Battleground Games Forum
Battleground Games & Hobbies => Painting & Modeling => Topic started by: buddyzen on October 10, 2008, 09:19:43 AM
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hey guys i am wondering what is the best way to strip paint off of plastic models and also metal models it would be great if anyone had any suggestions.
thanks ;D
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Plastic - Pine sol. Leave it in over night, rub it off with a toothbrush the next day.
Metal - High strength acetone (Don't use on plastic!). Doesn't need to be left in for too long, again use a toothbrush to scrub the paint off.
Of course, don't use that toothbrush afterward. :D
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Pine Sol is pretty good on resin too.
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Really? Resin is pretty porous and I'd imagine a good amount of the pine sol stays in there and may sweat out.
has it worked out well for you?
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Really? Resin is pretty porous and I'd imagine a good amount of the pine sol stays in there and may sweat out.
has it worked out well for you?
It's worked for me. And I've used it for Armorcast, which means porous TO THE MAX.
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Awesome! I tried paint thinner on some rhino doors forever ago and whenever it got hot, my model stripped :(
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Acetone? I think I used that once to strip paint off of poorly painted vespids I got from a friend. The paint came off (mostly) but the vespid legs became very weak and broke. It was hell trying to reglue the legs. How long do I leave them in the acetone for?
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Acetone should take the paint off after a few minutes of being covered in it. Scrub the model over with a toothbrush and nearly all the paint should come off. I woudn't reccommend acetone though, but everyone else seems to like it. Pine-sol is defintely the way to go, i've stripped well over 100 models with it, getting at least 90% of the paint off. Get all the models you want to strip. Put them in some container, tupperware or whatever, and fill it up so all of the models are submerged and leave the for at least a day, 24 hours, doesnt really need to be any longer. Then grab a toothbrush and scrub over the whole model. Also get another container full of water, a cup works. Because I can guarantee that after 10 models your brush is going to be covered in paint and grossness, and you'll be rubbing all that over the models, so just rinse off the brush every once in a while.
Also paint thinner, acetone, does work on plastic. Take a toothbrush, dip it into the acetone and brush over the model, then quickly rinse the model off in water. It takes off some pretty thick paint. Wouldn't reccommend it unless you have some really stubborn paint.
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gahhh I need help! I tried to strip the models with pinesol but for the first day it soaked, it didnt work, and after soaking for another day its the same thing. The toothbrush makes everything a greenish-black and I cant peel it off. It gets stuff stuck in the cracks and i cant get it out. Anybody know how to fix this or what else to use to get the paint off? this is the only time I dont like my Tau :-P
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The greenish-black is paint coming off, you probably have a ton of paint on them thats why you're not getting to the plastic. Theres not much you can do. Try paint thinner as I mentioned. And if you do, im not responsible if you mess up with it...
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crap, oh well atleast i got a few layers off....
Doesnt paint thinner melt the plastic?
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Yep, but only if you leave the paint thinner on the model for too long... like 2 minutes.
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so If i dip it in and wash it off right away it should take off all of the paint like it does with metal models?
Thanks
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I also Got some easy off oven cleaner hoping that that might work. I heard it doesnt damage models. I am trying to find the best method for taking paint off. Says to wait two hours but I will keep checking on it every 1/2 hour or so.
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so If i dip it in and wash it off right away it should take off all of the paint like it does with metal models?
-->Also paint thinner, acetone, does work on plastic. Take a toothbrush, dip it into the acetone and brush over the model, then quickly rinse the model off in water
Dont dip or submerge the model into paint thinner. Also dont pour paint thinner into anything plastic...
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okay, thanks.
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It seems people are very happy with Pine Sol but I also like Simple Green. Safe for the environment and it has worked nicely on plastic, on metal, and even on vintage action figures (I was surprised by the last one and don't recommend it for others). Can get a large container of it for cheap from Lowes or Home Depot.
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nothing is working...... I even used brush cleaner but that took off the edges and not all of the paint.
Does games workshop make something that strips paint? I have one model soaking in break fluid but it doesnt look like it will work.
ON a related note I got the easy off oven cleaner NO FUME one. That is the whimpy one appearently. There is a regular one which is lye based.
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I'm quite surprised about the Pine Sol not working.
You can try Detol (can be found at Super 88 / Kam Man Market even thought it's a Brit product) and if all else fails, nail polish remover.
