Stripping Hornby Dublo Loco Paint

[John Isherwood]

Fifty years ago, when I last stripped a Hornby Dublo loco, I reached for the good old, reliable, Nitromors; but this, I gather, is now pretty ineffective.

 

I need to strip a HD breakdown crane and I would welcome suggestions.

 

I have a heated ultrasonic cleaning tank, and I wonder whether a very hot, strong solution of caustic soda crystals would be effective / advisable. The crane body is solely mazak - is this likely to be adversely affected by such treatment?

 

Alternatively, can anyone advise a product or treatment that will effectively remove HD's very tenacious paint?

 

Many thanks in anticipation,

John Isherwood.

[Shed Driver]

Hi John

 

In the past I have used caustic soda to strip paint of mazak.  not hot but room temp. Crystals mixed in a jam jar with water.  Crystals in to the water not water to the crystals; it is a very exothermic reaction.

 

These days for paint striping on models I use Mr Muscle oven cleaner.

Since its a metal body how about cellulose thinners/brush cleaner

Norman

Edited September 1, 2022 by Shed Driver

[John Isherwood]

1 hour ago, Shed Driver said:

Hi John

 

In the past I have used caustic soda to strip paint of mazak.  not hot but room temp. Crystals mixed in a jam jar with water.  Crystals in to the water not water to the crystals; it is a very exothermic reaction.

 

These days for paint striping on models I use Mr Muscle oven cleaner.

Since its a metal body how about cellulose thinners/brush cleaner

Norman

 

Thank you for your input; I too resort to Mr. Muscle for plastic bodies, but HD paint has a deserved reputation for durability.

 

I have cellulose thinners in stock, so I will try that first.

 

Regards,

John Isherwood.

[ozzyo]

Do you have a grit blaster?

 

That will get rid of the HD paint and leave a nice finish on the metal.

 

HTH

 

OzzyO.

[John Isherwood]

53 minutes ago, ozzyo said:

Do you have a grit blaster?

 

That will get rid of the HD paint and leave a nice finish on the metal.

 

HTH

 

OzzyO.

 

Unfortunately not - the HD components are currently soaking in cellulose thinners; (my wife very kindly lent me a suitable glass vase)!

 

First indications are that, especially around areas of chipped paint, the chemical bath is doing the necessary.

 

John Isherwood.

[didcot]

I have had reasonable results with neat Dettol on plastic kits. It's lifted Halfords spray paints.

[DCB]

It's all very well stripping the H/D paint but you're not gong to find anything like as durable to replace it.

[John Isherwood]

4 hours ago, DCB said:

It's all very well stripping the H/D paint but you're not gong to find anything like as durable to replace it.

 

Trouble is - H-D crane paint is red, I need black!

 

Plus, anyone who has stripped a H-D 8F tender will have been amazed at the detail that is revealed; H-D paint was THICK!

 

CJI.

[cypherman]

Hi all,

I used caustic soda to strip these H/D cranes when I restored them with good effect.

[Torper]

As an experiment I recently tried repainting a Hornby-Dublo super detail coach.  Other than to rub down a rust patch I left the original paint finish as it was, sprayed the whole thing with primer, and then with enamel paint.  I wasn't happy with the finish so dunked the whole lot in an ultrasonic bath, tap water and 10% allendale electronics concentrated ultrasonic soloution,  set the temperature at 50 degrees and the time at 50 minutes, and left it to get on with it.  When I came back the enamel and primer had been stripped and most of the Hornby Dublo paint had gone as well.  Another few minutes finished the job and I've been leftwith a completely bare-metal body shell.

 

DT

[Prometheus]

As has been said, caustic soda - a strong mix - usually does for the paint on HD mazac models. In fact the only paint it wouldn't touch for some reason was that on a Wrenn Castle: I had that bead-blasted in the end.

 

Tony 

[Pandora]

We have dealt with Hornby Dublo,   how do we deal with Wrenn?

Is the paint on a metal-body Wrenn model the same formulation as Dublo?

 

[SR71]

Detol did the job for me on an N2 this year. One thing I've found on several locos that surprised me (and that unfortunately also came off while stripping) is a red compound had been used to fill out a few rough areas of the castings. No primer though.