Paint Removal

Roger Buchanan · Post by **Roger Buchanan** » 23 Sep 2009 12:23 pm

I bought an older model D-10 Shobud, and the previous owner (or owners) painted the wood cabinet black. Not a bad job, looks kinda pretty. However, they also painted the aluminum end and side plates black. I want to remove the black paint and bring back the shine to the aluminum, but have no idea what to use to strip the paint off. Got any ideas on what I can use?

Jimmie Martin · Post by **Jimmie Martin** » 23 Sep 2009 12:31 pm

lacquer thinner

Bent Romnes · Post by **Bent Romnes** » 23 Sep 2009 12:33 pm

Roger, I suggest you sand the paint off. Don't even try stripper, it will just wreck the aluminum. Anything like lacquer thinner..stay away from it. Some people say don't even get near it with Windex.

Start with 220 sandpaper. If it don't seem to do the trick, start with courser, maybe 150.
Once the paint is taken off with the course paper, work your way up thru the grits: 220, 320, 400, and 600

Then you need to polish with the buffing wheels and polishing compound. If this is more than you want to do, look up a shop that does motorcycle chrome polishing.

Bent Romnes · Post by **Bent Romnes** » 23 Sep 2009 2:11 pm

Roger, Just to clarify... I was writing my post and Jimmie posted his just a couple of minutes before mine.

So my advice is not meant to be contrary to Jimmmie's, a man of maybe more experience.

However, my advice about sandpaper stands.

John Coop · Post by **John Coop** » 23 Sep 2009 3:23 pm

Roger...I told myself that I would never post again on the Forum...but, I can't see letting someone go through unnecessary hassle. The first thing that you have to consider is that these Sho~Bud castings are JUNK with a capital J...I have worked all my life out in the industrial world with every casting alloy known to man. I HAVE NEVER WORKED WITH SUCH JUNK AS THESE Sho~Bud CASTINGS!!! Your best bet is to pull them from the body, find an automotive machine shop that has a glass bead cabinet, and get them glass beaded. After that, send them to Bud's Polishing in Pegram, Tennessee. Doug Moss has a GOD GIVEN GIFT to take these "SALS EARS" and make a silk purse out of them. I will also say that he is not a "MAGICIAN"...you can put lipstick on a HOG, but it's still a HOG!!!!!!!!!! He makes these castings look the very best that they have any chance of being. I don't know what alloy they were using to cast these, but I sure would not to have parts cast from it. Hope this helps...Coop

Pat Comeau · Post by **Pat Comeau** » 23 Sep 2009 5:13 pm

I had good results with lacquer thinner...not the cheap stuff

i meant the real lacquer thinner, i get them in 5 gallon and it cleans anything, just soaked them for a few hours and it will come off easy with a smooth brush, no disrespect Bent

but lacquer thinner is the best thing to get paint off anything, that's what they use in stripping old furnitures they have a big bin that they put the furnitures in and after they just scrap off the paint or varnish, :)that way it saves you alot of sanding.

Pat C

Jimmie Martin · Post by **Jimmie Martin** » 23 Sep 2009 5:25 pm

You can take formica off of counter tops with lacquer thinner. I have helped my dad do it a hundred times. Dad owned his own kitchen building business for years.

Bent Romnes · Post by **Bent Romnes** » 23 Sep 2009 5:31 pm

Pat, Jimmie, formica off of countertops is one thing.
Can you guarantee that those same endplates look just as shiny a year from now, after the thinner has maybe ate thru and pitted the aluminum?

Just to be sure, I think I'll stick to my sandpaper and buffing.

Jimmie Martin · Post by **Jimmie Martin** » 23 Sep 2009 5:39 pm

Thats fine.

