Technical Removing melted plastic from my headers

So those little plastic spark plug wire clips accidentally rested on my ceramic coated headers. I got a black blog about the size of a nickel.
Any ideas on how to remove it ? I thought about burning it off with a propane torch ???
They’re Sanderson’s, don’t want to mess them up
Thanks in advance !!

 

Maybe the tech guys at Sanderson will have your answer......they developed the coating and should know what to do to clean it......worth the phone call.....

 

You are probably screwed. Every time I have seen something similar it wouldn't clean up. The plastic is actually into the pores of the coating. Used to be a Sanderson Dealer.

 

Crap ! Any way to remove it ??

 

I would call them as mentioned

 

Thanks

 

Try lacquer thinner. HRP

 

Thanks HRP !

 

So it won't come off at all? Whatever kind of plastic it is they should make paint out of it.

 

Ha ! They are Moroso clips, some kind of plastic

 

Try M.E.K
Methyl ethyl ketone.

But keep it away from other plastics .
Or off your fingers when wet [You'll end up with deep fingerprints in plastics]

 

M.E.K. ? Don’t think I can get that at Home Depot !
Never heard of it, is it a wholesale item ?
I’ll google
Thanks

 

It is available locally ! Surprising, have you used it for this purpose ?
Thanks

 

Could you possibly take some fine grit sandpaper, sand most of the plastic off and then polish the area?

 

I had a spark plug wire melt on a tube before. I just kept picking at it with my fingernails whenever I had the hood up.
It just bugged me, so picked at it when I was seeing it.
Not immediate results but results nonetheless

 

Melt a matching spot on the other side! Tell everyone it's a factory applied 'identifier' applied by the craftsman that built them.

 

Have the same issue with my OT pickup..... Plastic bag got wrapped around my exhaust pipe.... SUCKS

 

M.E.K. = Methyl Ethyl Ketone. It is nasty stuff. If you have any of the original unburnt plastic left, try a piece in some acetone, paint thinners, any other solvents you have. If you come back and find some gooey plastic, use that solvent to try and melt the rest off the header. You could wrap a rag around the area, and keep it soaked until it the plastic softens.

 

My headers are silver ceramic/metallic coated. I always put on the car cover before the headers cool and, it being polyester, melts to the headers. Also have occasionally melted other plastic on them. I have had good luck scraping most of it off with a hard plastic scraper (credit card?) that doesn't harm the coating, or paint stripper on tough spots. The way stripper has been de-fanged that might not work any longer.

 

MEK, is designed to thinhrp epoxies and fiberglass. HRP

 

Back when I had my roadster, I hit a black plastic trash bag. Made a hellava mess.
I peeled of what I could and left the remains on to burn to a crisp.
I scraped that off with a plastic scraper and used carb cleaner and a fine scotch brite to gently remove the remains, then polished out with Simichrome.

 

This would probably work

 

heat it up and peel it off.

 

Had the same problem once on a friends car. Run the car to get header warm , but not hot to touch. Take dry soft cloth and once plastic melts a bit wipe off. Had to d a few rounds of this but worked.
careful not to get too hot and burn yourself . let cotton towel do the work.

 

M.E.K Peroxide is what you're looking for and it's available from industrial paint suppliers. It is extremely flammable and like alcohol, you won't see it burning. Used it for thinning and cleanup of fiberglass resin back in the 60's. Used it to melt ABS plastic shavings to make glue for parts.

 

MEK is highly toxic and I avoid using it. I won't even have it around. I knew one guy with a machine shop, he practically swam in the stuff. I could smell it as soon as I walked into his shop area.

How about dry ice, on cold headers of course, maybe warm would work. Place a chunk under a shop rag, wedge it in place and wait a few minutes. It may flake right off with a plastic spatula.

 

Hello,

The warning signs are listed for Methyl Ethyl Keytone. It is bad stuff for humans and other living things. Yes, it is used in various industries, but why use it when there are other options? Life is short, even for us teenagers back then, that think nothing is going to bother us, now or in the future. What kind of critical thinking is that? But, it was a part of our world then, in 1959 to the time we retired.

