Sunday, June 27, 2010

Some stripping, and application trial

(or my search for stripper proof gloves)

Began the day watching Argentina beating Mexico, at least the first half. Mexico can always be counted on to resort to dirty play and today was was no exception. I saw a half dozen Mexicans foul Messi, the idea being that each could get no more than a yellow. Once the pattern became obvious the referee could have shown a red.

I had three goals for today. Strip the paint from the headlight buckets, try out the sprayer on POR-15, and start filling the welded areas at the nose. I wanted to try stripping the buckets because sandblasting would remove too much at the rusted areas, and as it turns out the shop's media blaster is busted.

Next stop, Redline for supplies. Paint stripper, rubber gloves, two small cans of POR-15, Epoxy Filler.

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As I prepared to strip the headlight buckets I noticed that one of the parts that sit behinds the light had a different design. Why?

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The stripping went very well, except after about fifteen minutes I could feel my hands burning. I paid $15.00 for professional gloves, and they did not protect against paint stripper. It turns out I tossed my plastic sheeting when I painted the Lotus, so for lunch I went to Home Depot for plastic and more gloves.

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After lunch I did a second round of stripping. Most of the paint was gone, but the new gloves were no better, despite being labeled for stripping.

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As expected the painting took longer to set up for than to do. I masked some places I did not want painted, laid out the plastic as a drop cloth, put on my painters coveralls, the heavy latex gloves from Home Depot, loaded one can of POR-15 in the sprayer, put on my mask and goggles.

The sprayer would not spray. I thought the paint was too thick, so to continue the experiment I added some POR-15 solvent. Still no luck. I called it a failure. Since I was all dressed and had maybe four ounces of paint left so I brushed it on, making a terrific mess in the process.

Now I am waiting to see if the solvent messes up the paint. The shop is closed next week for the Fourth of July holiday, so in two weeks we'll know.

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I now had droplets of paint where I wanted to put filler, so that was out. I ended the day wire brushing the last of the paint from the headlight buckets.

I wonder if anyone makes gloves that protect against real paint stripper?

2 comments:

Gary Dunn said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Gary Dunn said...

Monday update -- I discovered I have POR-15 freckles on my forehead. I'll post again when they are gone.