Jerry Roller · Post by **Jerry Roller** » 23 Sep 2009 6:20 pm

Roger, sanding will not get the paint out of the pits and will cause surface scratches that you will be working on getting out for a very long time. Use the lacquer thinner and finish with lacquer thinner and a stiff toothbrush to get the paint out of the pits, then wash them with soap and water and polish them. Lets hope the paint is not on them to hide some patched up damage. Lacquer thinner has nothing in it that will hurt aluminum. Check and see what a paint spray gun is made out of.
Jerry

James Morehead · Post by **James Morehead** » 23 Sep 2009 6:35 pm

Concerning laquer thinner, if shobud endplates were made of the same thing aluminum sprayguns were made of(quality aluminum?), you'd be ok. Meaning no disrespect to anyone, the Aluminum by itself might be fine, but the other alloy metals used with the aluminum are the unknowns in this equation. They might chemicaly react in a way you won't like, so I'd be careful. JMO for what it's worth. Some times the chemical reaction never ends, even with some types of aluminum.

Concerning sanding, you will likely open up a nasty can of worms there, too. When you get into these old castings with sandpaper, you will soon discover hundreds of pinholes that appear---try to sand out a hundred of them, and they turn into two-hundred blah blah. Tread lightly, it's thin ice concerning these old castings.

Jim Sliff · Post by **Jim Sliff** » 23 Sep 2009 6:52 pm

but lacquer thinner is the best thing to get paint off anything, that's what they use in stripping old furnitures they have a big bin that they put the furnitures in and after they just scrap off the paint or varnish,

That is absolutely incorrect, against the law and outright dangerous. I've spent 35+ years in the paint/coatings business on the technical end and have visited application/removal sites from high rises to houses and abrasive blasting facilities to furniture strippers. None of the professional strippers use lacquer thinner tanks - the fire and OSHA regulations/inspectors would have them shut down in half a day. They use several blends of materials, primarily water based in compliance with air quality regulations. You simply CANNOT have an open "dip tank" of lacquer thinner. It would go by another name - "bomb".

Also, just stating "lacquer thinner" without knowing what paint is on the surface is a crapshoot. If they happened to paint it with a polyester or urethane (which is VERY common) lacquer thinner won't touch it.

Lacquer thinner MAY get off the paint if it's water-based or conventional oil-based (alkyd) - but it may not - some acrylics are very resistant to solvents when cured. And lacquer thinner WILL destroy any plastic (Formica, some fretboards and tuner buttons, hex tuners, washers etc).

I'm also not a great fan of sanding IF the surface is going to be left bare - it's a lot of work to remove the paint and then go through 6 to 10 grades of progressively finer sandpaper to remove scratches and obtain an even finish. 150 is far too course to start with, and 220, 320, 400, and 600 won't get it to a "polish-ready" level...you need to get through 800, 1000, 1200, 1500 and finally 2000 before using polishing (NEVER rubbing) compound.
Don't ever take a recommendation about HOW to remove paint unless you know WHAT the paint is. Take the instrument to an industrial paint distributor - many auto paint distributors also sell industrial coatings, or find an industrial coatings store. They can try small amounts of chemicals to ID the paint - and it may wipe off with something as simple as goof-off, go-gone, VM&P naphtha (aka "lighter fluid" - which everyone who works on guitars regularly keeps around).

Rule of thumb is use the least aggressive remover you can find, then polish the surface. Glass bead blasting can be done, but it's usually not cheap, and the final polishing is labor-intensive.

If you want a flawless, polished-aluminum finish then Coop's idea is great. But if you just want to get the paint off and do a reasonable-decent polishing jobI'd really suggest my removal method followed by polishing with whatever will get you the half-way decent finish you'll get without extreme measures (just a personal opinion - but if those castings NEVER looked real nice when new then making them look flawless is akin to refinishing a vintage guitar - it may look nice, but it's not original.)

And as someone mentioned - do NOT let anything with ammonia in it contact the aluminum. Windex and other ammonia-based cleaners will, even after wiping off, leave a chemical residue that will attack and pit aluminum. That is a non-recoverable error.