In those 1960 days, my friend had a great job that paid well and he had enough money to get his own teenage apartment. His parents were ok with that since he was 17 and by the summer, turned 18. That whole year and after, his job was working in an industrial metal shed, circa WW2 Army camp, half-round buildings, for various surfboard manufacturers. It was a surfboard finishing shop not for general public use. The brands were well known, and they sent the shaped blanks to the shop for the final stages of sanding, laying on multiple sheets of fiberglass and resin. Then more sanding, more layers of resin and more sanding.

Finally, a fine finish coat on top, dry, then flip over for the final coat on the other side. I helped him at that point in using the buffing wheel to polish the final construction phase to showroom condition. It was fun being a part of the surfboard industry and it was only a few blocks from my Westside of Long Beach house. Actually, it was near the Speed Engineering Shop, Clay Smith Cams, Venolia Pistons and other smaller speed shops/parts companies. It could not have been more industrial with fiberglass boat finishing shops, pipe and sheet metal companies, etc.

But, I only lasted a couple of days of finishing the polishing end. The overall smell from adding the MEK to the catalyst for the multiple layers of fiberglass + resin was a multiple of three or four, depending on how many layers of cloth were applied. (My teenage Bronchial Asthma was affected and I had to quit, just being inside of that building/shop.)

Then count the final two layers of clear resin for the gloss coats and as you can see, the aroma of MEK in the catalyst was overflowing. No fans were used in the final coats as infinite specks of something need not be floating around, so the doors/windows/vents were all taped shut for the time it took to mix up and lay the final coats.

There were times when my friend came out of the sealed door to trip and fall over until he could get some clean air and drink lots of water. I asked him why and he said the money was great and the place had to be dust free unless the specks were so great that he had to do those multiple surfboards over again. Now, back to sanding, cleaning and blasting another batch of Resin/Catalyst/MEK mixture.

Jnaki

I could not stand the smell and aroma that permeated my clothes, hair and skin. Not only that, but it was not good to breathe in the odor for too long. My friend gave himself time to get the procedure done as well as possible, but fast enough to save his health from deteriorating. (and not have to re-do the whole procedure for some specks or mistakes…) Masks were used, but they were not the modern enclosed/filter safety kind, we see today.

Don’t use MEK…

“The amount of MEKP (Methyl Ethyl Keytone Peroxide... has an influence on the strength of polyester resin. The resin manufacturers recommend adding less than 2 percent catalyst. With such a minimal amount, the gel time would more than an hour, and the foam would absorb large amounts of resin making it extra heavy. In very cold weather, some surfboard glassers have been known to use up to 10% MEK to achieve the desired eight-minute gel time.” Good for you, the buyer, bad for the glosser in the workshop.

Not knowing the condition of the surface of the headers, but most melted plastic will get brittle with cold. On my old Harley Sportster dual pipes, I had to use a cover to secure the bike in strange places. Usually, there was enough space between the hot pipes and cover. But, if some wind or person walked by and touched the bike cover, then it melted onto the pipes.

Because we lived by the beach and it was usually cold, I noticed that the melted plastic could be chipped off with a plastic tool and not scratch the chrome. Then Simichrome Polish made whatever was left come off and the shine returned. The Simichrome did two things, whatever bluing was on the pipes, became less with the polish usage.

I even quit using surfboard repair kits with catalyst as a result of the early incidents. It was easier to take the board, if it needed some major repair to a shop and pay to have it done, even though, it could have been done at home in the garage. YRMV

 

I'd check it at different temperatures of running the engine. It should soften back up at some point and be able to be lifted, scraped off. Very fine brass wire brush could help lift it without risjlkong the coating

 

Since MEK is a liquid catalyst for both 'glass n bondo(I think most bondos have the mek in gel/paste form so that type probably wouldn't work), go to a decent parts store, or automotive paint store & ask for a tube of MEK catalyst. Should be cheap, maybe free. Wear nitrile glovs, dbl'd, maybe, & I'd add a charcoal-mask., maybe one of the N95-types would do. You might try acetone to soften the plastic up. If it's a blob on the header, bob396's idea should get a lot of it off.
Marcus...

 

Are you sure you want that guy to do your machine work? I bet he relates well to the scene in Airport, when Lloyd Bridge's character says, "I picked a fine time to stopping sniffing glue!"