Best way to remove paint?

guitarslingerchris

guitarslingerchris

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Well, I have an older Lian Li PC-65 that I had painted the majority of the interior glossy white several years ago, and it's time for that to come off.

My first thought was sanding it down, but even drilling out all the rivets that would be an especially agonizing task and I'm certain it wouldn't get the job 100% done.

Next I thought of paint remover, but I wasn't sure about any effects on the underlying aluminum, or where I could use the product. I don't have access to a driveway/hose or large buckets and such to soak the case and then wash it off, my best guess of something I could use is my shower but I'm thinking that it would be bad to wash down all that junk through the drain.


So anyone with some insight to removing paint on the inside of a pc case, I'm looking for you!
 
Yea, im actually looking for this too, for a laptop case maybe :/, would be cool if someone helped us out :)
 
aircraft stripper will do the job, but it's VERY dangerous stuff if you don't take proper precautions. Use it outside (or in a large, open garage with proper ventilation) and use rubber gloves/goggles when you apply it.

it should come off VERY easy though and it's safe for aluminum
 
dr.stevil said:
aircraft stripper will do the job, but it's VERY dangerous stuff if you don't take proper precautions. Use it outside (or in a large, open garage with proper ventilation) and use rubber gloves/goggles when you apply it.

it should come off VERY easy though and it's safe for aluminum
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He asked for something to use like in his shower, so I am guessing he does not have access to anything where he can work out side, so stripper is a bad idea for closed spaces.

Is the paint peeling, chipping or in any other way losing adhesion? If no, then don't remove it, scuff it and paint it. There is no reason to remove a coating if it is well adhered, unless it is not compatible with the new coating system. So save your self some time and money and don't strip it.
 
BlueFireIce said:
He asked for something to use like in his shower, so I am guessing he does not have access to anything where he can work out side, so stripper is a bad idea for closed spaces.
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I can work outside if I need to, but the ability to wash stuff away is not really an option. I don't really have any large buckets or anything that I can think of to soak the case in and whatnot.


BlueFireIce said:
Is the paint peeling, chipping or in any other way losing adhesion? If no, then don't remove it, scuff it and paint it. There is no reason to remove a coating if it is well adhered, unless it is not compatible with the new coating system. So save your self some time and money and don't strip it.
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The paint isn't in poor shape because of it's adhesive properties, it's more my own lack of upkeep. It was running an old p4 box in my garage when I lived in Oklahoma and it had dead bugs adhered to the bottom; I found a dead mouse underneath it from crawling under and not making it back out on TWO seperate occasions, etc. So as you can imagine the case is somewhat filthy and I'd like to just start over from scratch and maybe use a different color.

Painting over the other paint really isn't a viable option in my opinion either just based on the clearance issues I had with the original paint job. If I had the money and time I would take it to get sandblasted and powdercoated like I did with my PC-71B but I can't manage that right now and I need a usable case in the next week or so.
 
Clean it with scotchbright and scuff-It gel. Dirty is no reason to remove the paint, as your only other option is sand blasting, or full disassembly and hours stripping and scrapping with a wire brush.
 
obviously you shouldnt be cleaning it in the shower. unless the paint is water-based, which i doubt, then you shouldnt wash it, let alone the stripper, down the drain. even with aircraft stripper you still have to be able to scrape everything off, and you will not get in the corners and holes and stuff. id say go to the store and get a small trash can or a rubbermaid plastic tub or something for 10 bucks. then soak it in paint stripper in there a couple times until clean. otherwise, and even if you do it this way, i suggest you drill out the pop rivets and do it right. either strip it or sand it down, and then reapply paint and pop rivet it back together. a rivet gun is like 20 bucks, and rivets will run you 2 or 3 dollars. itll give you much better results than trying to scrape inside those nook and crannies.

i do love aircraft paint stripper if you want to use some serious power. that stuff is amazing. very nasty though. :p
 
If you don't have access to a water supply, stripping it yourself is simply out.

I would suggest looking up a radiator repair place locally, and have them dip it in the strip tank. This will not harm the aluminum, and will cost you very little money, while saving you some serious grief.
 
Ayrton said:
If you don't have access to a water supply, stripping it yourself is simply out.

I would suggest looking up a radiator repair place locally, and have them dip it in the strip tank. This will not harm the aluminum, and will cost you very little money, while saving you some serious grief.
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I like this idea very much. As far as fully disassembling the case, I've pretty much already decided to do just that and I have plenty of leftover rivets from working on other cases. There are several scuffs/scratches on the case so it'll need alot of sanding in and out before it's ready for paint again.
 
BlueFireIce said:
Dirty is no reason to remove the paint, as your only other option is sand blasting, or full disassembly and hours stripping and scrapping with a wire brush.
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Dirty in this case is plenty reason to remove the paint. As this machine was pretty much forgotten in a dirty garage for 2 years there is gunk that's somewhat irremovable without removing a large amount of paint in areas that are not accessible to sanding.

I never really thought I'd be one of those people to make a pc into a garbage can, but I am. :( That's the problem with having too many PCs I guess.
 
I called several places today, first being a radiator repair shop who told me that their strip tank, and most radiator shops, would eat the aluminum pretty badly. He told me to call transmission shops, so I did that and a couple of them were worried because of the heat and force of their washers, but I found a shop that was fairly confident the case would survive so I took it down at lunch. He told me their solution was at 260 degrees when it left the nozzle, another shop told me theirs was ~200 degrees, so I imagine it varies alot between shops you look at.

I'll update with pics and more info when I pick it up later today in case anyone else needs this done.
 
Well I lied, I didn't take pics yet. I picked up my case, and about 90% of the paint was completely gone, leaving behind a nice shiny aluminum finish. The other 10% was there COMPLETELY due to the fact that the case was still in one piece. Had I taken off the roof, etc it would have been 100% clean.

So all in all, I'd highly recommend it if you take the case apart. As for me, I went by AutoZone and snagged a can of Aircraft Remover and I'm just hoping I can wipe most of it away and then rinse off the remainder.
 
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