Removing the big, ugly, peeling pastic decal on 98 tailgate

[NissanHunter]

Not even sure what it's called other than a platic decal but it is a cheap @ss piece of plastic that runs the length or the tailgate and it's peeling. Anybody know if it can be stripped off with a heat gun or some other method without F'ing up the paint? Searched high and low for a thread on this and no luck. Thanks!

[Resurrected]

The outer plastic coating was half peeled off on mine so I pulled it the rest of the way off...when I noticed it still looked like crap I bent the corner of the metal piece up to see what'd it do and kept pulling it apart a little at a time.

It takes a while and you gotta pull seriously hard.

After thats off it takes a WHILE to rub all the adhesive off, if you use a little heat and some prep-all and your fingernails you can usually get it all off without messing up the paint too bad (it'll be a little less faded from the rest of the tailgate)

That help any?

[NissanHunter]

Sounds like a plan. I was hoping that it wouldnt pull the paint off with it. I think I will try the heat gun on it to see if it will come off a little easier if I can get the adhesive warmed up a little.

Now if I could just figure out how to get those warning labels off the fabric sun visors, their huge and look like crap. I was thinking maybe steaming them with an iron? I'll prolly F em up and wish I would have left them alone but oh well. Thanks man.

[onelowfrontier]

Dont pull to hard, it will warp the tailgate because your pulling the tailgate skin with it.It happen to me and it was to mess up to fix.

[kyrumo]

Use a hair dryer and heat that beeaaatch up, that will make it easier

[NissanHunter]

Whatever that tailgate decal was put on with was some sticky stuff. Goo-gone wouldnt even touch it. I went to an auto paint supply store to see what they use and the guy turned me on to the 3M.

It comes in a quart can and is about $15. Well worth it. Makes goo-gone think you were using water. It evaporates fast so you have to work in small areas and then use your finger nail to scrape the crap off. O'Reillys stocks it and can be found in hardware stores. Don't get the spray can, the regular can allows you to soak your rag and really put it on heavy.