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Bought a super cheap bag of guardians. They had been primed with spray...badly. Very badly. There's a bunch of white paint dust in the bag with them kind of bad.

Is there a way I can save them or do I need to strip the primer off?

ender502

I suspect stripping is going to be needed. You might be able to just take a toothbrush or something and knock the dust off, depending on the nature of the bad prime. But as the primary job of primer is to lay down a smooth base for other paints to adhere to, if it’s patchy or uneven there is not a lot for that.

I was afraid you were going to say that.

Well, at least i'll get to practice stripping. Maybe i'll experiment and compare ISO alcohol to break fluid. See which one works best.

If the primer sprayed on kind of chalky you'll probably have to strip it and re-prime everything. From experience it should mostly come off if you soak it in Simple green or other recommended stripper.

From my experience I soak it for 24 hours, then take an old tooth brush too it and scrap off as much as I can, then soak it again. Rinse and repeat until you've gotten most of it off. May take awhile.

I may try some simple green. Pretty cheap at the local big box store.

Not that it will help in your case, but if you can get the bad prime into the simple green before it fully cures, it’s a LOT easier to scrub off.

 ender502 wrote:
I may try some simple green. Pretty cheap at the local big box store.

LA's Totally Awesome is even better and even cheaper (you should be able to find it at the dollar store).

One thing I would recommend if you are going to use Simple Green is to not get the one in the spray bottle. They changed it a few years ago so that the one in the spray bottle is much more diluted than before, so its not as effective. Get the big jug version as that is undiluted and much more effective.

I've had the minis sitting in LA Awesome for a couple of days. It took off the paint well and the white primer (what turns out to be first primer level) pretty well. The thickest parts are still sticking. But the lower black layer of primer hasn't budged.

ender502

Gave up on the LA Awesome and bought Purple Power degreaser.

24 hours in and it took off the paint and most of the white primer. So, better than LA Awesome. Gave the mini a brush and gonna let it sit another 24 hours

ender502

Hey folks,

Another quick update.

It is my opinion that many of the videos and blogs and posts you see about this product or that product being great for stripping paint from models are utter hogwash. The info is either massively out of date or the posters are just lying for clicks.

I have used LA Awesome AND Purple Power. Both of these have been said to be "incredible" for stripping. They aren't. Well, let me be a bit more clear. Both are good at stripping paint. Both are kind of crappy at stripping white primer. Both don't even come close to touching black primer.

So, if you were hoping to get your models back to metal or lovely gray plastic...skip these products.

Next up will be "Smart strip". It's an actual paint remover and is supposed to be non-toxic and safe on plastic. Or,.I may also try some Isopropyl alcohol. We'll see. Either way, you'll get an update.

ender502

My experience with stripping is quite extensive after having to remove a bad primer from my first Dropzone models. A lot of recommended products weren't readily available in Germany so I ended up using denatured alcohol.
It removes the acrylic paint without issue and managed to remove most of the primer. But some primer remained, especially in crevices. On plastic models it wasn't an issue, but on resin is was quite annoying.
One thing to keep in mind: depending on what the next step in the painting process is, I would not reapply any primer with a spray can. It may be more tedious, but you can paint with acrylics directly after removing the primer, as the priming still attacked the surface of the model. It should keep any paint without any issue. At least, it worked for me.

Brickfix wrote:
My experience with stripping is quite extensive after having to remove a bad primer from my first Dropzone models. A lot of recommended products weren't readily available in Germany so I ended up using denatured alcohol.
It removes the acrylic paint without issue and managed to remove most of the primer. But some primer remained, especially in crevices. On plastic models it wasn't an issue, but on resin is was quite annoying.
One thing to keep in mind: depending on what the next step in the painting process is, I would not reapply any primer with a spray can. It may be more tedious, but you can paint with acrylics directly after removing the primer, as the priming still attacked the surface of the model. It should keep any paint without any issue. At least, it worked for me.

Interesting. There have been suggestions for Isopropyl Alcohol but yours is the first for denatured. They are similar but distinct. I am actually getting some of the smartstrip tomorrow. That seems to be similar to BioSTrip20...which isn't sold in the US. They do have Biostrip in the UK so it may be a bit easier for you to get. I'm intending on reporting my findings.

ender502

Some pictures would really help in a proper diagnosis.

If they're chalky and whatnot, perhaps just washing them vigorously in hot water will remove most of the problem paint.

Since you're priming you really don't need to worry about any bits of color remaining as they will most likely be properly bonded if they survive the water

In my experience, all you have to do to reprime is make sure the underlying surface is relatively clean and dry, so just wash off the chalky stuff, and prime over them after they dry.

If you're having issues with the old primer making hard chunky patches of paint on the models, then you need to strip them. Good news is you can just use some cheap LA's Totally Awesome cleaner from the 99 cent store.

Hey there. Recap...both LA Awesome AND Purple Power we're both great on pi t, meh on white primer and crap on black primer.

The model below had some Smart strip applied. It had a thick, chalky layer of white primer OVER a layer of black primer.

I put some on and scrubbed with a soft toothbrush after 5 minutes. The white primer disappeared and the black primer was noticably greyer in areas. I rinsed the mini nd reapplied the smart strip. After a ten minute wait, some scrubbing and a rinse under cold water I was left with this.




Automatically Appended Next Post:
As you can see the model is pretty much down to the plastic. If I leave it for a real length of time (a solid hour) I am pretty sure it'll be pure grey.

In total I used about...a tablespoon and a half of the smart strip. I bought a gallon of the stuff on Amazon for a different household project. The smaller size would probably be more than you'll ever need.

ender502