bought an old Monark and am wanting to strip and paint. Liquid stripper or grind it off? Anyone tried it or something better? Thx for any and all help

Check pricing, take and have it sand blasted.

DO NOT Grind it off. You can blast it with very fine coal slag or glass beads, maybe even walnut shells(my preference) without damaging the aluminum. All that blasting media is available and you can probably buy a small blaster for the same cost as paying someone else to blast it. I have done a lot of blasting but not on aluminum. You can get everything really nice and clean with this process.

Liquid stripper could damage the aluminum, not sure, but if you leave any of it on there in the cracks and crevices, the new paint will not adhere. It will bubble up and peel off.

Also, I think you need to use zinc chromate primer, but some of the newer Epoxy primers may work well on aluminum. SPI (Southern Polyurethanes, Inc) are great products, You can call them and talk directly to the owner and he can advise the best products to use and his stuff is reasonably priced compared to other similar products.

Wayne

thx for all the help. TFF is truly a family deal. Glad to be part of it.

I painted an old aluminum boat I had one time. I used a vinegar and baking soda mix and I scrubbed the hull with it twice. Rinsing it well after. I used a very light grit sand paper on the dents and dings to even them out. I bought paint a Sherman Williams. A primer for aluminum and a epoxy paint that the guy recommended. It lasted for years and looked pretty good.

thx Ray. see you tomorrow

I used the paint stripper Walmart sells . I only would do a small area at a time and cover the paint stripper with cheap plastic painters tarp from home depot . stick the plastic right onto the stripper, wait 15 minutes and pressure wash it off . The plastic helps the paint stripper not dry out so quickly and it seems to get more paint to come loose . I used baking soda water to neutralize the acid in the paint stripper .

aircraft stripper, wal mart carries it in gallon size.

use the plastic method darrell described and it should come real clean

Stripping and painting that boat is like getting your grandmaw a facelift. It's still old and not worth much more if any than before. Not to mention the life expectancy of Eric keeping a boat for any length of time is months at best. I know you plan to keep this one a while. No charge for my sage advice and I wish you the best.

I've redone two aluminum boats in the past four years. I stripped one with paint stripper. The other, a 62-year-old boat, still had the original zinc chromate primer from 1958, so I just sanded it. NAPA carries Martin-Senour zinc chromate primer in spray cans. I used that, and Majic spray paint from Tractor Supply to finish. About a month ago a guy at a boat ramp asked me if my 1958 boat was new! IslandJim

This must be what you were inquiring on the wet blast idea for. There are medias out there (corn cob, walnut shell, and various plastics) that you can use dry. Also there are paint removal discs from 3M that work amazingly well. All will work on an aluminum boat. If it has multiple coats of paint, honestly since they took the methylene chloride out of paint strippers, you'll be on it for weeks using them. Mechanical is a lot more work, but it's a lot faster. Wet blast is fast, but even wet, it's a colossal mess. That was the great thing about the wet baking soda system. The baking soda dissolved when it got wet. No cleanup.


this is the paint removal disc from 3M

i am not to worried about sand clean up as my year is ALL sand lol Thx for advice.

Can I still buy strippper WITH MC still in?