450: Lagoon Windows

[Blackduck]

Just in case anyone is interested: My Lagoon 450 came with an annoying 'scrape' on one of the bedroom windows. Essentially the 'transfer' that covers one bedroom window had at some time been scraped back maybe as long as your thumb. Nothing terrible, but I like my boat to be pristine and so this has always bugged me. Anyway, from new my Lagoon has also had vinyl wrapped hulls. Time has come to remove and replace these as the sun, salt, sea and fenders etc. have taken a little toll and like I said, I like my boat to be pristine.
I got a quote on replacing the vinyl wrap and at the same time getting the lower bedroom windows 'transfers' replaced too (and all the salon windows tinted at the same time as it happens).
That brings me to the reason for this post.
If anyone else is ever in need of removing the window 'treatment' "dot transfer/sticker" on your Lagoon then here's some advice. Firstly do not believe anyone who says the windows are glass, they are not. A few people told me this but I had my doubts and had a specialist check and no they are not. That means if you use a blade or scraper be very careful. (We used what's called an American Blade which has rounded corners and will not scratch unless you go crazy.) Also, do not bother trying to use adhesive removers to initially remove the 'transfer'. You will need one of these chemicals later but initially they will do nothing.
What you do need is a heat gun. We used an industrial hand held one set to around 470 degrees. The other thing that will help is a second pare of hands: one to use the gun the other to carefully lift the edge with the aforementioned American Blade.


If you are so inclined, using this method you can in fact remove the entire "transfer' in one piece, but that is just showing off. (we did it for the last window just to see if we could...and you can). Once the transfer is off your window will still be covered in a fair amount of adhesive. Some people will say use acetone but I cocked with a specialist and they said the safer bet is a special acrylic/plexiglass adhesive remover. We used a spray on version FORCH R581 (to my untrained nose it smelled like Mineral Turpentine). I can offer no warranties of the long term effect on the window but initially it seems fine and the 'specialist' promised no long term clouding or crazing. It does take several applications, a lot of rubbing and elbow grease but we managed to end up with clear, glue free windows.
Next week, the new 'transfers' will be applied. (You can buy them from Lagoon but our guy here in Croatia has the pattern/template and vinyl prints them himself)
Anyway hope that helps if anyone has the need.


P.S. Also for anyone interested the Gelcoat under the vinyl wrap (which is coming up to five years old) looks absolutely brand new. And the quote for wrap and windows including application of same is 2700 euro.

[davedindubai]

Hi bd, are you going to keep this going and shows us the wrap install? I've got it pencilled in for the coming winter if I can get it done in Turkey.

[CatNewBee]

We removed one aft, it was a lot of work. But we wanted to have a nice view from the cabin instead of the white thing...

The other 3 will have to wait when we are on the hard again and have some time left for other projects... We hate the white things on the windows, the glue becomes more intransparent over time, so they get more useless...

I would never re apply the sticker back.

[Montanan]

I likely am showing my ignorance but what is the purpose(s) of the vinyl wrapping?

[CatNewBee]

Originally Posted by Montanan

I likely am showing my ignorance but what is the purpose(s) of the vinyl wrapping?

I assume, to keep the sun out of the cabin, but have natural light. The newer Lagoons have cler windows, so I guess, people dont like it.

[davedindubai]

1. keep gelcoat below like new
2. cheaply change the colour of the boat

[Blackduck]

Hi Dave, Yes I lift the boat in 3 days and it should take a day or two to do the new wrap of the hulls (I am also having the salon windows tinted deeper black). I am using a new superior brand vinyl this time (they have improved over the past 4 years). This one can be regularly polished and has a much longer warranty on colour fastness. Having said that the previous brand stayed really strong in colour terms for the first three and a bit years then faded a touch (the 'green' component of the 'gold' became more dominant,) then late last year it faded considerably to almost grey/green/silver (depending on the light). As I mentioned the gelcoat underneath is still in 'as new' pristine condition so even as just a protection procedure it is well worth it in my opinion.
I will try and photo the process and post them.
As for the bedroom windows, I may switch to just a deep black tint or go with the traditional lagoon style dots but in black to help shade the interior. Oh and the few scratches on the bedroom windows polished off entirely which was very satisfying. (started with 320grit - deepest scratch - then 500 then 800, 1000, 1500 and 3000 followed by a paste - took 20 minutes.)

[davedindubai]

I'm going to do the windows in a black tint too. Don't forget the outside rim of the window must be protected from the sun. I've heard of windows falling out!

[Blackduck]

Yes indeed. I like the look of the all black window and surrounds too.

[Go Wildcats]

I'm waiting for one of you to try this:

https://www.smarttint.com

https://www.smarttint.com/#colors

https://vimeo.com/80220500

I'm risk adverse.

