What chemical products do you use?

How is the clean-up?

Do you use the type that gets hard?

If so what brand.

I just need to the firewall and inner fenders of a car for an underhood extreme makeover.

Thanks
PLY478
Rich

I use aircraft stripper - the brand Autozone sells. I put it on very heavy and cover quickly with thin plastic. The plastic keeps it wet and helps it work better and longer. Let it work for an hour or two and scrape. It usually takes 2-3 applications to get all the paint off. I found the toughest is the original factory epoxy primer. It needs physical scrubbing, either a wire brush or a stainless pot scrubber even with the stripper. Plan on at least a couple pairs of good chemical resistant gloves if you use the pot scrubber.

I used Aircraft stripper years ago & it was very effective, I tried it again last year & was completely disappointed... Back it the 80's that stuff was mean, brush it on, spray it on didn't matter, some paint would wrinkle immediately & the tougher paint took waiting 15-20 minutes & sometimes two applications.... The stuff I tried on a door last year just sat there, I covered it with plastic & waited an hour, it softened the paint but barely....

The old stuff would leave you bare clean steel quickly. hell I stripped a whole Challenger convertible in about five hours, that included all exterior, door & trunk jambs & the engine compartment....

This new EPA approved stuff after over an hour barely touched the one repaint & didn't touch the original paint.....

Try scoring the painted surface with a rough grit sandpaper first. The scratches made by the sandpaper help the stripper to work into the paint faster. Covering it with plastic after you apply the stripper is very effective also.

The local hardware stores have several brands of stripper and I have tried most of them with less than great results. They won't touch the factory paint at all, but work ok for removing a cheap repaint.

For an engine compartment I would be carefull using it because of all the panel joints. If any stripper works its way underneath and doesn't get completely removed it could cause paint adhesion issues.

I stripped my engine compartment to bare metal with 3M stripping discs and then hand sanded the tight spots by hand with 80 grit. Not as fast as media blasting, but it was far cheaper since the discs are $7.00 or so at the hardware store.

I guess I should have elaborated, when I did the Challenger I used Duct Tape to tape off the areas with seams I was concerned about to keep the stripper out then stripped those areas with a D/A.. But since the new stuff isn't worth wasting time & money on I would just pick up a 8" bondo hog & a box of 80 grit....