How to remove enamel paints from plastic kits?

DMC 12

Active Member
Hi, I've got an AMT Enterprise E that I built a number of years ago, albeit quite badly. And I want to give it another go without paying for a new kit. So does anyone know a way of stripping the paints from plastic without damaging it?
 
Easy Off oven cleaner, brake fluid, Simple Green and Purple Power have all been used to remove paint. They can affect plastic, but the paint will come off long before that happens. I've only used Easy Off myself, it needs about an hour to take affect. I've heard some of the others are quicker.

I don't know what brands you need to look for in the UK, but I'm sure there are equivalents.
 
Ahh great thanks for the advice! I thought I'd heard something along the lines of that before. But always good to be sure. What use would there be in a melted enterprise?
 
I've tried oven cleaner on Enamel and it doesn't work. Try soaking the parts in Brake Fluid overnight and then scrub the paint off with sandpaper.
 
Your oven cleaner was probably non-caustic. You want caustic.

Another option is caustic soda itself. Just buy a container of granulated caustic soda, drop a couple of tablespoons into a bucket of warm water, stir, and soak your parts.

Do this outdoors, wear rubber gloves, don't breathe the fumes.
 
I've tried oven cleaner on Enamel and it doesn't work. Try soaking the parts in Brake Fluid overnight and then scrub the paint off with sandpaper.
If it is a styrene kit, then brake fluid will potentially damage the plastic.

Gastrol Super Clean (Purple Power) works better. It may soften the styrene, but just let it dry and it goes back to normal stiffness. For straight pieces you want to support it so it stiffens in the right shape instead of sagging. The thinner the piece the more likely it will soften. Larger supported pieces may not be affected like that.
 
I've used Super Clean to remove 20+ year old enamel off a few models.
Let is soak in a plastic tub a day or so then us an old tooth brush to scrub the surface.
Some of the paint will probably stained the plastic.

Easy Off works also.

You may find this article on removing paint from models useful.
 
I agree with the guys above. Castrol Super Clean is the best. You can get a gallon of this stuff at Walmart for around $8.

As stated above, I used it to take a really thick, brushed on paint job on a model car I did when I was a kid.

Kenny
 
I know bleach works well for stripping chrome plating from plastic parts, but I've never tried it for removing paint. It might work. However the amount of money you'll wind up spending on various things to strip it, and the cost of new decals, might set you back more than just buying the round 2 re release that came out a couple years ago.
 
If it is a styrene kit, then brake fluid will potentially damage the plastic.

Gastrol Super Clean (Purple Power) works better. It may soften the styrene, but just let it dry and it goes back to normal stiffness. For straight pieces you want to support it so it stiffens in the right shape instead of sagging. The thinner the piece the more likely it will soften. Larger supported pieces may not be affected like that.

Nah dude. It doesn't damage the plastic at all. Maybe over time, but the paint would be long gone by then. I've used this method to restore many kits...and I've never had it damage the plastic at all.

I don't think it even softens the plastic much. It works really well if you soak it for 24 hours, you can literally wipe most of it off with paper towels.
 
Your oven cleaner was probably non-caustic. You want caustic.

Another option is caustic soda itself. Just buy a container of granulated caustic soda, drop a couple of tablespoons into a bucket of warm water, stir, and soak your parts.

Do this outdoors, wear rubber gloves, don't breathe the fumes.

I've tried caustic. It's pretty damn weak on my paint jobs...works great for stripping chrome though...
 
Nah dude. It doesn't damage the plastic at all. Maybe over time, but the paint would be long gone by then. I've used this method to restore many kits...and I've never had it damage the plastic at all.

I don't think it even softens the plastic much. It works really well if you soak it for 24 hours, you can literally wipe most of it off with paper towels.


That does make sense since brake fluid reservoirs are plastic.

If you do use brake fluid, make sure you wear gloves. This stuff really irritates the skin.
 
I recently stripped 4 layers of enamel paint from my Monster Beetle shell, some of the paint was as old as 20 years.
I went to Boot's pharmacy, Bought Caustic Soda for less than £2.

3/4 filled a bucket with cold water, added the Caustic soda crystals, stired & left the shell in there over night.

WARNING do not add water to caustic soda!! Always only add the caustic soda to water!! & ware rubber gloves!! its real difficult to wash off, slimey soapy feel to it.

In the morning most of the paint had fallen off, I used nothing more than a stiff brush to get the rest off. No damage to the shell what so ever :)


Heres the stripped shell:

0001-2.jpg




HTH :)
 
Yeah, that's the kind of result I get. Just layers of the stuff coming off at once leaving more or less clean plastic.

BTTFSpencer, you might have made your solution too weak maybe?
 
I'm gonna have to try this at some point. I've got a 1/144 falcon that NEEDS to be redone. I did it as my first model and it's a total botch job
 
I've used the 10-Minute version of Easy-Off, which has done its fair share of stripping paint off of a couple of models. But it also depends on how thick the paint is too, (by having multiple layers, you end up having to do multiple rounds in order to remove the paint off). If you're going to us Easy-Off, make sure its the real deal and not the local store generic brand (I bought Dollar General 10-Minute Oven Cleaner to try, which didn't do anything).
 
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