Magic Eraser = Game cleaner

[Cassidy Nolen]

All,

 

If you have any text label Atari carts with sharpee or other marker on the front, I found out tonight what takes it off...Magic Eraser!

 

I use them on arcades and my car all the time. Now I have another use. Its the wd-40 of the cleaning world.

 

Just thought I'd share. Also takes the various "nauseam" off of the black textured plastic parts, too.

 

It is too abrasive for the paper label pictures though. Rubbed right through on one tonight. Eh, win some lose some. Have not tried a silver label one yet...

 

Cassidy

[shadow460]

That actually will help me clean some of my Sears picture label carts. Acetone, used in very small quantities, will remove sharpie marks from picture labels. It actually removes all the ink, but the Atari ink is far stronge than the Sharpie ink is.

 

Still, though, my Gunslinger (and a few others, too) has grease pencil markings on the back side of the case where I can't remove them due to the texture. Perhaps Magic Eraser will do the trick!

Edited March 15, 2007 by shadow460

[Video]

Just remember Magic Eraser is slightly abrasive (as Cassidy Nolen has already found out) So if you do use it, don't us it to heavily.

[revsdr]

i use it to clean the console.

take it apart and scrub away.

works great

[Deteacher]

Has anyone tried using it on the contacts of a game yet? I'm willing to test that theory out on a couple of my "harder to play" dupes. Maybe that'll get my non-working Pitfall II cart running again. I'll post my results later tonight.

[BigO]

Has anyone tried using it on the contacts of a game yet? I'm willing to test that theory out on a couple of my "harder to play" dupes. Maybe that'll get my non-working Pitfall II cart running again. I'll post my results later tonight.

 

I have. Works so-so, but makes crumbs. It's not easy to get it down in there and scrub in the tighter space on one side of the edge card so my results were not entirely positive.

 

Something I tried and found to work very well for cleaning my cart contacts was a piece of denim wrapped around a popsicle stick and dampened with rubbing alcohol. (Which reminds me, I need to snag some of that high grade IPA next time I'm at the plant.)

 

I was quite impressed with the Magic Eraser in general. To put it succintly, it works. I've found nothing that will clean textured (haircell, wrinkle finish, etc) plastic surfaces like the Magic Eraser. I had a Tomy Tutor that looked like it had been through a war. With some household cleaner and Magic Eraser, it looked like new.

 

I also used it (very carefully) with plenty of carnuba wax to clean the playfield on my '77 vintage cocktail pinball machine (my other 650x based system). Worked like a champ, as long as I applied pressure sparingly.

 

The last thing I used it for was to scrub the red grease pencil off of a nice $2 thrift store beige Tripp-Lite surge suppressor. Had to add a little of some orangeish-pinkish window/all purpose cleaner to get the job done.

 

It can't be stressed enough: don't get crazy, this stuff is abrasive.

[neodude112320]

I've found with other carts (SNES,Sega) that A small paintbrush and Metholated spirits works wonders,But can you get the bottom cover off?

[+remowilliams]

I've definitely used the Magic Eraser before to good success. It's in my arsenal of cleaners now. Still nothing beats RAM for overall amazing-ness

 

Has anyone tried using it on the contacts of a game yet?

That's not a good idea. As noted these things leave lots of gritty residue - not what you want to jam into a cartridge port. There's plenty of other things to clean contacts with

[Rik]

Be careful with MAGIC ERASER,that stuff will take paint off cupboards,i found out the hard way,that stuff is EXTREMELY STRONG AND POTENT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!.

[Atari Punk 78]

Just remember Magic Eraser is slightly abrasive (as Cassidy Nolen has already found out) So if you do use it, don't us it to heavily.

 

 

Thats very true, a little dab will do you just fine. It doesn't seem to work 100% but its better than nothing. I've been using those Magic Erasers for over a year now on my games.