Sanding off Vinyl?

[Klomper]

I am trying to remove the vinyl from the outside of a NARC cabinet, with a hair drier and the process has been extremely slow and somewhat painful (ouch those things get hot). Plus every once in a while the vinyl will pull up a 'splinter' of the wood.

So I was thinking maybe it could just be sanded off (I own a rotary sander). Has anyone done this or are there any pitfalls I should be aware of? I really don't want to create more work for myself or really mess things up.

[Klomper]

I decided to try leaving the cabinet in the sun to heat it up, and things went marginally better, but considering the amount of vinyl I figured a minimum of 8 hours or so for the heat and peel method.

So I grabbed the sander and gave it a go. Things went great! I used a random orbit sander and 80 grit paper. It took a couple hours, and running the sander was much more enjoyable than blistering my fingers peeling it off.

The vinyl on the cabinet appeared to be the same stuff the Happ sells on their web site.

[ChadTower]

If you had just put on a pair of work gloves you could have done that in a fraction of the time with a heat gun or even the hair drier.  You can strip a side of vinyl in 10-15 minutes that way.

[Beretta]

try a heat gun, i bought one recently from HF for 10 bucks.. i bought it to try and strip paint.. but it did'nt work to well.. it did soften the paint for scrapping but i could'nt get a 100% clean surface need a REAL sharp puddy knife or maybe a razor scraper..

anyway they put out some serious heat, much more then a air dryer so try one of those it would either help you peal it off or melt, not sure which but it's worth a shot.

[kronic24601]

I had the same issue, I am sort of just sanding over it at the moment.

I'd like to say I have done a fantastic job, but I was a little sloppy with the priming.

However, I can say with certainty that (at least the vinyl on my old Wrestlefest cab) can be sanded in a way that works.

Yo ujust have to be more careful (use really really fine sandpaper).

[mountain]

Try this:

Get a new razor blade and make 2" wide cuts (not too deep) from top to bottom. Run the heat gun just in front of where you are pulling. You will be amazed at how easy this will become. The cuts remove the resistance from areas that are not warm enough which keeps in intact as you peel.