I know a lot of you have questions about stripping paint from old woodwork. I know because it’s one of the topics I get emailed about the most. So, I won’t keep you in suspense any longer.
There are three primary ways you can remove paint (scraping/sanding, chemicals, heat) and we’ll talk about all three in this series.
Today, let’s focus on chemical strippers, which are really your best option if you have detailed or ornate moldings to strip since these can’t be easily scraped or sanded without destroying the profiles.
There are dozens of chemical paint strippers on the market today. Some have been around for decades, but in the last 20 years, there have been a lot of less caustic, more earth-friendly options.
In my experience, and in several comparison studies I have read, these less caustic options are much safer, but noticeably less effective than the old “burn your skin off” methylene chloride strippers. Let’s talk about some of my favorites.
Chemical Strippers
This is really the only chemical paint stripper I consistently use these days. CirtiStrip is a relatively non-toxic, orange scented, yogurt like consistency stripper. It does a good job of softening up paint, though it does take a few hours to work its magic. If you have any more than around 4 layers of paint, you may need a second treatment. It works great on almost any surface including wood and metal.
2018 article addendum: Here is a video from our YouTube channel showing you the most effective steps to using CitriStrip.
This is one of the more expensive paint strippers out there today, but for good reason. I use this exclusively when we have to remove paint from old brick or stucco where scraping or sanding isn’t feasible. This paint stripper is a two part system where you brush on the paste and cover it with a paper. After the stripper has dried, you simply peel away the paper which pulls the old paint away with it. It’s a great way to contain any mess and remove the paint.
Methylene Chloride
This is the old standby for chemical strippers. Methylene Chloride has been around for decades, is very effective and fast working, and unfortunately it’s also very caustic. The paint softens up in minutes instead of hours with most of the green alternatives. The vapors are overwhelming without an organic vapor respirator so be sure to protect yourself. You’ll need lots of ventilation to be able to use this type of stripper as well.
Other Green Chemical Strippers
There are a lot of options on the market today for chemical paint strippers that I haven’t had the chance to use enough yet to formulate a solid opinion, but I wanted to mention some of them with the disclaimer that I can’t tell you honestly how they work or if they are worth your money. But so you know, here are the ones I’m currently testing.
- Soy-Gel – Made from soybeans, this is another safe option for paint removal.
- Star 10 – Another soy based option and the manufacturer is awesome at answering any questions
- Lead Out – A cool product the strips paint and renders lead paint completely harmless when applied
How To Strip Paint
So, you’ve picked out your chemical stripper and you’re ready to start removing decades of caked-on paint. Good for you, brave soul! Be forewarned, chemical paint stripping is a messy process. You’re about to turn all this paint into a slimy, gloppy mess so you better have a plan for what you’re going to do with it and how you’ll clean up.
Step 1 Prep
If I’m going to be doing some serious paint stripping I make sure to lay down a layer of 6 mil. plastic on the floor below the area I am working and then cover that with kraft paper or rosin paper. If you just use plastic, the old paint residue can get slippery and possibly even eat throughout the plastic, depending on what type of chemical you’re using. Protect the area thoroughly.
Next thing is to make sure you have chemical resistant gloves on. Most strippers (even the green ones) will eat through regular latex or nitrile gloves so don’t even bother trying. Use the big, thick, mad-scientist looking gloves at the store.
Lastly, open a window or four. (If your windows are painted shut, I’ll show you how to get them open here). Whatever chemical stripper you use, you’ll need ventilation if you want to avoid seeing double for the rest of the day. Sadly, I’m speaking from experience here. Make sure your workspace has good ventilation!
Step 2 Application and Removal
Get an old paint brush or some disposable chip brushes and start brushing on the stripper. Most chemical strippers work best with a thick application that thoroughly coats the surface. Too thin a layer and the stripper dries out and stops working. If you’re working on a vertical surface, make sure you choose a paste like stripper instead of a thin liquid to avoid it running off the surface. I like to cover the area with a coat about 1/8″ thick of stripper.
