Roof Tar Removal

Our Scotty's previous owners had tried to fix leaks by using lots of silicone on the edge strips and tar on the seams of the roof and around the vent. We had to remove all of this to be able to take everything apart to replace the rotted wood on the ceiling and walls.

Some of the silicone came off when I stripped the paint from the edge strips, but silicone really resisted the stripper. I used some silicone caulk remover to remove most of it from the edge strips. It seems to work okay, but it's pretty slow. I still have some to remove on the skin later.

The tar on the roof did dissolve with the paint stripper, but there was so much of it, it really made a mess and would have taken lots of goop to remove. I needed to scrape off the big piles, but it had hardened and set up pretty well. I initially used a hair dryer to soften the tar. This worked okay, but took a long time to heat up and I found that I had to do it in layers.

I found an old propane torch in the garage, hooked it to a small camping-style propane bottle and got to work. That really softened the tar up and allows me to scrap almost all of it off with a 1.5" scraper. I could then use a towel to rub off a good portion of the remaining residue while it was still liquified. This probably only seemed fast by comparison, but I got it all off in an afternoon. I will need to get the rest of the remaining tar off with some solvent, probably diesel before I put the skins back on.

I had a few close calls with the torch and the wobbly roof. Be careful when you set it down, because on an old rotted camper, it's easy to knock over a live torch. I didn't lose my eyebrows and only singed a few spots I didn't mean to.