Removing CD Labels

[Sakuya]

I applied a CD label onto my CD-R. It is the paper adhesive kind. I find that the CD pauses every now and then near the end. Before I applied the label, it did not have problems like that.

Is there a harmless way to remove that label? I don't want to just peel it off because it is stuck on pretty tightly and it might harm the CD-R. Is it possible for it to peel off by itself? You know, when it gets so hot, the label will just peel off right? But if I leave the CD out in the soon, won't that harm the CD? I tried copying the CD, but an error occured. Plus, I do not have any back up copies of the MPEGs and the AVIs are gone also.

[Sakuya]

Can someone at least tell me if soaking the CD-R in hot water will harm the CD-R?

[ZippyP.]

Not too hot or you'll warp the plastic, out of a tap should be ok.

Try loosening the glue with WD-40 or alcohol.

[Sakuya]

So I can just dry it afterwards?

And loosening the glue with alcohol or WD-40, I just have to rub it onto the label right? Will it damage the disc data if it gets on the shiny side? Will I have to rinse afterwards?

[ZippyP.]

WD or alcohol won't harm the plastic. Soap and water will clean it off of either side.

[Sakuya]

Thanks! I'll try it!

[Sakuya]

Actually, I have another question. If the rubbing alcohol or WD-40 can't get on the adhesive side of the label, how would it work?

[Bob W]

Soak it in luke warm soapy dish water for an hour and it should just fall off.

[Magua]

Soap and water won't hard your CD. Ive heard of people running CD's through the dish washer to clean em up.

[junkmalle]

I use Goo Gone (Orange Oil based) to remove sticky labels. Totally cover the label with Goo Gone, wait about 10 minutes. The label will come off quite cleanly. Rub off any left over adhesive with a finger. Rinse with warm water to remove any remaining Goo Gone. Pat dry with a towel.

http://www.magicamerican.com/products_gg.shtml

[fritzi93]

Actually, I have another question. If the rubbing alcohol or WD-40 can't get on the adhesive side of the label, how would it work?

It's a question of how long it takes to penetrate to the glue. A mild solvent like WD-40 will be very quick, the other suggestions will take longer. Shiny labels will likely take longer than matte.

[gmatov]

I'll bet we see this one again next week.

Never, never, never use lables, specially on a CD, the recording layer is at the verytopof the disk, and if you even get a little too agressive, ie., a bit of it didn't quite loosen with your solvent of choice, you could pull that little bit of aluminum spatter off, and that's all she wrote.

And then you have the other school that says, "I have 10,000 of them with lables, and they all work perfectly." (Well,I haven't actually tried all 10,000 of them, who has that kind of time on their hands?)

And, magua, the mention you make of the dishwasher was a joke, in another thread. Pipple above are telling you to not get the water too hot, and dwashers reheat the water to 155 F, probably warp hell out've the disk, give it a try before you pass it on. Might save someone some grief, as in this case, he can't make another as the files are only on that disk.

I think I will stick with Sharpies, tho for RW I have begun using dry erase marker. Still screw up once in a while, just marked an RW with the Sharpy, gonna have to get the alcohol out, see if I can clean it off, else just scratch it out with the pen.

Cheers,

George

[Bob W]

Love these people that say never use labels.

[ZippyP.]

Still screw up once in a while, just marked an RW with the Sharpy, gonna have to get the alcohol out, see if I can clean it off, else just scratch it out with the pen.

Don't scratch it off! Toothpaste and a kleenex will polish it off.

[gmatov]

Zippy,

I didn't mean "scratch" scratch. Just scribble it out with the same Sharpy.

Cheers,

George

[The village idiot]

To remove Sharpie use alcohol! Rub gently!

To remove labels use a penetrating lube like WD40. The solvent melts the glue, and the oil keeps it from sticking while peeling the label off. Then clean disk with a mild soap or glass cleaner.