Once you have a workable area coated it’s time to wait. Depending on the strength of the product and the layers of paint this can take minutes or hours. If you see the stripper thinning out and starting to dry, apply a little more in those areas to keep it coated.
Once the paint is thoroughly bubbled and starting to look like the picture here, it is ready to be scraped off. You don’t need a sharp scraper for this. A painter’s 5-in-1 or putty knife will work just fine. You can use tooth picks or any other creative tool to get into hard to reach spots or little details (get creative). Scrape off everything you can and if there is still solid paint underneath, you’ll need another application of stripper.
Keep applying coats of stripper and scraping off the loosened paint until you get down to bare wood.
Step 3 The Secret to Getting to Clean, Bare Wood
Once you’re done removing dozens of layers of old paint, there will inevitably be a little remaining paint in the nooks & crannies. If your woodwork was originally painted, the old oil-based primer has likely sunk down into the pores of the wood and can’t be scraped off
Here’s a little secret I use to get things completely clean: put one final thin coat of stripper on the wood and let it work in for a few minutes. Then grab some 000 steel wool and polish the wood with the stripper and steel wool. work in circles or go with the grain of the wood, whichever seems to be most effective in your situation. This is like chemical sanding the wood and it gets the old primer out of the pores and gives the surface a nice smooth finish.
If you plan to stain and finish your project, this step is a must!
Step 4 Clean Up
Here’s where most people go wrong with chemical strippers. Sure, you need to clean up the old paint residue and dispose of it according to your state’s regulations (my apologies to those of you in California), but you also need to neutralize the chemical stripper. If you don’t neutralize, then when you repaint, that paint will fail prematurely because of the old residue still left on the wood.
Each chemical has different requirements for neutralizing the surface you just stripped Some require water, others mineral spirits, still others require something different. Follow the manufacturer’s instructions or you will have problems in the future!
Once you’ve cleaned up and neutralized, let the wood dry for a day or two so there isn’t any remaining moisture that need to get out and you should be ready to prime and paint. Good luck and, as always, let me know how it goes!
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I love old houses, working with my hands, and teaching others the excitment of doing it yourself! Everything is teachable if you only give it the chance.
Hi,
I wanted to let you know that the paint strippers you listed all have NMP which is a known reproductive toxin (Soy Gel and Citristrip). None of the ones you listed are safer.
Best,
Alicia
Alicia, I didn’t know about the NMP and thanks for sharing. I have no doubt that any chemical that liquifies solid paint or varnish into goo has some undesirable chemicals in it. Though none of them are nearly as bad as Methylene Chloride. Caution is always wise though!
Alicia!
Thank you for posting your warning about NMP. I saw a MSDS this morning that said the same thing you did about NMP. I did not know about NMP either until this morning.
Also, this Material Safety Data Sheet said that Methylene Chloride can cause death when used in enclosed spaces! This deadly stripper can also penetrate the cartridges of respirators, according to this MSDS…which surprised me! I’m wondering if they mean even respirators designed for use with methylene chloride? I will try to contact the people who drew up this list. I will post the URL here..it’s a comprehensive, well-thought out and well-written summary of chemical strippers.
I noticed some typos in my previous reply….I meant to say an MSDS…please pardon my typos
We own a 1927 Sears home, we are the second owners and have discovered the kitchen cabinets were painted with oil based paint. I have painted them twice with regular wall paint that peels off with every nick. I would like to strip down to the original wood and stain. We have also considered getting them dipped. I am also open to using the Citristrip, as we are approaching winter here, would it be ok to do this project in my basement?
Kim, if the canines were originally painted then getting all the paint off to prepare for stain will be extremely difficult because the paint or primer will have seeped into the pores of the wood. You can certainly try, but you may be better off stripping the built up paint off and starting fresh with high quality oil-based enamel paint.
HiI’m stripping my 1904 stairs .it’s very hard to get rid of the resideu from peelaway 1.
