So Ive been weight reducing my car for next season and one thing Ive been trying to get rid of is the interior tar. Normally most people use a heat gun or some nasty solvents to remove this crap, but I learned of a better way. Jsutter told me to use dry ice, I was skeptical at first but then he showed me this site. http://www.davesweb.com/houndawg/How...WithDryIce.asp

So today I went to get some dry ice from a local seller that I found online... Well let me tell you it works awesome.



Throwing the ice on and watching it work. You can see where I tried with a heat gun and what a mess it makes. Also takes way to much time...






Stuff comes off clean as whistle. Since my interior was already stripped the whole process took me less than two hours. This was 15 pounds of dry ice, I kept cycling it from one area to another so I could get the most out of it. I would let it work in, then attack that area and once it was clean move the dry ice chunks to another area.

I Havent even cleaned any surfaces with solvent or a brush, thats how it looks when you remove it with dry ice.



figured I would celebrate with a drink.

You kwazy bisch!

Don't play with dry ice, they burn like a mother...


- ßaller

Before you go buy dry ice, if you have an air chisel laying around, try that first. I was about to go to the store to pick up a thing of dry ice, but I had this air chisel and so I thought I'd give it a shot. The first time I tried it, BAM, big pieces shot up very cleanly.



I am guessing that since my car was raised in DRY Las Vegas it's whole life, the tar dried out! I certainly know that ALL rubber and plastic in my entire car is dry and brittle. I'm glad the air chisel idea worked b/c I had the entire job knocked out in less than 1 hour. I already had my carpert removed like you did.

But I've seen some people try a hammer and chisel on a hot summer day. That stuff gets messy. And dry ice isn't that expensive or hard to come by. Walmart and other big type grocery stores like Publix carries it.

Here are some more pics of my sound deadening removal:

http://www.iwdwebdesign.com/maxima/sound.html

Yeah my car's tar was very gooey. I doubt an air chisel would of helped me, but that can be another option for those who have one.

I would still recomend the dry ice cause it's very easy to get and easy to use. Just a word of caution, do it in a ventilated area, high amounts of CO2 gas can be poisonous. Also a fan would help, I had a hard time trying to see thru all the smoke.

I also remember reading this back when I was thinking about doing the job.

http://www.nissanperformancemag.com/...4/g20_racecar/

yea i did the hot summer chisle and hammer way.

yeah thats definately clean looking and i like it much better. i got all the deadening out of mine but have tar/goo/black sticky stuff everywhere. i will go snap a photo, have my car sitting up waitin for the next race in 3 days.

Any weight measurements? Is it alot

an easy 30 lbs

i would agree with j, i had already taken some out back home and finished it up here. and when i finished the job i had 24 lbs. so i would agree its about 30 lbs worth. just took some photos but havent gotten around to hosting them yet.

I would have to agree on the 25~30 pound weight reduction for this tar. With the carpet in, the missing tar is barely noticeable. I have yet to drive my car but I have been in other 4th gens with the tar removed and it's barely noticeable.

For me this is only going to be a "weight re-distribution" cause I want to POR15 the interior sheet metal and add chassis foam in the coming months.

wow, i'm gonna have to do this sometime.

is there any sound deadening in the trunk? i took out the trunk lining before and don't remember seeing any. if it's just in the cabin then that would save the trouble of having to rip out everything.

there are two strips of it on each side left and right side but thin (on my 97) and where the back seat so to speak meets the trunk (about where you take the 6 lbs metal plate out, there is a strip across there.



thats just from a certain angle, the whole car is done, another tip is to look under the speak deck thing in the rear window, sound deadening up in there too

i also agree on sound, with carpets and mat in the car, i cant tell much difference but riding around like in that photo above, ha ! thats a different story !

i hate to get off subject but what is the deal with removing the airbags ? isnt that a total of 14 lbs ? i spend most of my time driving in an 87 civic that doesnt have them anyways so dont really care to have them in the car.