To remove data use a microwave oven. For extra secure data removal, keep cooking until fire breaks out, then let sit until plastic is all crispy. Serve with lots of red wine and enjoy the light show!

[Sakuya]

I used my fingertips to get it started around the edges. Then I applied some rubbing alcohol onto napkins and started to rub it onto the label. I ripped the first layer of the label off (that is the paper area with the ink). Then all that was left was the gluey stuff along with bits of paper. I used the alcohol-napkin to rub the label. Then I used a dry napkin to get it off. Some more alcohol rubbing and dry rubbing. Then when all of it is off, I use a CD cleaning cloth to rub it clean. By that time, the alcohol is dry so the cloth won't smell badly. And now my VCD plays fine again! Thanks a lot!

This is weird because I have only used one labelling kit so far. I have a made a dozen labelled CD-Rs and they all works fine. But this certain one, it doesn't work well. And from then on, they never work well. It's weird. I guess I will stop posting labels and stick with Sharpies. What should I do with my unopened Neato kit? And my unopened CD Stomper Pro.

[gmatov]

Village,

Alcohol and a tissue, well TP, got 99% of the Sharpy off, can see a faint ghost of the letters at the right angle. I don't give a damn, just curious to see how well it worked.

You ever find out if the Perma inks will work in a Canon or other brand?

I'm tempted to try, wxcept if they don't work, what'm I gonna do with the other 95% of the bottle? Don't intend to buy an Epson, tho' the C84 was free after rebate this week with a copy of MacAfee VS, also some kind of rebate.

Cheers,

George

[gmatov]

Sakuya,

After reading this thread, I don't think yoou'll get too many offers here.

Now repeat after me "I will never lable another disk, because even though all those other ones work fine, the only one I can't replace doesn't"

I think ole Murphy is at work here.

Happy you got your data back. I would recopy it as quick as I could and store the backup in a safe place.

Cheers,

George

[The village idiot]

Village,

Alcohol and a tissue, well TP, got 99% of the Sharpy off, can see a faint ghost of the letters at the right angle. I don't give a damn, just curious to see how well it worked.

You ever find out if the Perma inks will work in a Canon or other brand?

I'm tempted to try, wxcept if they don't work, what'm I gonna do with the other 95% of the bottle? Don't intend to buy an Epson, tho' the C84 was free after rebate this week with a copy of MacAfee VS, also some kind of rebate.

Cheers,

George

I wouldn't try any kind of pigment ink in the Canon or HP or Lexmark printers. Any printer that uses a thermal head will have problems. If it doesn't damage the heads, it will most likely have bad color. The few people that have tried this years ago found that the colored inks become a little dis-colored from the heat. Or worse they look burned, yellow being the most noticed. Things may be slightly different now. The only thermal head printers that I know of that use pigment inks are the Encad printers made by Kodak with the GO (general outdoor?) inks. The problem is that the color gamut of those pigment inks is more limited than that of piezo pigment inks, not exactly photo quality.

The alcohol has worked well for me, but it does sometimes depend on how long the ink has been in place, and the surface it is written on. Some plastics will never give up the sharpie completely. Silver Sharpie is a petroleum solvent based ink, and should not be used on a CD/DVD, Though it does leave a nice gloss finish on the IJP disks. Maybe Foo was right, we need to bring back the pen plotter!

[gmatov]

Village,

I think you have a good point there. Hot the ink, change the chemistry, complain the colors are off, wha'd you use?

Where do you find the ICM you often refer to? My HPs have always allowed me to change the color profile, but do not think my Canon does.

Hell, I don't even know if my monitor is showing me true color, if my prints match the monitor, but still look off in color, then where am I?

Have to see if I have color correction in my Visioneer scanner. I think my scanned prints are the worst offenders. A couple shades off, mostly in the blues.

Ah, well, gotta hit the matress now, check back in the AM.

