Best way to Remove Vinyl Sheet/Cover on Case

I've seen pictures of people stripping the vinyl off their Yamaha receiver/integrated cases and just refinishing the wood that's already there (plywood?). It looks good enough for me and the fallback is to put on real veneer if the underlying wood looks bad.

But I'm wondering about the best way to remove the existing vinyl. Does it peel off in very small, annoying pieces, or once you get it started, does it come off mostly in one piece? Is heat needed to facilitate things?

If small pieces bit by bit, maybe a sander to just sand it off?

Thanks.

Try a hair dryer. If that doesn't work move up to a heat gun.

miklemke said:

Try a hair dryer. If that doesn't work move up to a heat gun.

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An a paint scraper perhaps.

OK, I tried the hair dryer and screwdriver as well as a paint scraper. It didn't work well for me - came off in very small pieces. The vinyl is not a thin layer, but seems more mounted on plastic and then glued on the case.

So I borrowed a belt sander and ground it off. Belt sander was a little hard to control (for me), so sanding evenness was sketchy. Anyway, stained it this morning and it turned out OK, but some of the areas that weren't sanded quite as much didn't take the stain as well, so there are some lighter areas. We'll see if I have the energy to sand it even and restain.

I like it better than the original vinyl, but an OEM wood case would look better of course.

looks great to me