The best stripper in the galaxy!

It's paint stripper. Get your mind out of the gutter.  

So you won the E-bay auction with the blurry picture? You know the one where the seller has primed them black for you. But when you get them you see that he has just primed directly over a couple of layers of paint so thick that your mini looks like a Lego man with the mumps.

"No worries" you think, "I'll just Bing it, and figure out how to remove paint from plastic". Easy right?
Wrong.


I've seen people suggest all kinds of crazy things on various forums, and I have tried most of the methods that are not obviously super hazardous. None of them are really worth the time, effort or money when compared to alcohol. In Norway we have a great product called Rødsprit, it is 70-95% denatured etylalcohol, and ethanol (C2H5OH). That or something similar is the way to go. Unless you can get that strong alcohol from say... that bearded uncle of yours, that always squints and has a shed out in the woods.



I haven't bought any used models in a long while, and I never took any pictures of the process, so I did not have anything to illustrate a post with. Until now.
Recently my daughter painted her first miniature. Sure I'm very proud and all that, but let's face it, she is too young to be playing Slaanesh marines, so that paint job had to go.

You'll have to wait until you turn at least three before you get away with this color scheme missy!


Get thee to a fortress monastery!
BTW This soup turns black after cleaning 10-20 figures, but it still eats the paint just fine.


I forgot about his guy for a couple of days, so he was left to stew for 48 hrs. This is what he looks like after one swipe with the toothbrush. As you can see even the primer lets go without a fight.


This is what he looks like after 30ish seconds of vigorous brushing.


The previous owner did not respect the plastic glue. Thankfully this guy is going to be wearing a cloak.

Obviously you should to do this in a well ventilated area, wearing at least gloves as protection. I did neither of those things, as you can see. But that is because I'm a real hardass. At least if you are to believe what people shout after me on the street. Or is it dumbass? The fumes plays tricks on my memory some times. Both are compliments right?

This worked fine on any acrylic based paints I tried it on. Enamel and oil based paints are not that easy to remove.
I also haven't tried this with resin models, so if anyone has any experience with that, please let us know how that went.

Hope this is helpful for someone.

Sticky worthy.

You mean it's not the triple-breasted hooker from Total Recall?

Great guide though

So you are saying that the 99% ethonal that I buy from the grocery store to clean my "natural herb sublimator" will also clean models? Wow, I learned something today!

Found this guy that has made this vid about the same thing. Posting it here for those of you that don't like reading.

In France, most people recommand to use Glanzer, the green version one.

It contains mostly ammoniac/ammoniaque/ammonia.
I firstly tried to clean some used harcode painted miniatures with pure ammoniac (cheaper) but it didn't work at all.

Tested glanzer (available on most supermarket)

.. And it worked like a charm.
20-30min for a lightly painted miniature. ~1h30 for a heavy/hardcore thick paint multi-layers.

Note that you'll still need an (old) toothbrush to help remove the paint. Some gloves are recommanded too.

Only downside is that you can let your miniatures a whole night in it, because it will attack and remove the glue.
But it can be great if you wanna switch equipement.


Anyway it's cheap (< 3€ a bottle), effective, easily available and reusable (filter in coffee filters after use).
Heavily recommanded