Jerry Roller · Post by **Jerry Roller** » 23 Sep 2009 6:53 pm

When I tear a guitar down I degrease the parts with lacquer thinner, never had a problem with it. I did use some cleaner with lye in it that caused some problems before I got it neutralized with water. I'm sorry for adding to the confusion.
Jerry

John Coop · Post by **John Coop** » 23 Sep 2009 7:58 pm

Bud and his son Doug did ALL of the buffing and polishing for Sho~Bud...I don't know what process Doug uses ( he won't show me )but it works. I have sent him some castings that looked like the running years of bad luck and he made them look good.Those endplates on that Maverick were glass beaded...cost me $15.00 for the pair...the machine work done on them...and then sent to Doug. As you can see in the pics, they look pretty good. Cost...about $40.00 for the pair plus postage...a set of D-10 endplates...probably about $50.00 plus postage...Coop

Roger Buchanan · Post by **Roger Buchanan** » 23 Sep 2009 8:16 pm

WOW, I never expected this many replies, but sure do appreciate each and every one. All of your answer's are worth looking into, and I will take a lot of the advice given. Thanks again for all who replied to me.

Jim Sliff · Post by **Jim Sliff** » 23 Sep 2009 8:17 pm

Man,at those prices Coop quoted I'd say that's the best and most convenient choice!

chris ivey · Post by **chris ivey** » 24 Sep 2009 9:36 am

sow's ear

Bent Romnes · Post by **Bent Romnes** » 24 Sep 2009 10:18 am

chris who cares

chris ivey · Post by **chris ivey** » 24 Sep 2009 11:30 am

well i just found out i did ten years of gigs on a steel made out of junk.

Bill Ford · Post by **Bill Ford** » 25 Sep 2009 6:55 am

Inlay/banding is another thing to consider. Liquid remover of any kind tends to seep into/under everything. The inlay may look OK now, but down the road it may start to lift.

As far as the endplates..Coop guitars look very good..why argue with that kind of success, I would go with his suggestion. On a set of endplates I beadblasted, then later decided to polish them turned out good, they were made from drawn stock and welded,not cast.

Cris, The cast parts on all the early guitars were "junk" compared to today's psg parts. It was a learning process. Would you even consider the purchase of a guitar made today, if it had 1/2" changer fingers instead of what Coop, Zum, Williams,etc put on their guitars today?

John Billings · Post by **John Billings** » 25 Sep 2009 7:23 am

Here's a fine quality casting from 1967! My pedal rack had a meteorite or something in it! Durn things knocked the teeth right off one of my files. Hadda get another pedal bar from Coop.

BTW, what era ShoBud are we talkin' about here? Many ShoBud/Baldwin guitars had black wrinkle finished endplates/frames.

JR Ross · Post by **JR Ross** » 25 Sep 2009 7:48 am

Jim Stiff...I have a new Mullen G2 and I have trouble polishing the front of the pedal rack which is brushed aluminum....

Would it be OK to use lacquer thinner and 600 grit steel wool to clean it and then wipe off and polish with either Mothers paste car wax or Happich Semichrome Polishing Paste? I use the Happich which I get at the Harly shop on the smooth aluminum (no steel wool) and it WORKS GREAT. iT TAKES OFF A LOT OF BLACK LIKE TARNISH JUST LIKE SILVER CLEANER DOES. RAGS ARE NO GOOD AFTER USE SO i DISPOSE OF THEM ..

For some reason the brushed Aluminum holds the tarnish and is much harder to polish than the smooth surfaces like the end plates

Jim Sliff · Post by **Jim Sliff** » 27 Sep 2009 6:34 am

JR - Yes, you should be fine - except for the sore elbow!

Progressively finer abrasives, when used properly, will improve the look of tarnished aluminum. If the stuff is deeply pitted, though, you may never get it smooth.

Jerry Roller · Post by **Jerry Roller** » 29 Sep 2009 7:57 am

JR, the "jewel" finish or "brushed" finishes on aluminum are not meant to be polished or rubbed out. Just need to clean them. I use aluminum wheel cleaner to keep these type finishes looking nice.
Jerry

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Paint Removal

Paint Removal

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Paint Removing

Paint Removal

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