stripping factory finish

[steve howe]

I have a couple of Bachmann panniers currently going through the works, I'm putting them back to pre-war condition which entails quite a bit of surgery to the bodywork. Can anyone recommend a plastic-safe method for removing the original paint finish?

Steve

[Daddyman]

My go-to was always Precision Super Strip, but it's expensive, and there have been reports in recent years of it attacking plastic. I then tried IPA, which had zero effect, and then Dettol, which was not 100% effective but, worse, made the house stink for weeks afterwards. In the end I settled on brake fluid from Wilco, but I can't remember what "Dot" it was - 4 or 5? Someone will be along presently with the right number...

[Tony Wilkins]

I have had some success using Methylated spirit. Put the model in a sealed tin with some meths and leave for several days and with any luck the paint goes soft and wrinkles, A good scrub with an old tooth brush removes what is loose. Sometimes further treatment is required. It's not infallible and I don't know whether this still works with more modern paints.
Regards
Tony.

[Tim V]

My go-to was always Precision Super Strip, but it's expensive, and there have been reports in recent years of it attacking plastic. I then tried IPA, which had zero effect, and then Dettol, which was not 100% effective but, worse, made the house stink for weeks afterwards. In the end I settled on brake fluid from Wilco, but I can't remember what "Dot" it was - 4 or 5? Someone will be along presently with the right number...

Dot4, but I've had better results with some very old stock DOT3!

[Philip Hall]

I heard forty years ago (!) that brake fluid was the stuff. But that was when brake fluid was probably very different to what it is now, and the paint formulations were different as well…

Philip

[Neil Smith]

Can anyone recommend something for spot removals please? I need to take off a printed Gloucester C&W plate from a Hornby PO wagon, because said prototype was built by Chas Roberts. (I did email Hornby months before it came out when they first published artwork which showed this likely error, and got a very bland reply that neither promised to correct it, now showed they really cared.)

The rest of the artwork is pretty good, so don't want to damage that.

Thoughts?

All the best

Neil

[bécasse]

Scraping it off with a scalpel or painting over it (using a cocktail stick rather than a brush) would be the possible methods I would choose.

[Stephan.wintner]

I've used a Paasche Air Eraser - I forget but believe Badger offer something similar over in the UK. A sort of grit blaster grafted onto an airbrush body.

I'd think a little masking tape, a little grit, and then perhaps some touching up should work. It definitely removes paint in a controlled fashion, and leaves a smooth transition to the unaffected neighboring area - no hard edges. I've heard of folks using baking soda as the grit, in my experience soda was too gentle. But if you are removing only the printed plate, i think I'd try soda first.

(Sorry for the North American terms, I'm not sure of the UK ones.)

Stephan

[steve howe]

A brief update on my original thread; thanks for the useful comments. I remembered methelayted spirits and brake fluid being recommended from years back, and surprised that they are still on the preferred list.

Having several bodyshells to strip I tried one in a 24 hour soak in meths in a sealed plastic container. About 95% of the paint came off fairly easily with the help of an old toothbrush but a few stubborn bits remained in crevices. Probably longer soaking would alleviate this.

The next experiment was with brake fluid. I used Mobil Dot 4 fluid from Halfords which at £8.00 for 500ml is probably dearer than the proprietary brands sold for the purpose! the shell was immersed in the sealed plastic container, after about 4 hours the fluid had turned noticeably darker, 6 hours later and the paint was falling off. A gentle scrub with the toothbrush removed virtually all the paint including bufferbeams and footplate. No noticeable damage appeared to have been done to the plastic body and the result was very clean. Curiously on both shells the paint on the bunker rear proved the most stubborn to remove and some was left on.

The conclusion seems to favour brake fluid for speed and efficiency. I don't know how often the fluid bath can be used before it loses its strength, but it certainly did the job.

Steve

[tmcsean]

I have had some success with gentle and prolonged application of TCut. Fortunately I have had no sense of smell long before this became widespread.

Tony