getting ready to perform a chemical strip of looks to be at least 2 layers of paint on my '53 cab/hood.going with a product from the eastwood company.I have two to three areas where either bondo or fiber-glass were used(previous owners unfinished business).Does anybody know if I should stay away from these areas with this stuff or just cover every thing and sand them prior to priming:-X23

 

Painy stripper will definitely damage body filler. Unless you want to redo filler I would stay away from those areas.

 

You will never get all the stripper out of the bondo and years fron now it will cause problems with your paint.

 

I had a '67 Jaguar XKE 2+2 about 20 yrs ago, put a 289 with c-4 out of a '66 Mustang, Cool car, very fast. Wish I had it now, Paint was bad so started in with chemical stripper found out whole lft side of car was body filler. Ended up having to redo all of it. If you do not have a lot of filler you would be better off using stripper and grinding out body filler. Lots of times it is not done properly to start wiyh so by doing it over right you might save yourself some heartache later. Nothing like putting a primo paint job on then having poorly done body filler with rust under it that you didnt know about pop ruining your paint job. I would strip it and redo filler to bare clean metal.

 

Never trust another man's mud. Strip the paint and then remove the mud and glass. Starting from the metal is the safest way to do things. Otherwise, why strip the paint at all; just prime, sand, shoot and hope all the layers below hold up.

 

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The one piece of advice I would like to offer is; do not get any stripper in body seams, it will came back to bite you in the future after you applied your last coat of paint. I cover the seams with tape-about 1/2" on either side- and apply the stripper. After the stripper is washed off I remove the tape and either use a small sand blaster or wire brush to clean out the seam. You can't always get all of the stripper out of the seam and like I said it will come out at the worst time.
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Thanks guys. glad I asked,stripper arrived yesterday!do I buy a wheel brush and just grind that stuff down to the metal opening Pandora's box?

 

[updated:LAST EDITED ON 18-Oct-02 AT 01:49 AM (EST)]I used "aircraft Stripper", and applied over the old bondo, it lifted the bondo and the paint.... i did the strip in the following steps... dont know if it was right or wrong, but i have the exterior primed and the interior paint, and everything is looking good, 'cept I need more friends to come over and block sand..

1. pressure washed exterior.
2. let dry
3.chemical stripper.
4. wash with laquer thinner
5. pressure washed ( paying close attenion to al seams.

and then proceeded with the body work, primer, paint


Robert

 

I'm sure at some points i will be forced to use block sanding too but I was concerned with such a "curvey" body as my '53 I may be doing more harm.What other weapons should I arm myself with?

 

I too eventually took my '53 down to bare metal. Took the bed down to metal, filled, and primed. Got lazy and feather edged cab, filled, and primed. Cab primer flaked off within a week. Learned my lesson - take down to bare metal. Didn't use chemical stripper for fear of getting into body seems. Did use a 7" "coating removal disc" from 3M that worked like a charm.