vinyl stain

[dcwjd]

Last weekend i mistakenly left a wet life vest on my white vinyl seat on my 280 sundancer and now it has an orange stain from the vest. I tried to remove it with acetone but no luck. Anyone have any suggestions? What about soft scrub? It looks terrible and is driving me nuts.

 

[skolbe]

Try Starbrites Vinyl cleaner and then let the sun take the rest of it out. I had an issue with beads from a Marine Max Cruise Club - the sun is the best vinyl cleaner.

 

[Four Suns]

I have a whole list of things that bleed on the vinyl seats. One of them is a blue washing glove from West Marine. Another bad one are those plastic bags from the grocery/hardware store (Food Lion/Ace) that have print on them. They will bleed the print on the seats.

The good news is that the stuff, for me anyway, has eventually come out after a few weeks of being in the Sun and being cleaned several times. Like you, I've tried solvents and they just don't work.... Cleaning, time, and UV are your only hopes.

The first season I had my boat, my kids came to the boat after a big swim meet. They had drawn on each other with Sharpie permanent markers and had things like "GO CLAMS!" and "WE ARE #1" and "PENGUINS SUCK" written all over their bodies.... well... I learned that when sharpie is on someone's skin and they lean against the white vinyl, it transfers to the vinyl. With about six sweating shirtless sharpie-tatooed children on the boat, I thought someone had deliberately grafitteed my new white vinyl seats. I was very upset... but.. a few weeks later, it was gone and I didn't even have to use a magic eraser on it.

Keep the sharpee-tatooed kids away from your boat.

 

[First Born]

Just good ole Sun!!! :thumbsup:

 

[boatmailster]

Last weekend i mistakenly left a wet life vest on my white vinyl seat on my 280 sundancer and now it has an orange stain from the vest. I tried to remove it with acetone but no luck. Anyone have any suggestions? What about soft scrub? It looks terrible and is driving me nuts.

acetone will only melt plastic but because vinyl is very porous stain will still be visible
what you can do is to clean seat very good with scrub brush and spray nine, dry it good and spray it (you have to mask some areas) with good quality vinyl spray paints
white color is easy to match and I've seen seat spray painted for over two years and look like rest original sea ray finish
krylon, plastikote and other companies make good spray paints for vinyl

 

[Asureyez]

Worst Offender to Stain White Seats

West Marine plastic bags! Blue stains even when not wet.

Best stain remover for white vinyl ... OxyClean and hot water ...
50 % Oxy 50% Hot water by volume ... Keep the stain wet with a layer of paper towel w/o printing ... keep it wet until the stain disappears

 

[Skuza]

True about letting stains take themselves out. This is true on vinyl and gelcoat! I remember using compound to get bug juice stains and bird crap out and rubbing my but off. One day I decided to just let them sit and after a day or two the sun pulls em out! I can second the plastic shopping bags bleeding print on the seats too. I know everyone cringes at the thought of using bleach on the seats but once a year I have done it and they come out nice and bright! It is the only thing that seems to clean the grain of the seats when used with a soft bristle brush. :thumbsup:

 

[water rat]

Fantastic does a pretty good job, too.

Good luck.

 

[smanier]

I keep a can of spray on "Goo Off". I'd bet it will take it out. Use very small amounts then follow with a vinyl cleaner.

Good luck