Just got this IS and not a big fan of the spoiler the previous owner installed. I want to remove it, and am pretty sure it’s held on only by adhesive. Will removing the tape damage the paint?

Also not sure if the original rear emblem is still underneath the spoiler or if it was removed. Any advice on this?

 

I would approach this by first cleansing the paint around the spoiler. Then I’d use clean, new fishing line to slide under the corner. Keep sliding it back and forth to further break the tape. If it snags on anything, you’ll know it’s screwed into the deck lid. In that case, I’d hope the screw holes are near the edge so they could be covered by an OEM spoiler. Or at that point you could fully reinstall the spoiler it came with or replace the trunk from a donor car.

 

+1 for this method. I wouldnt reccomend doing this, but if it was attacthed to the trunk with bolts, then you could just fill the holes with bondo and repaint the trunk, or use a touch up pen on the bondo. Kinda a sketchy fix but its an option if getting a new trunk isnt feasable.

 

You could just simply remove the trunk lid liner and look before doing anything else and confirm whether or not it’s bolted or just taped into place. If it’s bolted you will see the studs poking through with the nuts securing it to the deck lid. The next thing is, if you do remove it, because it’s only taped on, you’re going to likely still notice the difference in you paint color, as the underneath that spoiler area hasn’t seen the light of day. Good luck, hope all works out for ya.

 

I would just look under the interior trunk liner to see if it was bolted down first. If not, take fishing line to it, cut it off and clean up the residuals. If it is bolted and you just want a more modest spoiler, make sure what you want will cover the holes then buy it and swap them. If you want it spoilerless, then you're stuck swapping trunk lids or having it filled in and repainted.

It looks like that is the original emblem to me the way its recessed in the cut out, and the spoiler just fits around it. But it is hard to tell definitively from the pictures.

 

Looking under the trunk liner +1.

Hot water seems like a good idea.