
razor blade or other sharp scraping tool works great. Alternatively, you can try something like GooGone, but I have had mixed results there.
Years ago at one job we used to use a combination of a razor scraper and Goof Off and it worked well. It was on pricing stickers on metal painted with enamel, and as long as you didn't dig into it and just worked it loose it would come clean. Goof Off is a harsher chemical than Goo Gone (I think toluene or some mixture) so not the best for long term exposure, but that was then and we had some ventilation. I also think the product sold now like so many might be more diluted and not the original.
Olive oil on the other hand works surprisingly well if it can get to the adhesive.
90%+ rubbing alcohol makes a very good solvent for removing things like this. And it's probably cheaper than goo-gone.
Alcohol solvent can make this worse depending on the adhesive. It can just spread the stuff and thin it out. Someone else suggested oil, that's the ticket. Bit of olive oil on a rough cloth brings it right up. Wd40 was also suggested, same idea. You want it to move easily, not dissolve.
One of the few things WD40 is actually good for.
WD40 is great for dealing with things that are rusted in place, which is what it's supposed to be used for. It's just that it's not a great lubricating oil, and people often recommend it for use as that. Too thin and leaves a waxy residue to repel more water from rusting the surface, which you often don't want in things that you're lubricating.
I use rubbing alcohol for everything. Works really well to get tree sap and tar off of your car too.
Nobody's mentioned lighter fluid so far, but that stuff works well. Dad always used Ronsonol and it's quite cheap. It's also highly flammable, so mind that.
A couple points:
The lighter fluid that the parent poster is talking about, Ronsonol, is not the stuff that goes in butane lighters, nor is it the "lighter fluid" used to start charcoal barbecues. He's talking about the stuff that goes into Zippo and similar refillable lighters, stuff that's also called "naphtha".
If you want to use it as a solvent with much frequency, you can get the stuff at dramatically-lower unit prices in much larger containers than what Ronsonol is sold at.
https://www.amazon.com/2-Pack-VM-NAPTHA-QT-KLEAN-STRIP/dp/B01LWRQPWK/
Keep in mind that this is potent stuff and can damage some surfaces. For example, another user is talking about using Goo Gone above to remove adhesive from paint on a wall. Naphtha is more-or-less paint thinner -- your wall's paint will dissolve in it. It'd be fine on glass, what OP is intending it for, but if you use it elsewhere, be careful with it, try it on a small amount of the surface somewhere first to see if it damages it.
It can also cause skin irritation. Probably not a big deal unless you're regularly using it, but worth keeping in mind.
I also have a container of white spirits, which are similar but less volatile.
This is a really helpful post. Thank you for the link, because I spend way too much buying Ronsonol
I don't smoke, but I absolutely adore the sound that a Zippo makes when flicked open and struck, and wanted to get one a while back. I was kind of appalled at the fluid pricing -- the Zippo-brand fluid is even pricier, and I've seen the Ronsonol fluid itself recommended as a lower-priced alternative.
There are a lot of other things that people can burn in the refillable lighters, but I went through various testing that other people did and tried some myself, and none other than naphtha are really satisfactory. Some -- like white spirits -- aren't volatile enough, and won't maintain a consistent flame. Some, like gasoline, or low-water-content isopropyl alcohol, are too volatile and evaporate even more quickly than the regular fluid does or risk making an out-of-control fire.
Also works for the hand-warmers, which use the same fuel (and go through a great deal more of it than the lighters, so it's more-important there).
On an side note, I really wish that lighters of that sort would introduce some type of gasket that isn't dissolved by the fuel to help reduce the fuel vapor leaking out of the device when closed, or maybe some sort of other mechanism that seals the fuel reservoir off when the lighters are closed. As it stands, for a regular smoker, the fuel loss isn't a huge deal, but for someone who infrequently uses a lighter of the sort, the fuel loss is much more obnoxious -- it only takes several weeks for the reservoir to empty itself, in my experience.
Goo-B-Gone or Goo-Gone, plus steel wool like SOS pads or Scotch-Guard. Razors would work if it was a flat surface, but on a curved one like a bottle or glass, you want the flexibility of the steel wool.
+1 for steel wool
orange oil is one i haven’t seen mentioned yet!
i haven’t tried olive oil and other similar oils like others have suggested, but there’s a product in my country that’s specifically sticky stuff remover (like label residue) and it’s made of orange oil
Wait... oranges have oil?! O.o
It's in the peels and has lots of the fruits flavour. All citrus have it, that's why you grind a bit of lemon peel into your food: It tastes way more lemony than the juice.
I like to use WD-40, I just lube it up and massage the adhesive until it dissolves into a goo that can be removed with dish soap. I find the goo-gone that I tried evaporates too quickly to soak into stiffer jar label adhesives.
An Oxyclean soak is the most common way I see homebrewers recommend for removing labels from bottles. Definitely a good choice if being food safe matters.
Water and a razor blade works. Original Windex is really good at removing left over tint adhesive from glass, so it might work here too.
When I need to do something like this I run the glass under hot water to soften the adhesive the use 91% rubbing alcohol.
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