924Board.org

[jjames]

Hello all,
I am about to remove my old paint from my 77 924. I was thinking about using the chemical strippers to do this (less dust and elbow grease). is this the bestway to get down to the metal or am I just dead wrong. please give me your opinions. thanks

[JB 924]

Do you have to strip all the paint? It'll take you forever to get it all smoothed out again when you repaint it. The way I do it is just sand the paint with 120 grit until it's all smooth. Some high spots will automatically go down to bare metal. Then, if there is rust, I just use a sandblaster to get it off ($70 at NAPA). For larger areas like rockers I use a drill with a wire wheels on it, very quick but dirty.

[Smoothie]

Chemical stripping worked well for me. I actually did much of mine with a razor blade scraper alone and no stripper, but the rest was done with the chem. Another advantage to chem stripping is you don't damage the galvanized coating on the sheet metal.

I've about 28 pics of the fun I had stripping my car starting here - http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/smoothies931pics/detail?.dir=/14dcre2&.dnm=1b4cre2.jpg&.src=ph

The "Low Odor Aircraft Remover" here is what I used (don't believe their claim of "virtually no odor", but I guess it could be worse) - http://www.kleanstripauto.com/products/removers.html
I found it at Autozone for about $20/gallon (NAPA's equivalent was $40/gal). It took more than 1 gallon, but I used it to strip a lot of body filler as well.

Don't use chem stripper on the sunroof if you have one - they're made of fiberglass. -And obviously keep it off of the plastic light lenses.
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"..it's made in Germany. You know the Germans always make good stuff."


'82 924T, US version, dark green metallic, 5 speed Audi 016G gearbox

[356speedster]

There also exist companies that can dip a whole chassis in a "chemical strip bath"


Image from www.bs-teknikk.no

A company here in Norway (pic) charges $1200 - $1800 depending on the overall condition of the chassis. Not cheap but might be worth it if you are restoring a true classic car
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1982 Porsche 924 na My 924 blog
1990 Porsche 928 S4 My 928 blog
1995 Fiat barchetta
2007 BMW 318d M-Sport
2010 Volvo V50

[NEMESIS]

There are places here in the states that do the chemical dip for $500-$750

You can also take your chassis to a professional media blasting company and have it hammered with walnut shells for about the same.

Not at all what I would do with a 924 though.

I would just sand it down, repair any bad areas and then spray it.

[AndyFranklin]

If you get the car dipped it will strip EVERYTHING to bare metal - including the undercoating and all the interior soundproofing. Here in Cleveland the cost is $400-500 to do it.

If you are just wanting to remove all the paint from the exterior, I've done a combination of the "Aircraft Stripper". braided wire cups and wheels in the angle grinder, and flapper wheels in the grinder. Anything other than wire wheels is probably too agressive for street use.

The final touch for me will be to DA the surface to remove the deeper scratches. then prime with a high-fill primer. Of course, this will do a number on the galvanizing - which is OK for the track but probably not for the street.

Be patient with the stripper, cover it as the instruction say. It will probably take two applications. Wirewheel it off after the paint is loosened.

[jjames]

Well I finally decided to go with tha chemical stripper and it works great. It took the red (2nd paint job) right off in seconds. My car is actually white.I am now going to repaint her white as,I am restoring her to her original glory. The stripper seems to be having a harder time with the original paint but, I am confident it will work. Thanks for your input everyone. I will post some pics of the progress soon.