easy way to strip paint from entire caliper assembly?

[Draven]

Well, I've had my first good look at my calipers while stripping the paint off them ,and it seems the bright spark who painted them red did so with the pads and clips attached. As a result, *everything* in the caliper assembly has red paint on it, from the pads, to the clips, retaining pins, bleed valve.. everything.

I have started removing the red paint with a razor, but this is a relatively slow process. I had thought to use a dremel with wire brush attachment for all the grooves in the supra 4-pots, but I was thinking there has to be a less labour-intensive way to do this.

Has anyone had experience? I was thinking paint-on paint stripper (that gel stuff you can buy at bunnings) or something similar (sure, it'd probably ruin the seals, but I'm planning on a new set of seals anyhow).

Any other ideas?

[MWP]

I used a wire brush on a drill to clean off mine.
I dont know if that would be too harsh for your calipers though (i assume they are alloy).

[kingmick]

Paint stripper then clean then up with thinners! Thats how i would do it!

[barned01]

gasket cleaner that comes in a preasurised spray can was good for removing paint from my engine block.
it is a slightly acidic gel like mix that bubbles for about 30 seconds when you put it on.

[slide86]

maybe some brake fluid? its a pretty good paint stripper you know.

[kingmick]

lmao but not if you want to repaint them!

[Draven]

exactly mick.
I might make a detour via bunnings today and see what they have in the way of metal paint stripper. I've got a tin of prepsol around to wash off any residue

[lumpy]

There's a few of kinds of paint stripper - methylene chloride based, caustic based and the "environmentally friendly" stripper which is mainly n-methyl-pyrillodone. The methylene chloride is not that great for you health-wise, but is fast and comes in a thick gel so you can "paint" it on. Will most likely root the seals as well.

Evrionmentally frienldy stripper is better for you but works a bit slower - put it on, leave for an hour or two and was it off. You can get this in an aerosol can (Citristrip) as well which comes in handy for tight spots etc. Less likely to root seals but no guarantees.

Much easier to get paint off metal than timber! Stay away from acidic strippers if your calipers are alloy. Caustic based strippers can work well but I've not had much to do with them.

[Draven]

cheers lumpy, exactly the sort of info I was after

[Grega]

get that industrial brake cleaner stuff in a pressure pak can. that cleans paint, brake dust, skin, fingernails, everything off. i had good success when i did my calipers with this.

wear breathing stuff and do it in an open space. this stuff made me ill post usage.

[Draven]

Grega - would this product have a name or place to buy from?

[Grega]

VHT brake cleaner matey
http://www.speco.com.au/vht_chemicals.html
I got mind from Supercheap
Again, please be very careful using this stuff. Its very toxic.

[YLD-16L]

please be very careful using this stuff. Its very toxic.

My brake cleaner pressure pack had a sticker on it alerting me to the fact that "..this product is known to cause cancer and birth defects in the state of California..." - thankfully I don't live there so I will be fine

I am in the process of doing the exact same job as you Draven but I have the calipers stripped down so they will be prepped (using a wire wheel and prepsol) then painted and rebuilt with all new seals and dust boots etc. They will be painted in black VHT caliper paint even though fluoro green was veeeeerry tempting

[oldcorollas]

There's a few of kinds of paint stripper - methylene chloride based, caustic based and the "environmentally friendly" stripper which is mainly n-methyl-pyrillodone. .

stay away from caustic cleaners for alloy also.... we used to muck around with NaOH and aluminium to make hydrogen ( )

ethylene chloride? or methyl chloride (carbon tetrachloride?) (can't have methylene )
CCl4 is nasty nasty shit and should not be used by anyone....

avoid any cleaners or "metal brighteners" with hydroflouric acid.

http://www.speco.com.au/vhtmsds.html

that brake cleaner looks to be naptha, acetone and hexane.... not too nasty, but you wouldn't give it to your kids to drink...

oh... look at the MSDS for whatever product you want to try (it must be available by law for any chemicals sold in Aus)

as for grinding, there are some neat 3M discs (i got mine from blackwoods) that you can mount on dremel and it works well.. they are used at Qantas (or used to be) for cleaning paint and shite off alloy panels.... there is hard and soft.. hard you can use for porting soft is for polishing.....

[lumpy]

Yeah yeah I know I'm a lazy chemist for using common/trade names. It's dichloromethane.

http://www.nicnas.gov.au/Publication...loride_PDF.pdf

Food for thought!

NMP ain't great either but a lot nicer than ChCl2