Originally Posted by
BCRider
Yes acetone can work well. But it eats rubber tires like sun melts an ice cube. If you go that route you should certainly pull the tires off and work only with the bare wheels.
It's also able to leech through your skin and enter your bloodstream very easily not to mention being extremely harsh on your skin. And the fumes are also harmful. So if you're using it work outdoors and wear solvent resistant gloves like the blue Nitrile gloves. It is VERY nasty stuff just like any of the seriously aromatic solvents.
While a lot of rims are anodized not that many are anodized on the actual braking surface. Unless you bought the hard anodized "ceramic" types. If you did then yeah, sanding, steel wool or Scotchbrite pads should be avoided. But for the machined silver braking surface rims it's not hard to use the abrasive cleaning methods and control them so that they don't touch the painted or anodozed parts.
I was speaking of putting some on a rag and using the rag (on the end of your index finger) to take the marks off. This is used for removing fingernail polish.. Even the pure stuff I have has never caused a reaction to my skin, but I don't bathe in it either. Gloves are fine, but again, you open the can, put your rag-covered finger over the opening and slosh it once, then close the can.. Yep we can get the HazMat team out, but alcohol can dry your skin out just as quickly. If you use the fingernail polish remover it even has skin moisturizers if you want that Dove feel.
Most of my rims are anodized, none of them have machined braking surfaces. Some are hard anodized, some soft anodized, some are dark and some are clear.