Removal of fugly warning stickers on Sun Visors?

[T6061]

The Alcantara I use for my wireless charger tray is an exact match to OEM. Pics here:

Custom MagSafe Wireless Charger

A few people have been asking if I would make wireless charging kits available for purchase. I figured I'd start a thread to gauge interest. It consists of a 3D printed tray (in PETG) upholstered in Alcantara with a built-in Apple MagSafe Charger that replaces the OEM rubber mat in the center...

www.emiraforum.com

I get it from Relicate. Black 9040 unbacked.

Ok, to address another OCD issue I have, I wonder if this material (backed or unbacked) could be trimmed into a triangle to place behind the empty A-pillar speaker grill to mask the tweeter hole and the 4 screw holes that ave been left empty in our cars? Anyone know how to remove the A-pillar trim to get access to that area? I think seeing a solid expanse of black behind that grill would look much better. We could then pretend there was something behind it!!

 

[Time2Fly]

@T6061 there's instructions on removing the A pillar trim in the hardwired dashcam thread.

 

[FlyNavy01]

I took the risk hoping it would be as easy as the Porsche in the video above. The edges came off relatively easily, but most of the adhesive seems to be around the center and it got very tedious very quickly after that. First photo is after 5 minutes and second photo is nearly an hour later. I would say this isn't worth your time unless you can find a better method than mine.

My next step is trying a heat gun, but if that doesn't work I may look into covering it with a patch of Alcantara until I can call my dealer and inquire about the cost of a replacement, or with any luck try to order a euro visor sans sticker.

 

[Aero]

I wonder if a steamer would work. I've used mine on tint and things but never on alcantara. Not sure how it would handle getting very moist/wet. Probably better remove the visor from the car 1st. Wish they would make these dumb things easier to remove.

 

[FlyNavy01]

I wonder if a steamer would work. I've used mine on tint and things but never on alcantara. Not sure how it would handle getting very moist/wet. Probably better remove the visor from the car 1st. Wish they would make these dumb things easier to remove.

Excellent idea! Can't believe I didn't think of that. I'm going to try that before using a heat gun. I was able to unscrew the visor assembly from the headliner but the wire for the vanity light didn't seem to have a disconnect. Frustrating.

 

[crestima]

I wonder if a steamer would work. I've used mine on tint and things but never on alcantara. Not sure how it would handle getting very moist/wet. Probably better remove the visor from the car 1st. Wish they would make these dumb things easier to remove.

That does seem like a good alternative. The moister produced by the steamer shouldn't cause damage if you keep a decent distance from the visor to avoid excess condensation and try to keep the vapor stream exclusively on the sticker area itself . Besides, steam being water will eventually dry. It certainly seems like a safer method safer than chemicals. I actually have one of those compact hand held steamers that I ocasionally use to eliminate wrinkles on suits and shirts which seems ideal to try this. The problem for me is that while I have the handheld steamer what I don't have is the Emira...yet.

Let's see if anyone tries this and reports back with a suceess.

 

[crestima]

Excellent idea! Can't believe I didn't think of that. I'm going to try that before using a heat gun. I was able to unscrew the visor assembly from the headliner but the wire for the vanity light didn't seem to have a disconnect. Frustrating.

Ageed. Let us know how it turns out please.

 

[Rapture]

Excellent idea! Can't believe I didn't think of that. I'm going to try that before using a heat gun. I was able to unscrew the visor assembly from the headliner but the wire for the vanity light didn't seem to have a disconnect. Frustrating.

You need to pull the wire; the connector is further down under the headliner. I pulled the headliner down a bit to provide some room for the connector to pull through. I just pulled the headliner at the Sunvisor mounting hole.

 

[crestima]

Can anyone please post the dimensions of the sun visors' stickers ? Thank you

 

[FlyNavy01]

Can anyone please post the dimensions of the sun visors' stickers ? Thank you

I measured them at 124x80mm.

I was able to finally remove mine with a combo of isopropyl alcohol and steam, but it was not fun and left behind a decent amount of adhesive residue. For now it's at least better than the white/yellow sticker right in your face, and is MUCH less noticeable when folded up in the dark interior than in these outdoor photos, but I'll still research a few methods to safely remove the residue without harming the suede.

In retrospect, ordering a roll of matching alcantata from Relicate and making a patch to cover the sticker may yield more acceptable results, and be much less work.

 

[Eagle7]

I measured them at 124x80mm.

I was able to finally remove mine with a combo of isopropyl alcohol and steam, but it was not fun and left behind a decent amount of adhesive residue. For now it's at least better than the white/yellow sticker right in your face, and is MUCH less noticeable when folded up in the dark interior than in these outdoor photos, but I'll still research a few methods to safely remove the residue without harming the suede.

View attachment 45415

In retrospect, ordering a roll of matching alcantata from Relicate and making a patch to cover the sticker may yield more acceptable results, and be much less work.

Here's an interesting article about removing glue from Alcantara:

Cleaning Alcantara

In my last post I talked about finishing some bits of my interior and in the process I had gotten 3M #90 adhesive glue onto my alcantara (what is alcantara?) and let’s just say it left a few …

jasonphan.wordpress.com

I have no idea if this will do the trick, but it might.

 

[crestima]

I measured them at 124x80mm.

I was able to finally remove mine with a combo of isopropyl alcohol and steam, but it was not fun and left behind a decent amount of adhesive residue. For now it's at least better than the white/yellow sticker right in your face, and is MUCH less noticeable when folded up in the dark interior than in these outdoor photos, but I'll still research a few methods to safely remove the residue without harming the suede.

