Alternative use of a sugarcube

Pieter-Tjerk de Boer, PA3FWM web@pa3fwm.nl

(This is an adapted version of part of an article that I wrote for the Dutch amateur radio magazine Electron, May 2014.)

Here's a little hint that might be useful to someone.
When I recently wanted to reuse the case of a discarded (and taken apart) piece of equipment, there were still texts painted/printed on the piece of plexiglass behind which a display was mounted. At our local radio club evening, one of the other members said he had heard that those could be removed with a sugarcube. Despite the doubts of everyone present (including myself), I gave it a try: first at an inconspicuous spot to see whether the plexiglass would not be scratched, and when that turned out not to be the case, I rubbed the sugarcube over the texts. And lo and behold: those texts disappeared easily!
Later, I found also that a layer of varnish on a copper surface could be removed this way.
Apparently, a sugar cube has precisely the right hardness, on the one hand not to scratch plexiglass or copper, and on the other hand sufficient to detach the paint.


Text and pictures on this page are copyright 2014, P.T. de Boer, web@pa3fwm.nl .
Republication is only allowed with my explicit permission.