Best chemicals / methods for stripping paint from old bodies.

[RC10CE75]

Hey all,

I picked up a High Rider II Corvette that came in a box with miscellaneous parts for a ridiculously good price. Going through, I think it is complete. I was going to use it as runner for my kids but it in in really good shape. Even the body is good with very minor scratches, some trimming that needs to be cleaned up and a half done paint job. The only real issue is the tires have dry rotted. Getting to the question, I have never tried to restore a body. I have read about Tamiya Poly Cleaner, Dot 4, Nitro and all but was hoping to see what people think that have removed paint before. What has worked best, causes the least damage, etc. Soak or scrub with cotton pads. Any feedback appreciated.

[silvertriple]

Hi,

I've used a product call Glanzer with success on my Marui Hunter body.

The body was like this initially


I started by a bath of 24 hours in Glanzer


Results after 24 hours


The result after another bath of 48 hours and some manual rubbing on the remaining paint.


The guy who gave me thre trick which is quite known here in France told me he found this working well with a 60% chance average. The remaining 40% are no effect for half and damaged body for the second half.

The product itself is called Glanzer, can be found in some shops in France and on Amazon (FR) : https://www.amazon.fr/dp/B007CX0OT0/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_JX17ADEKBC31F4E1PS2G?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1
You would need enough product get the body fully in the product, and you can filter an reuse it for other bodies with partly new product.

Hope it helps

[JosephS]

Hey all,

I picked up a High Rider II Corvette that came in a box with miscellaneous parts for a ridiculously good price. Going through, I think it is complete. I was going to use it as runner for my kids but it in in really good shape. Even the body is good with very minor scratches, some trimming that needs to be cleaned up and a half done paint job. The only real issue is the tires have dry rotted. Getting to the question, I have never tried to restore a body. I have read about Tamiya Poly Cleaner, Dot 4, Nitro and all but was hoping to see what people think that have removed paint before. What has worked best, causes the least damage, etc. Soak or scrub with cotton pads. Any feedback appreciated.

I tried the DOT route myself with mixed success. I went and clear small parts of the body by soaking in dot3 and using a Q-tip pulled the paint off as soon as it was soft. Then I immediately cleaned the area. This left minimal to no fogging where I did that.

I then decided to soak the remaining areas in brake fluid for multiple hours. The paint pulled right off but the body is very foggy.

I would say that if you use dot, only do so until the paint is soft.

[XLR8]

I'm certainly no chemist but I have stripped a few RC bodies during the past few years. There are a lot of different chemicals that work to varying degrees - some work more quickly than others. Anyway, I believe in many cases the cloudiness or fog you are seeing after the old paint has been removed is from the paint and not from the stripper.
Perhaps the paint contains solvents or agents that are meant to etch the polycarbonate and promote adhesion. I would suggest that the fog is from the etching.
Anyway, I think once the surface has been thoroughly cleaned (hot soapy water to completely remove the stripper), the new paint will fill the etching created by the old paint and should look fine.

[silvertriple]

I'm certainly no chemist but I have stripped a few RC bodies during the past few years. There are a lot of different chemicals that work to varying degrees - some work more quickly than others. Anyway, I believe in many cases the cloudiness or fog you are seeing after the old paint has been removed is from the paint and not from the stripper.
Perhaps the paint contains solvents or agents that are meant to etch the polycarbonate and promote adhesion. I would suggest that the fog is from the etching.
Anyway, I think once the surface has been thoroughly cleaned (hot soapy water to completely remove the stripper), the new paint will fill the etching created by the old paint and should look fine.

I can confirm that the fog is not visible after having paint the body...

[XLR8]

Comparing the before and after photos, that's a remarkable transformation.
Well done sir!

[USAPaulo]

This forum is full of useful info! Maybe going to need to try this on the long list of second hand kits I'm watching...I've got to be lucky at least once right...?!

Paul

[Coelacanth]

The fog *will* be visible after repainting, but won't look nearly as bad as it does on the clear paint-removed Lexan. It will dull the glossiness of the new paint. Repainting a fogged Lexan body doesn't make the fog go away, unfortunately.

Here's a body that I stripped the paint from with DOT 4 brake fluid, then repainted. The areas where the paint was more stubborn to remove from, such as the roof scoop and the 2 rear roof body pillars, is where the fogged Lexan clearly shows regardless of the paint. Just letting people know that a paint-stripped, fogged body will not be suddenly perfect after painting, and not a shelf-queen candidate. If that's what you're after, buy a repro body.

[isaidme]

I tried using nitro fuel here recently but had poor results. I have seen WD-40 used to soak in a plastic bag for 8 hours or longer but haven't tried it myself. Tamiya makes a Polycarbonate body cleaner people have tried with success but takes some effort.

[Coelacanth]

I think the important detail most often left out of this conversation on "Which chemicals to strip paint from Lexan bodies" is "What kind of paint are you trying to remove?"

People mention this or that method but not all paints are the same. Pactra paints (and others meant to bond to polycarbonate) will almost never be easily removed, if at all, and chemical fogging is almost certain to occur.

Acrylic paints will most likely come off with much higher degrees of success.

[ZED32]

One I've never seen mentioned is isopropyl alcohol. I stripped this body with it and got no fogging at all from the alchohol itself. There was fogging where the darker green paint was, but I assume that was the paint and not the alcohol. Took a few hours and a lot of scrubbing, I did get all of the paint off.

[terry.sc]

I use 30% nitro fuel, Carson Paint Killer and Tamiya Body Cleaner depending on what shifts the paint.

Especially with vintage bodies I wouldn't put brake fluid anywhere near them as it can make the bodies very brittle. I think it was an original Losi truck body I cleaned with brake fluid as a test and the section cleaned with brake fluid went cloudy and broke away, the other side I cleaned with nitro fuel and was fine.
I used to paint bodies as a sideline years ago, and I messed up on a body that was needed by a racer in a couple of days. With nothing else to hand I used brake fluid to clean the messed up paint off a small section of the body, washed it down and repainted it. First race meeting the body was run at, it cracked exactly where I had done my paint repair. The owner patched it up with drywall tape and shoegoo and the rest of the body lasted the season. Others seem to use brake cleaner with no problem, but after my experience of using it it's not soemthing I would ever use again.

[mAdMan]

Hey all,

I picked up a High Rider II Corvette that came in a box with miscellaneous parts for a ridiculously good price. Going through, I think it is complete. I was going to use it as runner for my kids but it in in really good shape. Even the body is good with very minor scratches, some trimming that needs to be cleaned up and a half done paint job. The only real issue is the tires have dry rotted. Getting to the question, I have never tried to restore a body. I have read about Tamiya Poly Cleaner, Dot 4, Nitro and all but was hoping to see what people think that have removed paint before. What has worked best, causes the least damage, etc. Soak or scrub with cotton pads. Any feedback appreciated.

I tried the DOT route myself with mixed success. I went and clear small parts of the body by soaking in dot3 and using a Q-tip pulled the paint off as soon as it was soft. Then I immediately cleaned the area. This left minimal to no fogging where I did that.

I then decided to soak the remaining areas in brake fluid for multiple hours. The paint pulled right off but the body is very foggy.

I would say that if you use dot, only do so until the paint is soft.

Clear the body inside with poly acrylic clear. It’ll shine again.