Epoxy removal

I know ...this goes against all that is good with epoxy.

But I have some small very thin expoxy stains on my deck that a driving me nuts.

And before I do something to make matters worse, I thought I would ask.

Short story.....Doing some small epoxy repairs in a well protected area when the wind picked up an blew a couple of small drops of epoxy on a un protected spot. I thought I had wiped them quite well with acetone but a couple of days later....there they are small yellow smears.

Anyone know of a way to clean these spots up without causing more harm?

thank you.

 

I expect that the acetone thinned the epoxy and allowed it to further penetrate the wood surface. I doubt that you will get it out short of sanding the wood to below the depth of penetration. Heat might soften it but I don't see a way of wicking it out of the wood. An even scraping of the affected area and blending into a larger surrounding area should spread out the amount of wood removed over a larger area and so make it less obvious but you'll have to get down to the untouched wood in order to get rid of it completely.

 

I'm sorry....Just to be clear This is a fiberglass deck I'm refering to.

My Bad.

 

Any FG or Gelcoat can be lightly wet and dry sanded to get rid of tough stuff.

Doing it without making a discoloration is going to be hard.

 

Wet and dry sand, polish with compound.
Its going to change the color locally, so to get it even you have to compound the whole area.

You can apply some heat and try to scrape with a new exacto blade (something really sharp) to minimize what you scrape off, but you will probably still see a change in color.

 

Hey guys thanks for the imput, just to make this more interesting. It's a non slip diamond pattern deck.

I'm going to try some heat and light scraping. Might just have to cover the deck in teak......That will fix her up...Hahaha.

 

What's the texture made from? Heat should soften the goo enough to scrape it off, but it does depend on what it's on.

 

Just gelcoat

 

Use a heat gun on the low setting and keep it moving. Around 150 degrees the epoxy will soften considerably and you can push it around with a sharpened wooden stick or putty knife. It'll take a few attempts to get the bulk of a significant spill, which can then be polished smooth.