Two years immersed in paintstripper!

[Barks]

I bought some Neomics fantasy football goblins in, I think, mid-2010. I basecoated them with paint-on white primer, but overdid it somewhat. This goblin shows where I scraped away some of the excess paint on the model's undersides, and also demonstrates many areas of excess build-up. Looking at this picture now, I'm amazed I didn't strip this one.



Some of the miniatures had too much paint on them to simply scrape off, so I put five of them in a bath of Dettol, and left them.

For over two years.

The longer I left them, the less enthused I was about opening that Pandora's tub. Today- for some reason- I decided it was time...

External examination reveals an opaque liquid with dense sediments.



I removed the lid, and wafted the air cautiously (as I was taught in high school science)- still smells like Dettol. I ran a hot tap into it to clear the Dettol out, which revealed a sludge of miniatures, paint, and softened Slottabases.



I scrubbed with an old toothbrush, which removed the worst of the sludge, but after a while it was just spreading the goo around. It has this wonderful tacky, stringy quality to it.



These are rubbery and soft now.



After several minutes of scrubbing



Luckily, I had a small amount of mineral turpentine around, and that helped clean off most of the rest. I'm going to leave them to dry, then do the turps thing again to clear off any residual muck. Then I'll be back at square one! Maybe I should strip that figure above...

After mineral turps:



Don't know what it's done to my hands, let alone the local drainage system...

[Christian]

I had something similar occur the other week, cleaning out my Dad's garage.

I found a bucket half full of Simple Green with two OOP Genestealer familiars, Aekold Heldbrass and some other random stuff. Chunks of paint down the bottom.

It was all fine though, including the plastics!

I have another bucker I found with a plastic Pegasus floating on the top... and some 2nd Ed. Terminators that have sunk to the bottom!

[beefcake]

 
They came out a treat. I've never used turps with dettol. Only the dettol then nothing after it. I must try that.

[Dr. The Viking]

This is not the way mate. Bad karma.

[Mitch K]

Coincidentally, I posted my experiences on the subject a few days ago.

Learn from my mistakes!

http://mitchwargaming.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/how-not-to-strip-miniatures.html

[Predatorpt]

So...there's still hope for my guys, who are resting on a vat of brake fluid since 2008?

[Billchuck]

Way back when I put some plastic GW space marines in pine-sol for a few weeks before I remembered them.  They looked fine, until I took an old toothbrush to them to remove the paint.  The bristles slashed through the plastic just as well as the paint.

[Barks]

I won't leave minis that long again- and I'll take the bases off first! Still haven't needed to strip any plastic minis.

[Brandlin]

The length of time you left them in the detol is irrelevant.

The 'mess' you get is simply because you tried to use water to wash off the detol. In future do not use water just scrub with a little clean detol and a tooth brush, you won't need the mineral spirits then!

[Barks]

I think I would have been surprised if the metal 'melted' or similar. Good tip for the Dettol.