Guess what, I figured I'll just try all my applicable household
chemicals starting with the mildest one (Isopropyl Rubbing
Alcohol), and I hit the jackpot right away!

A cotton swab dripped with rubbing alcohol plus a bit of
rubbing followed by wiping with dry toilet paper works
like a charm on this particular type of conformal coating.
(I only cleaned the top of the ICs so far)

I wonder if it's acrylic or urethane based, (based on one of
the posted link) and what does it going to do if I heat it up.

BTW, I found a bunch of comparators, some Schmitt triggers,
a PWM conroller, and a quad AND gate. Appears to be a
fairly trivial circuit.

Thanks for the links and the follow-ups.

wrote in message
...
I think its called conformal coating and a real beast to try any repairs,
I
inspected them and when the vendor repairs them they really look bad and
unreadble!!!
timba

"aurgathor" wrote in message
news:1102671420.02f831312d3421b0c00ecddb127c8a66@t eranews...
I took apart a UPS, and the PCB, including a significant portion
of the components on it are coated with some kind of clear and
shiny lacquer. This is nice for some things, but now I can't read
the markings on the chips. What kind of cleaner is best to clean
the coating from the chips?

TIA,
aur