[WhiskeyBusiness]

Originally Posted by Blackduck

Just in case anyone is interested: My Lagoon 450 came with an annoying 'scrape' on one of the bedroom windows. Essentially the 'transfer' that covers one bedroom window had at some time been scraped back maybe as long as your thumb. Nothing terrible, but I like my boat to be pristine and so this has always bugged me. Anyway, from new my Lagoon has also had vinyl wrapped hulls. Time has come to remove and replace these as the sun, salt, sea and fenders etc. have taken a little toll and like I said, I like my boat to be pristine.
I got a quote on replacing the vinyl wrap and at the same time getting the lower bedroom windows 'transfers' replaced too (and all the salon windows tinted at the same time as it happens).
That brings me to the reason for this post.
If anyone else is ever in need of removing the window 'treatment' "dot transfer/sticker" on your Lagoon then here's some advice. Firstly do not believe anyone who says the windows are glass, they are not. A few people told me this but I had my doubts and had a specialist check and no they are not. That means if you use a blade or scraper be very careful. (We used what's called an American Blade which has rounded corners and will not scratch unless you go crazy.) Also, do not bother trying to use adhesive removers to initially remove the 'transfer'. You will need one of these chemicals later but initially they will do nothing.
What you do need is a heat gun. We used an industrial hand held one set to around 470 degrees. The other thing that will help is a second pare of hands: one to use the gun the other to carefully lift the edge with the aforementioned American Blade.


If you are so inclined, using this method you can in fact remove the entire "transfer' in one piece, but that is just showing off. (we did it for the last window just to see if we could...and you can). Once the transfer is off your window will still be covered in a fair amount of adhesive. Some people will say use acetone but I cocked with a specialist and they said the safer bet is a special acrylic/plexiglass adhesive remover. We used a spray on version FORCH R581 (to my untrained nose it smelled like Mineral Turpentine). I can offer no warranties of the long term effect on the window but initially it seems fine and the 'specialist' promised no long term clouding or crazing. It does take several applications, a lot of rubbing and elbow grease but we managed to end up with clear, glue free windows.
Next week, the new 'transfers' will be applied. (You can buy them from Lagoon but our guy here in Croatia has the pattern/template and vinyl prints them himself)
Anyway hope that helps if anyone has the need.


P.S. Also for anyone interested the Gelcoat under the vinyl wrap (which is coming up to five years old) looks absolutely brand new. And the quote for wrap and windows including application of same is 2700 euro.

This is great info. We are a week away from purchasing/closing on our 2015 450. This is definitely on the to do list. I'm not really sure what they were thinking when they put these "no see through" windows on.

[WhiskeyBusiness]

Does anyone have any photos of the final result after removing the white film over the cabin windows?

[Jimmy30379]

Originally Posted by WhiskeyBusiness

Does anyone have any photos of the final result after removing the white film over the cabin windows?

WB,
My wife and I juste removed the window stickers from our 2016 Lagoon 450F.

We used BackDucks advise from this thread.
The main points were:
Don't use a metal blade as you will scratch the crap out of your window (we learned this one the hard way before reading BackDucks post...)
We used a plastic scraper very gently with a heat gun and a heck of a lot of "GooBeGone" spray product.
We waited for a sunny day and covered the window with GooBeGone and then taped a plastic bag over the window for an hour, to let the GooBeGone sink in.
Then we used a heat gun around 450 degrees to work small pieces of the covering off at a time.
Take care not to hold the heat gun in one place for too long, as you can damage the plexiglass of the window. If you work small areas of the window at a time, you should have no issues removing the decal.

It takes time & patience and having two people work on it will be better then trying it solo. The results are worth the time spend on the project.

Also, the edges of the window will be ugly once you remove the decal (you can see through the window to void in the hull), so you will need to come up with a solution for masking the edges of the window. We tried painting the outline of the window on the forward port window and it came out good, but we are still searching for a better solution, we might try a dark window tint for just the edges of the window...

I attached some photos of the window, once we got the decal off. We like the windows much better without the decals.

Good luck!!!

[WhiskeyBusiness]

Thats Great Jimmy, thanks for the further advice. I have a few questions. Does the Goobegone hurt/stain your gel coat at all? Also is the window by itself tinted? If not i am thinking adding some tint would help reduce heat but still let light in and obviously be see through. About how much time does it take per window (estimate). Thanks in advance!

[Jimmy30379]

Originally Posted by WhiskeyBusiness

Thats Great Jimmy, thanks for the further advice. I have a few questions. Does the Goobegone hurt/stain your gel coat at all? Also is the window by itself tinted? If not i am thinking adding some tint would help reduce heat but still let light in and obviously be see through. About how much time does it take per window (estimate). Thanks in advance!

WB,
The GoBeGone did not stain the window or hull at all, and we used a ton of it.

The windows are not tinted. We are currently in California and we will leave the windows un-tinted for a while to see how we like it. When we start cruising in 4 years and 9 months, we might re-evaluate that, as we will be in much warmer climates when we throw off the lines.

We took the decals off the the windows of the three state rooms, but left the decal on the starboard forward master bathroom (we have an owners version of the 450F) for privacy purposes.

We started with the the forward Port window and made a ton of mistakes that were thankfully reparable. (we gouged the hell out of the window with razor blades. Fortunately we were able to sand and buff the scratches out)

The other two windows each took us about 60 to 90 minutes to complete (from the time we started scraping to to the final clean up of the glue residue that was left on the window with the decal gone.

Take your time and you will be able to successfully complete the project.