Maybe your Lotus could use paint and you have time on your hands and you need a challenge. It is generally accepted that if you want a "real good" paint job - you want to start by getting down to the naked surface. Additionally, getting all that old paint off reduces the weight of the car, aiding the performance.


Well, the following are some considerations and revelations discovered as I decided to strip the paint off my 69 Elan+2 to prepare It for its new paint.


The historical wisdom and almost universal practice among the west coast professional glass painters I have talked to is: "grind it off". However, I was concerned about my skill and results (possibly ruining the gel coat or the shape) using a power grinder. I will not discuss the pros and cons of the two approaches - which gets religious ......


Alternatively, according to Miles Wilken's book, How to Restore Fibreglass Bodywork (Osprey series), the other method is chemical stripping - with care. This is the route I chose. It took me in the vicinity of 100 hours and about $60 worth of stripper. Also on a personal note, I believe in better living through chemistry.


Many strippers say that they strip glass and do it - but soften the gel coat. A water soluble stripper - applied properly, is necessary. I used J. Scott Company's RFD stripper (175 Barneveld Ave, San Francisco, Ca. 415-824-1741 ).


They aren't enthusiastic about selling less than a case ..... however, they are more pliable if you go and pick It up. This stripper worked well and left the gel coat hard as a rock - when the directions were followed. It was very safe in that the stripper could be left in contact with the gel for several minutes without damage.


One benefit of chemical stripping is that since the glass gets completely exposed, all the glass defects are easily visible, so none are missed as might happen it repairs are made only where the defects show through the paint.


One disadvantage of the chemicals is that once chemicals have been used on paint, you are committed to remove all that paint. New paint will not adhere well to contaminated paint. So the worst case is needing to sand to remove "partial work". However, I had no such problems.


Let me note up front that there is some messiness involved in the process, and you absolutely should PROTECT YOUR EYES at all times. I also used black textured Boss brand gloves that I got at Orchard Supply for $2.50 that worked extremely well and didn't dissolve. The stripper burns skin - but is neutralized by water - so have some handy.


My car had 4 coats of paint when I began: an outer black coat over the car, sometimes below that was a red primer, below that was what I believe to be the original factory British racing green, below that a grey-white primer.


The effort to strip the paint was uneven. Sometimes the paint was stubborn (esp. areas like the bonnet that were engine baked), other areas were a piece of cake. Your effort will vary depending on the specifics of the paint.


I discovered that there is no one technique for doing the stripping that works for all situations. Here is what I found by trial and error:


The black outer coat tended to respond best to a thick stripper application - It bubbled quickly and came off beat by scraping It with a putty knife.


The green factory coat was very hard being 20 years old, Again, after a thick application of stripper and waiting 10+ minutes, it scraped off with force. However, the 2' knife was still more effective then a wire brush.


The grey white primer was thick and soft. Again, a fairly heavy application of stripper, 5-10 minutes time and a wire brush turned it into a slurry that got about 80% of It. The next coat of stripper and #0 steel wool got the surface completely clean to the naked tanish gel coat. I then wiped the surface dry with another piece of clean steel wool.


I found that I had to push quite vigorously on the tools to get the paint off,

and was surprised that the amount of force used didn't hurt the glass at all.


The stripper didn't harm metal or ordinary glass, but be careful near rubber or synthetics. Again, PROTECT YOUR EYES.


My results were very good. At the point where I declared victory, I had removed the doors, windows, and all other trim items. I did the door jams (necessary if you are changing colors), rocker panels, 2" down into the engine compartment, the boot channel, the light pods, and down under the car to the front and rear seams.

Original Article located at <A href="http://www.gglotus.org/ggtech/paintstrip.htm">Golden Gate Lotus Club Website</A>.