While John has found many things to love about our old truck, the after-market rear-view mirror was NOT one of those things. You could say, in a sense, that removing it became a little bit of an obsession for him. Not the mirror, itself. Oh no. THAT came off quickly and efficiently and was added to the "old parts" pile in our garage. It was that tiny little metallic piece glued to the windshield that held the mirror on that became John's personal nemesis. The piece called the rearview mirror "button." Oh, make no mistake...there was nothing "cute as a button" about this little chunk of metal. It clung to the glass with the tenacity borne from years/decades/eons of unknown chemical compounds having been baked by the sun. In a nutshell, this baby wasn't moving. We were going to have to get creative.
John diligently searched for the proper removal method. Preferably one that did not involve breaking the glass. Some suggestions: hold a blowtorch to the metal until it was hot enough to melt the adhesive behind it; use a fine wire to try to slip between the button and the glass, effectively "sawing" it off; pry it off with a sharp, flat metal object... There were countless ways to try, but nothing was working. Each time John looked at the truck, that little button seemed to wink at him, as in assurance that it was here (as an eyesore) to stay. Well, when the going gets tough, the tough turn to...what else? The internet. Within minutes, we found what has appeared to have actually worked for several people: Sit the truck out in the sun to heat it up, then use a crescent wrench to twist off the offending piece. It seemed too simple. Being that it was nighttime and darned cold outside, we assisted the heating process with Tracy's hair dryer. The poor appliance, unused to such treatment, promptly popped the breaker and threw out the electricity to the garage. A few flipped switches later and we were back in business with the space heater as our radiant heat source. We twisted with vigor, but with no luck. 5 minutes. 10 minutes. It was a full 25 minutes later that John had it....success! And the window was still intact!
With the help of some adhesive remover and some serious scrubbing, the windshield is back to looking like it should...clear, clean, and mirror-free.
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smano
Dude i ain't got no urinal.
So when we picked up this truck along the shores of the Califronia delta. I says "boy you anin gonna be obsessing over this tin lizzie is ya.
Na sman he said with assured grace and a red face. Don worry about it, les go get some crawdads, mudbugs, slew crawlers. And off we went.
As he consummed the last of the two pounds of the crusty lil critters he turns ta me an sayes. Ya know the onliest thing i don like about this truck is the mirror.
Little did i know! But at least it didn't put em on the coach. And that little piece of obsession is in da yeaterday book. Congratulations every studey truck fan breath better when they got to the part abut the windshield being intact. Keep on hitting it, it's lookin gud bro.
sman/GD
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