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All of these products get the majority of the paint off, its inside these crevices and lines I cant get the paint out of. This is infuriating. The Brake fluid didnt work, so I got some dot 4 brake fluid to see if that does a better job. Nothing I use has helped. its the same all over the internet. Tau have a lot of crevices, but I didnt think it would be that hard to strip them.
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I don't think you'll find anything that gets all the crevices. You need to get most of the old paint off and then move on. Someone who strips more paint than I can attest to this with more authority.
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I don't think you'll find anything that gets all the crevices. You need to get most of the old paint off and then move on. Someone who strips more paint than I can attest to this with more authority.
HE IS RIGHT!
Is that enough authority?
Go get some modeling picks and go to town on the crevices. It sucks but you probably won't get all of it out. Back when I was lame and ebayed much of my early 40k stuff, I would strip and it was an arduous process. Metal is best because you can be so harsh with it before it starts to be damaged. Hell, I only strip hard to get pieces at this point because of all the trouble it can be.
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modeling picks? WHY HAS NO ONE SAID ANYTHING ABOUT THOSE BEFORE! lol
Thanks. I will.
I just stripped my metal stuff after soaking it in pinesol for two days, it was easier than pie.
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There are picks designed to work with green stuff. They look like dentist picks.
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i have heard that an easy way is to run them through your dishwasher. no shens
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how do you get the paint off models with plastic and metal parts?
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Hi Bryan, if you take a peek at some of the other posts in this thread you'll see recommendations for products that work great on metal and on plastic. By and large if something is safe on plastic it will be safe on metal. I know it can be tough to distinguish what the products are when there's several pages of posts in this single thread.
Below you'll find a post I made earlier in this thread. It gives THUMBS UP for Simple Green. Works great on plastics and it works on metal. No product will get all the crevices but with elbow grease and an old toothbrush you'll be able to get 95-98% of the old paint off. Hope this helps and I'm sure others on here with far more experience than I will have other awesome advice to share with you. Good luck!
It seems people are very happy with Pine Sol but I also like Simple Green. Safe for the environment and it has worked nicely on plastic, on metal, and even on vintage action figures (I was surprised by the last one and don't recommend it for others). Can get a large container of it for cheap from Lowes or Home Depot.
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Simple green is also available at Target. It's a good deal milder (and smells better) than pine sol, so it's generally considered the 'safest' option. It can take a few days soak to strip a model, but as long as you're not in a hurry...
Pine oil is the active ingredient in both of these solutions.
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I just stripped my plastic terminators with simple green with no damage to the plastic. I will never use Pine Sol again after how effective simple green was.
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I just stripped my plastic terminators with simple green with no damage to the plastic. I will never use Pine Sol again after how effective simple green was.
Yay! This is what I've always used in the past when I would strip paint. Works great, affordable, and safe for the environment. Sounds like a triple win to me. Glad it worked so well for you.
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i noticed that there are a few different kinds of simple green, is there one that works better for stripping paint?
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I have a whole mess load of plastic marines ruined by primer. I used Goof off anfd it left a sticky slimy residue all over the model.
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Zombie thread, rise from the dead. Since this is a couple years old, I wanted to post and see if this information has changed in two years.
I'm looking at stripping some plastic models, and am told an hour of Simple Green soak and a toothbrush is the simplest way about it. That still right?
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Maybe more than an hour but it's the safest. I have a hellblade sitting in it right now.
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Do you dilute the Simple Green at all? I've heard some say you should, but was wondering what others thought.
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You don't have to. You can but it is safe enough that you can just use it 100%.
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Cool, thanks!
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i've recently been trying to strip about 35 grey knights that i over-primed due to some humidity
went with the simple green method for about a 4 day soak and the primer jumped off the couple metal models in there and also came pretty easily off the finecast ones
the plastic however are requiring a good toothbrush scrubbing to get the primer off
some new info on the interwebs i've found is telling me to try "super clean" (some kind of degreaser from walmart) so i may head out looking for some of that tomorrow and try soaking them in that
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Tried the super clean (purple gallon jug in the automotive dept. of walmart) and the stuff worked awesome at stripping the primer off my plastic minis.
24hr soak (granted they had been soaking in green stuff for a couple days before that) but BAM it fell right off
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An addendum to using the "super clean" solvent.
while it's awesome at stripping paint off plastic it apparently also breaks the bond on superglue (the plastic glue seems unaffected)
meaning all my magnets need to be reglued /facepalm... think i'm just going to say hell with it and just glue all the arms and backpacks on since about the only swapping i did was backpacks for teleporter packs and the occasional halberds/swords for hammers