I am VERY interested in doing this. But I am pretty sure it's best left up to the professionals. I'm ripping apart my dash right now in order to replace my heater core. So I am doing as much weight reduction as possible. I saw an SRS computer that's gotta be a few lbs at least, but I'm not going to touch it unless I know what I'm doing.

i have done airbags before. you disconnect the battery, let the car sit for at least 15 minutes. then have at the bags. when i did it im not even sure if i disconneceted the battery the 1st time. we even drove the car without the passenger bag for about a week. we had no baggage explosions. i took out my seats which have air bags and all it did was make the light blink. they do make an air bag simulator if you wanted to just remove the bags and not all the wires and computer, say for future sale or something.

my tar was gooey and messy a chisel put holes and dents in my floor.

And remember guys acetone on a rag will clean the remaining tar off nicely. but use ventilation and be carful

It didn't put any dents in my floor. Just a tiny scratch here and there. I didn't have to bare down at all, the deadening just popped right up for me. I was lucky!

I am in the process right now of replacing my heater core. I've pretty much removed all the dense material on the firewall. I'm looking for other things I can remove while I have everything torn apart. Any suggestions?

Lots of fun!

thanks for the tip krismax, also does everyone know their present raceweight ? i went and had my car weighed after a day of racing to find out how much the car was weighing. Would be nice to compare with some of you other guys, I just went to a dump and drove up on the scales, I had to pay 10 dollars last time, but the other day she said I could do it for free but wouldnt get a slip.

97 Nissan Maxima SE
Decription: Sunroof, rear spoiler on trunk, fully loaded with power everything, but no abs, and only airbags in front dash and steering wheel.

Car Weight: 2689 lbs.
Car/driver: 2901 lbs.


My plans are to get my racing seat shipped over soon, that will knock me down another 20 lbs. But after that i dont see much else, cant make my mind up about air condition or egr. We dont have emissions in NZ but we could one day.

It would be cool to discuss the weights of some of your cars, what else can we do, and compare to the weights of other cars. Im having to race gutted civics, and they are still much, much lighter !!

aaron i hope you can put all that back together, rofl ! is that fluffy mat thing what you move around to sit on !! lol !

Yeah, it hurts sitting on a bare metal floor, especially when you are as skinny as I am (5'10" 135lbs).

I can get it all back together. As a matter of fact, I might not put the dash back on. I will just fab up something to hold my speedo and tach. We'll see. But if I do want to put it all back together, I took notes and kept track of the nuts and bolts. That's why it's taking me so long to do this job.

BTW, my car's weight last time I hit the track was 2890lbs plus me, which brings it to 3025 lbs. I ran 14.3 with that weight in hot weather. So if everything goes as planned, I'll run deep in the 13s within the next couple months. My car's weight then should be around 130 lbs less than before.

So my weight then should be 2760 plus me for a total of 2895!! I also have some other things planned to help me get even deeper in the 13s.

Oh yeah, I know you guys are going to ask how I can remove another 130lbs after I've already removed 410lbs since I weighed the car stock (3300lbs). I am going to remove my alternator, AC compressor, condensor and all lines, front and rear sway bar, door panels, trunk beams that keep the trunk open, hood lining, A pillars, all seat belts that aren't in use, maybe remove automatic seat belts and use the lighter rear seat belts for the front driver's seat, and the 30lbs that I've already removed while doing my heater core job.

aaron what are you doing to your car know it fast ....

I didn't know that running w/o the alternater is possible...

only if you have a good battery and dont run it too long. reserve capacity on say an optima is onmy 90 minutes.

Yeah, I have a good battery and I have ran 8 1/4 mile runs on a fully charged battery. That includes having to crank my car up about 5-10 times for EACH 1/4 mile pass. I kept an eye on my voltage with a multimeter that was connected. That was when I was in Carlsbad, CA running 14.5s. There was no way to push the car since it was such a steep incline in the staging lanes.

Just by taking the alternator belt off, you WILL free up some HP. It's actually a noticable amount in the butt dyno! I can honestly say that you can squeeze another tenth in the 1/4 just by removing the belt.

Also, you should be able to drive your car for an hour or two just on battery voltage. Especially if you don't run the radio and other electronics.

Aaron, you are a maniac. I can understand all this for drag racing, but I hope you're not cruising around like that

Of course I strictly do this for drag racing. That's all. No, I don't cruise around without an alternator.