King Richard and the Sharpie Marker, Part 2

If you recall from part one of my story, this is what I started with:

The dryer door, stained with marker.

The dryer drum, a Sharpie victim.

Now, it is time for part two of the saga.

On Monday (7/9/2012), I had planned to go shopping for some type of solvent that would remove the dreaded black marks from the Gooseberry Lane dryer.  Fortunately, I was saved from that task by the suggestion of King Richard's co-worker.  A while back, the guys had "field day," an old Navy term for cleaning day, where one of the tasks was to remove Sharpie marker from linoleum tile.  They used a product called SoyGel and it got the job done.  After King Richard shared his marker story, one of the men suggested I try the same thing on the dryer.  Since we had some SoyGel in the garage, I gave it a go.  This was the result:

The dryer door, clean once again.

A closer look at the dryer drum.

As you can see, the paint remover worked well, at least on this small job.  The bigger problem was just inside the dryer door, to the left of the lint catcher.  This is a picture of the "lighter" stain to the right of the lint catcher.

Thinking that some type of graffiti remover would still be faster, I stopped by the local hardware store on my way back from dropping Katherine the Great at organ practice.  Finding no Krud Kutter brand products, I settled on Zinsser Graffiti Remover instead.  It helped to cut through the worst of the mess at the start of each removal session.  But to really banish the staining, I had to use the SoyGel just as if I was tackling painted woodwork or window trim, leaving the paint remover in place just long enough to wipe out the stains but not so long as to eat through the paint.  Then, to really make sure I was neutralizing the stripper and protecting the surface, I wiped the area I was working on with soapy water every few minutes.  It was a very tedious job.

But...after six long days with no dryer, here is the reclaimed appliance:

The dryer drum, cleaned and polished.

A bit cleaner near the lint filter.

It isn't perfect, but it will do.  It is certainly an improvement over what I faced last Sunday (7/8/2012).  The washer needed some treatment, too (about ten minutes worth!).  A few dabs of SoyGel and a thorough cleaning with Washer Magic, it went from this:

The washer drum with only a tiny stain.

to this:

Stain-less and looking great!

Now for the next task:  catching up on all the laundry!

Note:  No compensation, financial or otherwise, was received for this blog post.

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King Richard & the Sharpie Marker, Part 1