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Hey guys i have been stripping paint off some of my old models using dettol.

I have used a 1:1 ratio of dettol and water and left them to soak for a good 24 hours.

The paint starts to just rub straight off when i remove them from the solution but after scrubbing them with a toothbrush it goes all gloopy and dosn't want to shift anymore.

Im not rinsing them in water as i have read that will send them sticky.
However im a bit stumped now as i dont want to have to throw any miniatures away, got about 20 space marines in it, but if it wont come off then i cant think of anything else i could do to them. And starting to get fed up with them

Some tips would be much appreciated as i have reached a dead end
Thanks in advance
Soitra

Hi I dont know if it will be the same but when I soaked some resin in dettol I left it in therefore days neat, I did fined most of the paint lifted but some remained in the deep detailed sections.

Like I said this was resin not plastic, so I am not sure how it will effect plastic, I found a place that supplied simple green in the UK which works way better.

If you take this root it is quite costly but I felt worth the investment, however keep an eye on the models I left some resin minis in it for a few days and turned the resin rubbery.

Hope this helps good luck

hey i did a test with a part of a plastic sprue left in pure detol over night it didnt affect the actual plastic ( well it made it smell very clean) but the plastic still stayed solid and didnt go rubbery.
cant remember what paints i used on the models, even found a lovely yellow paint job that i had forgot about painting, The models are about 10 years old.
i should say that it has worked fine on the metal miniatures i have put in it.

I stripped a whole host of minis using neat dettol a while back. After the initial 24hr soak and scrub when most of the paint had just sloughed off anyway, i put them back into another bath of fresh dettol and repeated the process of soaking and scrubbing. That got most of the stubborn bits out of the deepest recesses.

Try some fairy power spray, I've done a lot of paint stripping owing to my continued ability to really screw up my paint jobs.

Anyway I've found a 1/2 hour soak to be plenty. I imagine the combined effect of that and your dettol will shift that paint.

HTH

soitra wrote:hey i did a test with a part of a plastic sprue left in pure detol over night it didnt affect the actual plastic ( well it made it smell very clean) but the plastic still stayed solid and didnt go rubbery.
cant remember what paints i used on the models, even found a lovely yellow paint job that i had forgot about painting, The models are about 10 years old.
i should say that it has worked fine on the metal miniatures i have put in it.

Sounds like it a winner and with a little scrub should come clean, metal miniatures I use Nitro morse from home base, get an old glass jar fill it up with the stuff plonk your minis in a day later scrub and they are a good an.

You must where gloves when using this stuff though and its stinks, use it in a well ventilated shed or a garage, but it works a treat but don't use on resin or plastic melts them to nothing.

Metal mini's I've used pure acetone and a cheap 50pence paintbrush.. can have a mini lookin brand new in 5 minutes!
But acetone is massive overkill, and will destroy plastic and resin parts.
Other sucesses were window cleaners, i used a green Mr Muscle brand glass cleaner with some sucess using 24 hour soaks.
Spray on over cleaners (the kind that expands white foam as it goes down) this can work quite well but may also destroy plastics.. Im not actually sure if it does, worth a test on some sprue or something.
And one other product i have used was a liquid oven cleaner type product (I've forgotten its name im afraid, sorry) but it comes in a pack for cleaning grill's and stuff; e.g you put the metal grill off your bbq into a big sealable bag with some of this stuff overnight and it comes out looking brand new with a rinse this was actually okay on the plastic figures - i was doing metal ones but i threw in a well caked old marine backpack as a tester and it came out looking new after a light scrub with an old tooth brush.

thanks guys i have left them soaking in a stronger concentration of dettol again today gonna give them another scrub now.
as for the oven cleaner i think you mean oven pride from your description, Dont think id be too confident putting my plastic mini's in that.
ill let ya know how things go
thanks guys

soitra wrote:thanks guys i have left them soaking in a stronger concentration of dettol again today gonna give them another scrub now.
as for the oven cleaner i think you mean oven pride from your description, Dont think id be too confident putting my plastic mini's in that.
ill let ya know how things go
thanks guys

Yes, thats the one I think he means, it strips wood work surfaces just ask my misses took me hours to strip that and re oil it just so she could drip oven cleaner over it 3 days later.