Paint removal

The last jeep I bought has what appears to be a brushed on thick coat of red that looks terrible and is cracking and flaking away. What's the easiest way to get it all off?

 

Heat Gun...

 

you can use paint remover you can get the spray on kind it works good
just in on and want, then hose it off . i used it on my 68 cj5 ,i got all the old paint off you can get it at walmart or any parts house.
good luck

 

Sandblasting. Ha! Ha! Ha!

 

The dip and strip I used in Atlanta closed down.....

B^(

 

I completely stripped all the paint off Nixon with a 4" side angle grinder and a wire wheel. Actually about 10 wire wheels. Wear safety glasses because once the wire wheel starts breaking down the wires start slinging out.

I dropped a wire in my boot once while grinding a trailer down to paint. Continued working several hours and walking all around the trailer grinding in different spots and with each step felt a little annoying poke on the side of my foot. About 6 months later my foot swelled up and turned all red. Went to the Dr....took X-Rays and found the 1-1/4" long wire embedded right in the middle of my foot.

 

OUCH! That just made my foot start hurting, and I haven't ever had anything stuck in it.

They sell come kind of aircraft stripper at autozone, or use to, that works pretty good. Just don't get it on any plastic or anything you don't want the paint taken off of. Other than that, the scraper idea works good, the wire brush works good, and the belt sander or a DA works good, or sandblasting. I have done it pretty much every way out there. I would try to find some spray on stripper to save a little work though.

 

I'm all about saving a little work.

 

Like they said, any kind of zip strip type chemical stripper works pretty well on most types of paint. Makes a HUGE mess though. Throw down lots of newspapers if you don't want melting paint goop everywhere. Avoid doing it in direct sunlight too...it dries to quickly and won't work right. To clean up what's left, use a 4" sanding disk (on a drill if you don't have anything else). 80 grit works well most of the time...go to 60 if it clogs too much. I've stripped several cars like this, and it will get most paint off. Some factory primers seem to be immune to this though, and you have to sand or blast them off.

 

Well if I can ever get a front axle under it, I'll roll it out and pull the body. Not enough room in my garage to pull it off.

 

I think Por-15 sells a liquid stripper that's supposed to work good, but I've never tried it, I plan to though. I was kicking around the idea of putting the tub and body parts on a trailer and hauling them to a car wash at night, applying the stripper and let it do it's thing, then blasting it off with the car wash.

Just an idea.

 

I bet you'd be a prized customer after that!

 

Oooooo, never thought about that before. I will probably have to try that in the future, but don't tell anybody.

 

That's why I'd do it at night, under the cover of darkness. And I'd go to one of the older, nastier carwashes, off the beaten path. I know of one where all the cowboys wash out their stock trailers.

 

I might just put in on the flatbed trailer and do it under the barn. Not worried about getting the paint on the trailer. Can hit it with a pressure washer if I need to.

 

If you do use a pressure washer, be sure you have a way to dry it off...if all the paint actually comes off, bare metal and water will make a lot of surface rust to sand off . I'd be worried about that paint goop getting blown into parts of the car you don't want it too. If it's just a bare tub it wouldn't matter I suppose. I've always just used a 6" steel drywall knife to scrape it off. Apply a second coat if there's still a lot of paint. Sand off whatever's left if it's not much.

 

In my case, it's just going to be a preliminary to some minor bodywork, and the tub will go from there to the local "sand"blaster, that's actually a specialist in classic auto body parts, so he doesn't use sand...uses other gentler stuff. Plastic beads or soda, something like that. If I can get as much paint off beforehand as I can, that cuts down on his time and my cost.

 

workable idea, don't ask how I know

 

"Aircraft Stripper" is supposed to be the strongest and I've seen it in Auto Zone. I did a tub off and it worked pretty good blasting it with a powerwasher after about 20 minutes. In the hot, dry weather it will dry pretty fast and you can blow it with compressed air to dry faster. Just don't do it with out safty protection or with shorts (don't ask). Those little flying boogers can burn right into your skin.

I tried the angle grinder, much slower and dustier.

The best way is to have someone else sand blast it