"Stripping paint -- will Pine-Sol ruin my plastic figures?" Topic

Okay, so felt-tip pen isn't doing what I want, unless the effect I'm striving for is "dude, what preschooler detailed your car?" Might need to strip it all away and start over.

But is Pine-Sol too strong? Is it going to corrode the plastic under my paint?

Something better, hopefully still cheap, for removing paints?

thx

Thomas, I tried Pine-Sol in the past and it did soften the figure up considerably. I have had MUCH better luck with "Simple Green". It does a better job loosening the paint up, had no impact at all on the plastic figures, and it smells better to boot!

But can't you just laser the paint off?

I use it on plastics regularly. It does not damage the hard GW plastics used for LOTR or WFB. There are other types of plastic, so testing might be in order.

IMO it is not too strong and works well.

Yes.

Especially, when used with GW primer.

I generally recommend Simple Green or Castrol Super Clean as a starter. If those do not work, I move up to Easy Off Oven Cleaner.

I've used it to take the chrome off plastic model parts and it did seem to soften those a bit but didn't deform them. Worked fine for that purpose IMO but I'd hesitate using it on my plastic miniatures.

I use Fantastik brand cleaner. Let soak for a day or two and paint softens right up requiring just a little work with brush to remove stubborn bits. I have used this on hard and soft plastic with no ill effects on the figures.

Simple Green is one of the better (some argue best and I cannot disagree) stripping agents for plastic (especially hard plastic) figures. Another solution to try is Castrol Superclean engine cleaner from the motor vehicle section of a large store like Wal-Mart, K-Mart, or an auto parts store. Castrol Superclean is designed to remove most anything from plastic and metal parts without damaging the plastic or metal parts on engines. The hard plastic figures fit in there somewhere in the substances it doesn't affect in my experience. I've let them soak for 48+ hours in the solution without issues, the same with Simple Green. Pine-Sol can cause issues.

Yes. Pine-sol melts plastic like butter.
Don't use it, ever, on plastic.

All the other advice above is good.
Simple Green is excellent for stripping plastic.

Simple green changed it's formula this year and no longer contains 2-butoxethanol. So though I've used it in the past, I can't vouch for how good it is anymore as I have no desire to mess around with the new formula when there are other options.

I now use Purple Power, which does contain that ingredient and more and works much faster, but is equally safe for plastics (left stuff in there for months before…). It is available at auto zone and sometimes walmart and is half the cost of Simple green.

I find that it works at least as good as Super Clean -with which it shares a color and main ingredient- but is less expensive. The ladies at Auto zone think it works better than Super Clean.