Remove stickers and labels and glue from kegs

billtzk · 08-12-2008, 05:38 AM

I spent about three hours today peeling and scraping the labels off of the kegs I got from CHI a couple of days ago. It was brutal hard work. I used naptha and Goo Gone to soften the adhesives. The Goo Gone worked better than the naptha, but neither worked as well as I'd hoped. I used a razor scraper to peel up and scrape off the labels, but they came up mainly in little fragments, so it wasn't very efficient.

There were mainly three different types of stickers. A yellow square sticker warning of maximum pressure of 130 psi. A larger white and blue sticker proclaiming Pepsi ownership of the keg. A narrow white and blue sticker that nearly circled the keg also proclaiming Pepsi ownership etc. The latter was the hardest to remove.

I still have stubborn adhesive where all the stickers were. I ran out of Goo Gone, so I'll need to pick up some more before I can finish cleaning the kegs.

This was hard work for twelve kegs. If I ever buy any more kegs, I think I'll buy them cleaned up and reconditioned. It'll be worth it.

But just for the record, is there anything that works better than Goo Gone for removing the keg stickers and adhesive? There's got to be a better way to do this. The people who sell reconditioned and cleaned up kegs for $25 each can't possibly be putting this much effort into cleaning them. It'd kill any potential profit unless they are getting the kegs practically for free.

Wrathbone · 08-12-2008, 05:43 AM

If you could find something big enough to soak them in, oxyclean could do the job.

**BigKahuna** · 08-12-2008, 05:49 AM

Go to your local Parts Store...(Napa) that sells Auto Paint and get 5 gallons of Lacquer Thinner and some 3M "Scuff Easy" pads...they'll know what you mean.

Wet one with the other and go to town...EZ as Pie.

abracadabra · 08-12-2008, 12:22 PM

Something worth trying:

Depending on the type of glue. I've had luck with WD-40 but it sometimes takes a lot of elbow grease too.

Don't know if Goof Off is any better than Goo Gone.

Acetone from a paint dept. Acetone is also the primary & sometimes the only ingredient in finger nail polish remover.

**EdWort** · 08-12-2008, 12:33 PM

I find that setting them out in the sun in our wonderful 100+ degree heat softens them up well enough that I am able to peel most of them off by hand.

billtzk · 08-12-2008, 01:03 PM

I really should have tried the heat treatment, Ed. It has been hella hot the last few weeks. Yesterday it rained up here in Dallas, finally, so it cooled down a bit.

I went and looked at the can of solvent I used just now, and it was actually Goof Off, not Goo Gone. I get those two mixed up. I've used both of them at one time or another. They are probably about the same.

I did try WD-40. That didn't seem to work as well as the Goof Off, or perhaps I didn't put enough elbow grease into it. But I am trying to conserve elbow grease and achieve better living through chemistry.

If Lacquer Thinner and some 3M "Scuff Easy" pads make it easy as pie, as BigKahuna says, that sounds like the ticket. I'll give it a try on the adhesives that are left.

Chello · 08-12-2008, 01:34 PM

olive oil gets glue residue off very well.

**Shay** · 08-12-2008, 06:21 PM

Bar Keepers Friend and a green brillo pad takes a lot of them off.

MNBugeater · 08-12-2008, 06:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by billtzk

There were mainly three different types of stickers. A yellow square sticker warning of maximum pressure of 130 psi. A larger white and blue sticker proclaiming Pepsi ownership of the keg. A narrow white and blue sticker that nearly circled the keg also proclaiming Pepsi ownership etc. The latter was the hardest to remove.

Are these similar to the "property of.." stickers ones see on CO2 tanks ?

billtzk · 08-12-2008, 09:38 PM

I don't have a CO2 tank yet so I'm not sure what labels they have on them. The sticker that was hardest to remove is exactly the same as the one in the front center of this picture that I found in the gallery.

kegs with WARNING labels

They go almost all the way around the keg, and they were extremely difficult to remove. 2/3rds of my kegs had that label. The front left keg in the picture has one of the two types of pressure warning stickers that my kegs had. They were not as difficult to remove as the long WARNING label. Most of my kegs had the pressure stickers.