View attachment 45415

In retrospect, ordering a roll of matching alcantata from Relicate and making a patch to cover the sticker may yield more acceptable results, and be much less work.

Yeah, I can see it was a pain in the ass to remove them, but I agree that it's still better than the look of the fugly stickers that are there in-your-face every time one gets in the car.

I just had an idea that I plan on trying...

1) Buy the matching non-backed alcantara from Relicate, sufficient width 124mm x 2 + (some extra edge margins) for a total of about 155MM, plus to cover a full vertical wrap around of the visor.
2) Fold the alcantara piece equally on both sides and stick them together with 3M spray glue so that you end up with a double sided alcantara piece with the length-wise seam on one side. T
3) Either sew or glue the alcantara piece at both ends, leaving the glued seam to the inside (hidden section) to create sort of a nicely tight sleeve around the visor.
4) Slip the sleeve on of the visor from its open end covering the sticker sections. Besides hiding the stickers the sleeve could conveniently be used as a card, parking ticket or sunglass holder. The sewn of glued joining ends could be discretely placed either towards the edge of the visor on the windshield side since you can easily rotate and adjust the sleeve around the visor.

This should be fairly easy to work on separately from the visor and without even having to remove it. The part that may prove somewhat tricky is going to be (perhaps?) with the visor that has the vanity mirror, since I'm not sure if it's location relative to the respective reverse side sticker are in the same general section of the visor. Even so, I can easily do a cut out on the sleeve to accommodate for the vanity mirror frame and perhaps tuck the edges into that frame. Can you let me if and where the sticker overlaps with the reverse side vanity mirror ? and can you send a picture of the vanity mirror side to check out its framing ? Thanks again.

 

[T6061]

Not a perfect solution but Banco's Sun visor organizer just about covers the entire sticker from my vantage point in the driver's seat. I think it would need to be an inch or two wider to completely block the view of the sticker from any angle.

 

[TheMotizzle]

I bet we could find someone on Etsy to design something slick that goes over the label instead of trying to remove it. Maybe some metallic Lotus plaque.

 

[birdegac]

What about the sticker on the glove compartment? Does that peel off cleanly? I am afraid to try it.

 

[kitkat]

What about the sticker on the glove compartment? Does that peel off cleanly? I am afraid to try it.

That one peels right off, go ahead! Mine was already bubbling on day 1.

 

[crestima]

Ok so today I finally got to tackle my fugly sticker delete project. I had to abandon my former idea of designing a band around the visors as it proved too complex due to the angled shape of the visors plus the challenge with the passenger side mirror.

Instead, I drew on my limited arts and crafts skills to make a pocket out of the Relicate.Black 9040 alcantara (thanks Silent Cilantro for the tip) with backing in the dimensions of the stickers. I then glued them on 3 sides, one at a time. and placed a metal ruler with a heavy weight on top of each edge to compress the alcantara as the glue dried to get as close to a flush surface as possible. Finally I placed a bead of glue within 1/4" along the perimeter on the stickers leaving one end unglued (open) and again, used a cutting board with a heavy weight to compress well the pocket to the visor.

To my own amazement, it came out really nice, even nicer than the pictures suggest, since the shadow effect makes it look less flush than it really is. My main objective was, of course, to get rid of those unsightly stickers and make it as discrete and blending as possible. Another collateral useful purpose however is that the pocket could be functional to hold parking cards etc.

I've included a few pictures of my project should any of you like to follow this idea.

On a side note, the last 2 pictures was something I thought of (and very glad that I did), which was to place small mats with my leftover alcantara in the door handle cavities which I cut out using a paper template. I gave it some extra length so it could slipt extra on a slip under the slot which makes it stay in place nicely. No need for glue or anything else. As small as a detail as this may seem, it definitely looks nicer than the hard plastic of that handle cavity and feels much much better when opening of pulling the doors, plus they easily can be pilled out for occasional cleaning. I did both door handles in less than 30 minutes.

 

[crestima]

Here are the pictures....

 

[A2Hell]

Similar T6061 above, I purchased this sunglass holder for the drivers side. I covers most of the sticker and you can't see it while driving. Passenger side has the sliding mirror so I'm debating what to do about that one. Amazon link [$9 - Accmor Sunglass Holder - Amazon product]

​

 

[netsinah]

For anyone interested, I covered my visor labels and I'm 99% satisfied. I didn't measure properly so this post may help others do better, should you cover your labels with alcantara, like I did.

What I used:

-Black 9040 unbacked alcantara purchased from "Relicate" (NY, USA); a 12x11.5" small panel. This was the alcantara that silent cilantro recommended, as matching the Emira, based upon what he used for the custom magsafe wireless charger he sells on the Forum. I thank him for that advice, since it was a good match.

-3M Super 77 multipurpose spray adhesive. I used this since it cost less than $20, rather than spray adhesive costing twice as much, since the glue only needs to bond fabric to "paper". It worked well.

My mistake was failing to cover up the outer edge around the visor lablel, which isn't part of the label but rather a clear edge around it. It's visible but only for ODC people like me, when knowing what to look for and focused on a close-up and well-lit view. I cut out a swatch 121mm x 79mm and should have added at least 1-2 mm to each side, to cover up 100% of the clear edges. But I accomplished my mission and got rid of the labels. Here's a "during" (before spraying; I left the visors on) and "after" photo, of the final result:




Total cost: about 40 bucks. Hope this helps others.