# Possible paint stripping breakthrough!



## grungerockjeepe (Jan 8, 2007)

So I stumbled onto this little trick completely by accident. Best of all, it uses household items.

So to strip chrome parts, I use a little Windex in some water. Id found a little goes a long way, but for whatever reason, I had a bucket of it near full strength. I had an Auto World '59 Miller Meteor hearse, and a Tyco dump truck in there to get the chrome off the truck and the crud off of both. Well, I planned on trying to sand and repaint the hearse anyway so when it came out with the paint a bit hazy I didn't mind. The dump truck's paint looked a little chalky too. I had these soaking for about 3-4 days. The chrome came off of the truck parts and both were nice and clean. 

Cut to today when I was cleaning off a curvehugger with my normal soak in 91% rubbing alcohol. I dripped a little in the bed of the dumptruck and it sat on it for a few seconds so I wiped it off....and a good glob of the paint too. So I poured a little more in the back of the dumptruck, waited a few seconds and wiped again and the paint was coming right off!

Sooooo....I filled another gladlock bucket with the same 91% rubbing alcohol and threw the whole truck in. The back door of the dump bed wasn't chalked at all by the windex, so at first when I scrubbed it with a toothbrush it didn't do anything so I tossed it in the bucket and tried the dump bed since it was the piece that the paint was coming off immediately--AND the paint was chalked up a good bit from the Windex. A little work with an old toothbrush and a toothpick in the cracks and the paint was coming off nice and clean. I revisited the door of the dump bed, and since the alcohol had been working, some of the paint was already dissolved. It brushed right off! The cab did pretty well too, however there was some superglue residue under the roof mounted horns and behind the grille. Still, it scrubbed WAY clean everywhere else, and I noticed that unlike some strippers which cause the paint to sheet off in some areas, and denatured alcohol makes the paint soften and 'gum up' when its not submerged, this seemed to mostly dissolve the paint. For the hell of it, I figured Ill toss in the hearse since AW paint is notorious for being near impossible to strip. Mind you, it started out black with flames. Feast your eyes:





Even in the underside nooks, this stripped pretty clean. The black paint on the hearse seems to have leeched into the plastic, leaving the stains but theres no paint left on the surface. The dumptruck stripped VERY clean. Yes its a 2-stage process, and I don't really know how long it would take for the Windex to do its thing, since Ive had both of these sunk in for a minimum of 2-3 days. Apparently the ammonia in the Windex isn't enough to strip the paint, but it does weaken it enough that the alcohol just mows right thru it. After the Windex treatment, just a few minutes in the alcohol is enough to get it going. The dumptruck had been out of the windex and on my bench for like 3 days dry before the alcohol, but after seeing this, I took the hearse right out, rinsed it in water and right to the alcohol. 

So there you have it, a possible way to strip all paint types! I have a whole ton of cars in the Windex right now, in a few days they'll hit the alcohol. Mostly tycos with a couple tomy/AW in the mix.


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## Ralphthe3rd (Feb 24, 2011)

We knew about the Chrome removal technique, but the paint removal tip is NEWS (my bad for jumping the gun with my pre-edit reply).


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## grungerockjeepe (Jan 8, 2007)

Its news to me too. I think the 91% alcohol is a key player here too....I put a couple un-Windexed tycos right into some of that, and it does do a number on the paint on its own. Now, one was a chevy stepside that's been pre wetsanded, one was a Jeep that I had stripped in denatured alcohol once before and still had some residue, and another was a virgin black with flames blazer. With some work the stepside is coming a lot cleaner, but theres work to do. The Jeep is nearly completely clean, and the blazers paint is coming off, but still needs plenty of work. 

The windex clearly starts the process so the alcohol can rip right thru the paint.


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## grungerockjeepe (Jan 8, 2007)

And I just checked back after 20-30 mins and that 91% alcohol mowed right thru the tyco paint! I don't know what it would do on an un-Windexed AW car. I know that I tried denatured alcohol once it didn't faze AW paint.


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## grungerockjeepe (Jan 8, 2007)

So, Im starting to think it might be ALL about the hardcore alcohol. Id tried stripping cars in the standard 70% stuff with no luck....but I just tossed a lime green dumptruck in it, came back in 10 mins and the paint was falling off of it! I also had a lime green/orange AW Hemi Cuda from the carfitti series in there and its coming clean too. Im noticing a LOT of the plastic is stained green underneath, even though the paint is off the surface. I just rinsed everything from the Windex bucket and put them in a fresh bucket of 91% Isopropyl....

Oh and the windex alone did remove SOME tampos cleanly from some of these bodies. I had a yellow/orange/black Tyco Blazer in there and it took off the 'Blazer' lettering, leaving the rest of the paint completely intact.

FYI, the rubbing alcohol Im using is the Target brand. They have 70% and 91, so try this with the 91%


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