Andrew Bodenham
Member
- Messages
- 441
- Location
- North Lancs
MdB,
Nice looking doors, which will look lovely when restored. On similar tasks I've used a combination approach, sanding the large flat faces (using a random orbit sander with dust extractor attached) and scraping the mouldings back to the wood with cabinet scrapers, shavehooks, chisels or whatever works best. If you've got fiddly mouldings then a solvent stripper is probably the best way - I have had good results with Rustins Strypit, which is similar to Nitromors. For larger areas I use the hot air gun.
Avoid commercial dip-strippers at all costs. I tried that route once, and had real trouble neutralising the caustic residues afterwards. Also can be very detrimental to the structure of joinery.
As others have said sound old paint has a certain charm, and if it doesn't need to come off then why bother? But more probably it's flaking off already, and liberally textured with carpet fluff and entombed woodlice, with dribbles on the edges like candlewax. In which case it's time to get stripping and scraping and sanding. All best done out of doors, and with suitable PPE.
Nice looking doors, which will look lovely when restored. On similar tasks I've used a combination approach, sanding the large flat faces (using a random orbit sander with dust extractor attached) and scraping the mouldings back to the wood with cabinet scrapers, shavehooks, chisels or whatever works best. If you've got fiddly mouldings then a solvent stripper is probably the best way - I have had good results with Rustins Strypit, which is similar to Nitromors. For larger areas I use the hot air gun.
Avoid commercial dip-strippers at all costs. I tried that route once, and had real trouble neutralising the caustic residues afterwards. Also can be very detrimental to the structure of joinery.
As others have said sound old paint has a certain charm, and if it doesn't need to come off then why bother? But more probably it's flaking off already, and liberally textured with carpet fluff and entombed woodlice, with dribbles on the edges like candlewax. In which case it's time to get stripping and scraping and sanding. All best done out of doors, and with suitable PPE.