Night, all,

George

[The village idiot]

Color correction is a very involved process, and ranges from approximate and pleasing to "exact" and expensive. For me I finally broke down and bought . click on the picture Still working out the bugs, and just when I think I'm there.... I ran out of ink If you want, let's make a thread down in the computer forum for color correction.

[gmatov]

This is a test. 4th time trying to reply. Unknown Modifier warning, blank post.

What's happening? Post works fine in Feedback.

Effectively barred from this thread.

George

[gmatov]

Last edit worked, try again.

Village,

Ckicked your pic, looks great, 999 alittle more than I want to spend.

For a Pro, either in printwork or Tech, probably indispensable.

Have to dig into PS 5.5 for the monitor setup routine, same with printers, scanner, see if I can improve on what I have.

Thread on the subject might be useful. I can't be the only one too dumb to know how to improve his color profiles. Well, maybe I can be.

Cheers,

George

[Alan69]

One of the most effective ways to remove stickers is heat. Hair dryer a few minutes evenly, and then peel. Not taking it to 200 degrees, just around 100 or so. Most sticker adhesives become much easier to peel completely around this temp, and it shouldn't warp the disc. Of course try a test disc first with a coaster etc. And you're really only heating up the label a minute or two, you should be aiming to get the sticker and glue just hot, and not doing so long as to heat through the rest of the disc so much.

Only major concern would be peeling the top layer, but really once the heat has weakened the adhesive it should do ok for most CDs.

Try it on a bumper sticker etc that you thought you'd never get off a car, works ten times easier than dealing with goo gone etc. Of course there you don't care about the total heat, may take a bit more technique on a CD.

DVD's I wouldn't blink doing this, with laminated layers and the brief heating of mainly the label it should be a breeze.

Actually I have some old CDRs around and some label material I'll test one of mine just for fun and see if I can even peel the layer or mess up the disc..

Alan


Alan

[bbeiler]

Quite a few of you mentioned that you use sharpie's. Is it safe to use a sharpie on a DVDR? I read on another thread that ink that is alcohol based should not be used on a cd/dvd because it can bleed through over time and damage the burned side (I believe sharpies are alcohol based). Any input would be helpful. I don't want to have to go back and erase 200 disk with sharpie ink on them.

"I will never label another disk again"

I have 200 disk that need their labels removed. I'm thinking about dumping 10 at a time in my kitchen sink into warm dish detergent water and letting them sit for at least an hour. Any objections?

I've removed about 6 labels so far and it has solved all my problems. I've tried using a solution that is designed for label removed, but that turns into a greasy nightmare. It works, but no matter how hard I try I get some of the solution on the burnt side which seems to carry over some of the adhesive, so then I need to wipe the entire burnt side with this solution. Which turns into multiple flipping of the disk to get the adhesive off both sides which concludes with a soapy finger wipping then rinsing; and then my kitchen reeks of the smell from the solution. So any fast input on getting these labels off would be appreciatted. I'm not so sure about the dryer thing. I might try it on one of my lame movies. Maybe wd40 or toothpaste


Thanks!

[gmatov]

BB,

Smell your Sharpy. Alcohol, or something like it?

Now, write on a throwaway disk. Immediately smell it. Smell the same?

Okay, now wait 5 minutes. Smell the disk again. Does it smell like alcohol? No?

Then that must, MUST, mean the alcohol vehicle, that which carries the colorant to the tip of the pen, has evaporated.

To my knowledge, there has never been anything non-existent that can penetrate halfway through a DVD and destroy the aluminum spatter.

Go ahead and use a Sharpy. Hell, even Sharpy does.

2 bucks for a Sharpy, or 30 cents for a lable that fucks up 90% of your 1 dollar disks.

Rocket science, it ain't.

Cheers,

George

[The village idiot]

See this thread:

https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=205168

[gmatov]

Village,

I cn't believe that you believe that bull, link to it or no.

Cheers,

George

[Propertyman]

Here's something really simple: Try charcoal lighter or mineral spirits. Let it soak and it should peel right off. It's mild and shouldn't affect the disc.