Chipping Away

Many moons ago I got a cheap Chinese backup camera. I'm not 100% sure where it came from, I think maybe Father picked it up on sale from Princess Auto and gave it to me for xmas one year. I never installed it on Jellybean, but after I got Pedovan and moved down south I finally got around to getting it all hooked up.

Things went ok for a year or two, but eventually the cheapness showed through, in the form of the lens cover on the camera fogging from UV exposure. So after ignoring it for a while I eventually ripped it out and threw it in the trash. Money well spent, that.

However, ripping it out left a little memory behind, in the form of the glue that the screen had mounted to the dashboard with.

I ignored that for a few years too, but today I finally got around to removing it. I initially tried using some vinegar (more on this later) to soften up the glue but it was hard and crusty enough that it didn't seem to be making much headway. I switched over to chipping it off with an x-acto chisel and cleaning off the remains with vinegar, and after a bit I managed to get it looking pretty much shiny and new.

Nice.

So the vinegar. Initially I'd gone onto Amazon and ordered some highly concentrated cleaning vinegar, about 45% (regular vinegar is 5%). Some of the items showed up as not being able to ship to my location, but I found a listing that seemed ok and clicked the buy button. Then a day later I got an email saying that my package was undeliverable and refunded me. Great. Thanks, California, for banning vinegar of all things.

Anyway, with the concentrated stuff out of the question I decided to pick up a jug of the normal stuff at Safeway. I headed down the cleaning aisle and found a half gallon jug of 5% cleaning vinegar for about $4. That seemed a bit pricy, so I checked the next aisle over near the condiments and wouldn't you know it but I could get a whole gallon jug of food-grade 5% vinegar for... $4. Who the hell would buy cleaning vinegar, exactly the same stuff except not guaranteed to be food-safe, for twice as much? Absurd. But, now I have vinegar so all's well that ends well I guess.