Are you fed up with your old window tint? But how to remove window tint? We have an answer.
Window tints are great. They help you beautify your car windows and you can protect the interior with them.
But just like with every other thing that is part of this universe, window tints have their expiration date. Coincidently, this expiration date comes before the expiration date of your car and you are left with no other option than to remove this window tint and apply a new one.
And when that happens, you are left wondering how to remove window tint?.
You can get a professional to help you with that, I assure you! But why would you resort to paying high fees to get this covering removed when you can do it yourself?! You may not want to put some effort into this boring and time-consuming task.
But if you have some extra hours in your week, why not leave the sedentary lifestyle behind you and pursue a valuable task!
If you decide to take the DIY route, this article will tell you all the methods to make it faster and easier.
But Why Do You Want to Remove the Window Tint?
Before you start reading the instructions to one of the two techniques that can remove window tint, ask yourself if you want to do that.
It’s one thing to replace your old window tint give a new style. And it’s a totally different thing to embark on the whole process of removing the previous one only because it has a few scratches. The effort and money that goes into replacing window tint require you to ignore tiny issues.
If you aren’t craving for a new style to show off, the only reason that can justify the hard work is a visible deterioration of the coating. Whether we are dealing with cheap tinted windows or your window tints are of high quality, this deterioration can come from scratches or it can be a weather effect.
If your primary reason to change window tint is that you hate the scratches it has sustained, you should first try some scratch removal techniques before deciding on the removal of the tint.
For obvious weathering effects such as bubbles on the tint or fading, your only course of action is replacing it.
How to Remove Window Tint
There is a reason people prefer to use professional services for this process: the work is tedious and you may have to deal with lots of leftover adhesive if you make the smallest mistakes. Still, there should be an easier method to get rid of outdated tint, right?
Fortunately, some tricks can help in making the process easier for you. You can get rid of tint as well as its adhesive using one of the two methods: heating and soaking with soap.
Here is How You Go About With Each Of These Methods:
Heating Process to Remove Window Tint
This process keeps the adhesive stuck with the tint. So once you’ve removed the tint, it doesn’t stay behind asking for another round of cleaning from you.
You can use a steamer, heat gun, or hair dryer to heat the tint before removing it. To remove the remaining adhesive, you would need a razor. The protective equipment includes gloves and safety glasses.
With the right devices, this process of heating is fairly easy. You may, however, find it repetitive and mundane. You start with rolling the car window down a couple of inches. This step allows you to cover the top of the tinted window.
Starting with the edges of the window, you start steaming or heating the tint. You have to focus more on the edges so the adhesive there loosens up easily allowing you to start peeling.
If you are using a steamer, start by heating the outside. Once the whole outer window is warmed, you have to heat up it from the inside. You have to heat it until the whole window is evenly steamed.
Make sure you are holding the device at least four inches away from the window. Also, take care not to hold the device in one place. You don’t want to melt the adhesive into the window glass nor do you want other heat damages to your window glass.
Instead of holding the heating equipment in one place, rotate it around the same place three to four times.
Once you have heated the window, you can use the razor to remove tint from the edges.
Your goal is to remove enough tint that you can hold in your hand. When you can easily hold it, you have to simply peel it off.
As you peel the tint, you have to keep the window warm with more steaming. Now you have to be careful not to bring the device too close to the window.
After you have peeled off the whole tint, you will find that the window is generally free of adhesive. Yet, there will be some places with tiny strands of the chemical that you would want to clean. Check out the removal process of this residual at the end of this article.
Soap or Ammonia to Remove Window Tint
The next method includes dissolving the tint’s adhesive using soap or ammonia. This process may require more effort in covering the car’s interior and exterior from damage than it would require for carrying out the steps of tint removal.
For this process, you need tarps or plastic sheets, garbage bags, sticky tape, ammonia, soap or detergent, water, razor, and safety equipment including gloves and glasses.
Start by covering the seats and doors of the car with plastic sheets or tarps. Don’t cover windows, of course. Spray soap mixture on the outside window and stick garbage bags on top of it.
Then spray ammonia on the inside of the window and stick the garbage bag using sticky tape. You can replace ammonia with soap and warm water mixture if you want.
Let these bags be stuck on the window for a couple of hours. The soap mixture and ammonia will help the tint’s adhesive to loosen up.
After this duration, use a razor to peel the edges of the tint just like you did in the heating process. Once you have gripped enough tint, peel it off with your hands. You may still see fragments of adhesive sticking with the window but their volume will be manageable.
Removing the Residual
DIY window tint removal is a tedious job. But we still bear with it because we expect quality results. Still, after hours of hard work, if we don’t see impeccable results, we may get disappointed.
We shouldn’t be. It’s perfectly normal even for the most professional tint removal efforts to leave some adhesives behind. Luckily, you can deal with this residual after you have removed the tint of the window.
You have to use a soap mixture, ammonia, or nail polish remover to get this task done. Isopropyl alcohol is another ingredient that can help the adhesive to loosen up. Other than one of these chemicals, you would benefit from a microfiber cloth.
Start with applying – or spraying the chemical on the window. Proceed with scrubbing it off using the cloth. If some parts of the adhesive are difficult to remove, you need to apply more chemicals to it.
What’s Next
Your next steps depend on the goal you have from removing the window tint.
If tinting car windows is your goal, you need to make sure that your window is clean enough to do so. It shouldn’t have any dirt or debris as these elements will cause bubbles in the tint being applied.
You should also wipe the gasket as far as you can. And the next step is to worry about how to window tint or how long does it take to tint windows.
If you only want to remove the tint and are not interested in re-applying a fresh one, you can use a cloth to dry the windows so they don’t collect dust.
Take Away
You might have been wondering how to take tint off car windows without coughing up cash for professional services. This article walks you through the complete process. Before you begin, know that the work is mundane and you are committing at least three hours when you decide to conduct this chore.
Nonetheless, it’s a perfect exercise you can carry out in your leisurely time. And you don’t need tons of supplies to complete it. On the contrary, most items used in the process are everyday home appliances.
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