The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Paint and Body Shop Stripping paint ? MARTINSR ?

Simple question, maybe not a simple answer.
What is the best way for a guy to strip paint off of sheetmetal (55.1 Pickup)? I'm looking for a simple backyard way if there is one. Maybe a variable speed disc with the Scotchbrite pads? Chem. paint remover? Elbows and sandpaper.
I have a friend doing his fenders now by sandblasting, his end product is looking good and clean. How can you tell if the blasting is doing harm. Is it a visual thing or metal fatiuge issue?

Thanks, Buddy in AK

To check for damage on blasted panels - run a long board with 120 grit on it fast across the whole panel - look for low spots (areas not sanded).

To srip paint - I've used several of the chemical strippers and prefer Aircraft remover to other products I've tried.. Use it outside - and WEAR GLOVES and LONG PANTS. After it does its job I followed wiht a palm sander with 120 to get all the little spots clean. Then cleaned the whole part with laquer thinner (solvent) to get rid of the stipper - be careful in the nooks and crannies - paint will not stick to stipper - so make sure it's clean!

Blasting is my preferred method - but I don't have a blaster. I sent most of my parts out. Others have pointed out the problems with this though.

- Ryan

Ryan laid out some points on chem stripping. You do not need to run a straight edge to sand blasted damage. It is MUCH worse than that everytime I have ever seen it. The panels are TOTALLY DISTROYED. We are not talking, "Gee I have some more work to do" Damage, We are talking "It is TOTALLY DISTROYED, I'll have to throw it in the dumpster" kinda damage.

The sand hitting the metal are like hundreds of thousands of little hammers stretching the outer surface of the metal. The inside doens't get stretched so the metal warps out towards the blaster. This is VERY ugly stuff.

It "can" be done, all I am saying is, it CAN more likely DISTROY your truck. I have sandblast very few things. Once and while I will bring a sheet metal part to a blaster here in town. The part either has to need little blasting, so he doesn't have to "bare down on it" or it is thick metal, or it doesn't matter if it gets screwed up anyway. The last thing I brought to him was a 1928 Buick door that I was going to use in a display. It didn't have to be perfect, it had very little rust, this was a perfect candidate. He TOTALLY DISTROYED IT. I had to shrink with a rose bud tip on a torch! I put a full gallon of filler on this door to "repair" it good enough for this display.

I use a couple of differnt methods. Chemical strippiing, or sanding. I like sanding, I usually take one panel at a time. Sand the paint off with an 8" orbital sander with 40 grit, then 80, then 120 with a 6" DA. I spot sandblast the nooks and crannies that can't be sanded. This seems to work the best.

Then after each panel is done, I do the body work and get it into primer before going onto the next panel.
A totally stripped bare metal car or truck can be VERY, VERY overwelming.

I recently saw a promo on TV of a company that was using baking soda instead of sand to blast. It won't remove rust for some reason but it will take the paint away. They didn't even cover the glass as they said it wouldn't scatch it. I had most of my truck redi stripped. You end up spending a bit but to me it was well worth it in the time I saved and the metal looked brand new. Went the other route with my cab, used Tal 500 paint stipper ( stink's, time consuming and wouldn't remove the brown primer) turned it to a gooey mess, so had to sand anyway. The reason I didn't redi strip the cab is that they have to rince the truck with water after dipping and I was worred about water getting in the folded seams. Ends up that the metal cleaner and coditioner we used had to be rinced with water. Next time I will spend the extra cash and dip the cab to. In my books Time is money

Stuart, Can you give me a rough idea how much it would cost for Redi-strip and a description of the process or a link to their site if they have one? I'm just over the line and a little curious.

http://www.redi-strip.com/
Splashoil
I know the owners son so I got a deal at $700 Can. to do every piece but the cab shell. That included phosphate treatment. I would suspect it would be double that. But in my opinion it would still be well worth it. Before phosphate the metal looks brand new I mean like not a spec of paint anywhere and no metal distortion. I would think that the cab would be around 8 hundred to a thousand to have done

Splashoil, Stuart, others,

About two years ago I had my 48 burb stripped by Redi-Strip. Including the phosphate coating to etch and protect from flash rust it ran about $1000.00 . I had soda blasted a 52 1/2 ton about ten years ago. The benefit of Redi-Strip is getting all the rust and getting into places that soda, sand, etc. can't get to and/or you cannot see. The downside is trying to treat the same hidden areas so that rust doesn't come back to haunt you from the inside out. Sand might be fine for a stripped frame but as Martinsr points out it can really screw up body panels. Soda is nice for sound metal with no hidden problems - fenders, bedsides, and hoods for example where you can see everything or perhaps the exterior of an solid,dry, No rust vehicle .

I guess my sandblasting guy is just good - all my panels (read entire truck less bed and frame) came back as smooth as a baby's butt - in fact, when he showed up at the house with the cab (yup he delivered it, 75 miles!) I asked him if it was primered! - I did find out he used a VERY fine grain sand.
- Ryan