Cone marks

[RETII]

I recently attended the PDS and during the festivities managed to become confused and think that I was playing pinball and collected several cone strikes.Having confessed my sins I feel that I can now ask what is the best method to remove the cone black marks from the clear rock guard film?
By the way, if the club ever replaces the cones My vote would be for silver replacements.
Ralph

[Jad]

Ironically, the rock guards are the only place the marks don't come off easily When I repainted my car, I left them off to protect the appearance

The marks will come off, but it is work. I haven't found anything I really like, but elbow grease and rubbing compound or wax tends to work or even a little paint thinner, but maybe someone else has a better solution.

[RickK]

I've used Simple Green on my wheels before, works well but still takes some elbow grease. I'm not sure if that is safe for the paint or not.

[Curt]

Simple Green Automotive formula is the best thing I've found for getting the rubber from tires marks off of my car. I saw them using it at a Grand Am race and if the rubber is fresh it melts it right off. I don't know about cone marks though.

[Robert]

Jad is right, the black stuff from cones does not come off stone guard easily. Rubber directly from tires is much easier to deal with. I've tried lots of stuff and even took it to a pro and no one has been able to fully fix it thus far. The amount of work to get even a small area clean once you've got it down to just cone crap is ridiculous. I figure if I drive enough the entire rocker panel will just turn black so it will at least be uniform

[Dan Chambers]

A little patience, some serious effort, and Simple Green works well.

Also, the citrus based degreasers, like the ones from Costco work on the stone guards, too. Finally, Primsol, a cleaner used before painting a car, works well, and takes slightly ... and I mean very slightly ....... less elbow grease (oooh, bad expression..) er, effort. You can get Primsol where automotive paints are sold.

Be careful! Do a test patch on an inobvious place just in case. Silver is one of those colors (like white) that shows "shadowing."

Regardless of what you use (I personally like scratch removers like Scratch-X by Maguiars), you will need to re-wax the area you cleaned. All those "cleaners" strip the wax off before the black mark goes away.

Good luck!

[martinreinhardt]

I have been using Simple Green for years to rub off cone and tire marks on the paint and wheels. Then I wash the car with soap. I have heard of other products like tar remover etv, but have not tried them out yet.

[MVZ944T]

You can buy what is basically a big round rubber eraser on a bit that fits in an electric drill. They work very well for removing adhesive left from vinyl graphics. As long as you are careful they do not hurt the paint, strangely enough. I just did my new car with one and it worked great. I tried it on black track rubber marks and it worked well on that also. You can purchase one at various auto paint supply stores. I bought mine at a shop on Washington Av in Escondido.

Make sure you buy the soft one and experiment carefully.

[RETII]

Thanks to all for the feedback. I'm still voting for silver cones for replacements Seriously though I tried WD40 on a soft cloth and it worked quite well. There is just one small area that is stubborn and that's where the Simple green will come into play I hope. Hey Dan. don't know about the bikini's on the Bazillians but at the PDS I saw alot of wax jobs and even a Cayman with a bra? Thanks again to all who replied Ralph

[John Straub]

I was just going to say WD40. We used it on our old race car and it worked great.

[Rsylvestri]

I second the WD40, on the really tough ones I'll do a second app. The clear guards seem to be a bit tougher, I'll polish them after the clean up.

[ttweed]

I was just going to say WD40.

Another product that works well is the 3M Adhesive Remover.

TT