Tar sound deadening. To strip, or not to strip? Options

[Detroit]

What's everyone's take on this stuff? I'm putting a new carpet set in, so now is the time if I'm going to tackle it. Is this a must do type of job?...
It looks pretty good on the outside, but, of course, I've no idea what it looks like underneath.

[hockeymutt]

When I pulled mine up found all sorts of holes in the sheet metal but it's the reason why I removed it. If you decide to remove it use an isolating multi tool with a flat scraper and a heat gun.

[Bobco]

I got rid of mine.Then at least you will know what you have.

[mbseto]

Strip it. Otherwise you'll never know what's underneath. This job was the one task on the car that turned out easier than it looked.

[Maltese Falcon]

The heat gun is good with an assortment of scraping tools, but I also had good results using the acetylene torch; quick pass in small areas, no problem warping the floor. A 2 man job works even better !!

[PlantMan]

Some people think the dry ice method works well.....
I have tried this approach with marginal results.
I prefer the heat gun and a 1" wood chisel. The chisel is a better alternative to the putty knife/scraper in my opinion.
I cleaned the whole surface with a heavy steel wool and mineral spirits afterwards.

[cal44]

I use the small yellow nylon scrapers from Harbor Freight, and their heat gun. Do small sections, take your time.

The nylon will not damage the paint. Don't over heat, just make it soft enough to come off. Even then you still may need to use some type of petroleum product to fully clean up the tar. Finally we use Trader Joes house hold cleaner, the green liquid in the spray bottle.

Or, leave it if you don't see rust thru on the bottom looking up.

[Detroit]

Thanks for the advice, everyone!

[Tom_T]

What's everyone's take on this stuff? I'm putting a new carpet set in, so now is the time if I'm going to tackle it. Is this a must do type of job?...
It looks pretty good on the outside, but, of course, I've no idea what it looks like underneath.

If the topside of the floor were all looking clean & rust free, with no other evidence of inside water intrusion & rust, then I'd say that you could leave the tar in place.

However, in your pic I see rust under the driver's seat near the tunnel & a couple of other places - so you'd probably be safer to strip the tar, deal with any rust, prime with Wurth or Eastwood Zinc Rich Primer (serveas as localized hot dip zinc does on newer Porsches - zinc becomes sacrificial metal to water/rust before the steel/repair-patches/etc.), then do an epoxy prime & repaint to body color; & then replace with either an AA floor tar kit (or cut your own from sheet - tar gets painted over, as you can see, but zinc & epoxy primer is under), or Dynamat, etc.

Heat gun & scraping seems to be the most successful wa to remove, & is in the factory repair manuals as such too IIRC.

PS - IMHO - strip the entire floor & sides/longs, F & R firewalls inside then too - anywhere that you can see possible rust & can reach, & treat,prime, paint as one job.

Good Luck! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/beerchug.gif)
Tom
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[Cracker]

Strip it...I have done this a few times but finally got smart. I paid my son $15 an hour to do my last car - best $45 I ever spent around a teener!

Tony

[bbrock]

+1 for stripping it. It really isn't that hard and could save you a ton of money and heartache. Mine popped our pretty easy by warming it with a heat gun and scraping with a variety of putty and taping knives. You don't want to heat it so much that it melts; just enough to loosen it from the floor.

I'll be replacing sound deadening, but after seeing what was under the old stuff even where it was pristine, I think stripping is something that should be done on any car that still has the original tar. One thing I wish I'd done though is to cut some paper templates of the tar pieces so I could replace the sound deadening exactly as the factory had it.

[VaccaRabite]

Ive done both heat and dry ice.

I'll use Dry Ice every time now. The trick is to let the dry ice sit on the tar for a few minutes and really get it cold. Hit is with a hammer and it comes off in big chunks. No fumes, no stringy mess. It was great.

Added bonus. On a HOT summer day, dry ice is cold. working with a torch can be unbearable on days like that.

Zach

[rhodyguy]

Spare your wood chisel. A Painters '5 in 1' tool and a heat gun makes short work of the job.

[mepstein]

Ive done both heat and dry ice.

I'll use Dry Ice every time now. The trick is to let the dry ice sit on the tar for a few minutes and really get it cold. Hit is with a hammer and it comes off in big chunks. No fumes, no stringy mess. It was great.

Added bonus. On a HOT summer day, dry ice is cold. working with a torch can be unbearable on days like that.

Zach

I bet waiting long enough for the tar to get really cold is the key. Thanks for the tip.

[dr914@autoatlanta.com]

your pan looks pretty good to me, I would just touch up where the paint has pealed and install the carpet. It is a heavy job to remove and then install the new die cut floor pan tar kit and repaint. I would only do it if your floor was rusted and you were restoring the car

[gothspeed]

It seems it is easier to remove where the deadener has delaminated or bubbled due to corrosion.

[Detroit]

So, I figured I'd give everyone an update on this just in case some future member finds him/herself in a similar position.
I chose to go ahead and remove the tar deadener. Thanks again for everyone's input, incidentally.... I recall reading a thread awhile back that a forum member bought one of those oscillating cutters from Harbor Freight specifically for stripping this deadener, and as I didn't have a heat gun to try, I took a spin over to H.F. where I bought one of each. I tried the oscillating cutter first. It worked well enough that I didn't even bother with the heat gun.
Underneath I found still painted metal in perfect condition, apart from a small patch of surface rust behind the driver's seat.
The next question was how to clean up the bits of tar that didn't come up readily with the tool. I didn't have any mineral spirits or green Trader Joe's cleaner laying around, so I tried what I did have. Kerosene. That and a non scratch abrasive sponge work rather well. I've not finished yet, but here's a shot of the floors before I started with the kerosene...

[type2man]

Clean up the surface and then add a few coats of sound deadener all over again. They sell it in a spray can and a brush on. It helps with road noise. The important questions is, will this be a garaged vehicle or will it sit outside. If it is going to be an indoor vehicle, rust will not be much of an issue in the future....