I’ve rinsed and rinsed and wiped over and over with sponges etc.can you help? The resideu is still greyish no matter how many times I rinse with the water. Cheers ,fionnuala
Hi, my contractor stripped the wI down and base trim as well as a door with commercial stripper. I don’t know the brand. One door was dipped in a tank, and another door was stripped by someone else using a different stripper. I do not know what stripping products were used. What is the best way to neutralize since I don’t know what was used to strip the wood? Thank you.
There is no way to tell what will neutralize if we don’t know what the stripper was. Water is always a good guess for neutralizer but checking the ph of the wood will help determine what needs to be done. Some strippers are very alkaline and need something more acidic like oxalic acid to counteract the strong base.
I have new wood cabinets that I just primed to paint, then changed my mind. I started stripping today with a chemical stripper, but at this rate will take months! What is the best kind of paint scraping tool to use? There are some pretty small areas to get into!…also the remover seems to leave quite a film on the wood and the gel stain I want to use looks horrible over it!…finally, the matching cabinet has veneer doors that were sanded initially when removing finish in preparation for painting. Can I sand again?
Teresa, you’re in a real pickle. Removing primer from freshly sanded wood is extremely difficult. Sadly chemicals are your best bet. The haze is likely un-neutralized stripper. Once you have everything stripped you will still need to do some hand sanding to clean up the details, but it may not look as good as you’d like because primer goes deep into the grain of the wood unlike paint.
I have to agree with the person above: citristrip is amazing, put it on thick though (1/8″ thick), and just watch it bubble up in about 30 minutes! Doesnt stink, use indoors vertically, great stuff. My first coat was too thin, had some scraping to do, then a second coat. I got 18 small doors done with less than 64oz of citristrip! Also want to say, Scott, youve got the best diy blog ive read. Im a mid century window resto guy and learn so much from you!
Thanks Steve!! Love those mid century houses too!
Been lurking for some time now, started reglazing my windows, and this site is now my go-to place for all restoration projects. Great info and explanations!
My current dilemma is getting the bottom mystery layer off some doors from the 2nd floor of our 1895 house. Does anybody have any idea what this last layer is and why it’s so difficult?
The layer is white, doesn’t seem very thick, but is really smooth – not like any sort of water or oil or lead-based paint I’ve ever seen. Maybe it’s the same stuff Jacqueline mentioned above? I’m guessing part of the problem is that it appears to have been applied directly to the wood instead of say, on top of what appears to be shellac that the rest of our woodwork was originally coated in.
We took the doors to the local dip-stripper because it was actually relatively inexpensive in our area and there were so many layers of poorly-applied paint it obscured the paneling detail. I don’t know exactly what chemicals he used, but our doors were the first things dipped in that batch. Three of the doors came out almost completely clean, like you’d expect. The rest came clean except the last layer which is basically perfectly intact, even when he left it in over twice as long as usual.
The guy who stripped them had never seen anything like it. My husband went through an entire 60-grit pad with an electric sander in an area about twice the size of the pad itself.
Would heat stripping be worth a shot? It seems like the only alternative is scraping, which would be fine… except we’re worried about the contours/edges/angles of the paneling. Surely someone has solved this problem before…
Thoughts?
Sarah, hmmmmm, I want to know what the mystery paint is too. I would thinks it’s the primer, but dipping should have removed it. Maybe try infrared heat (Speedheater) or mechanical scraping.
I wonder if its White lead based primer. I have that on my 1965 custom Georgian colonial. Does not come off except with sanding, multiple coats of stripper. Vaporizes when heated, so that’s a no go. What a nightmare. I’m ready to give up and replace all my fluted trim around my front door instead of stripping it.
That’s what I am dealing with in my post! It’s very strange but under it, IF, you get under it, is perfectly preserved wood!
My 110-year old house has twenty square feet of copper-clad exterior trim (columns, and other vertical elements). I intend to test CitriStrip on the trim. Do you have any suggestions regarding the stripping process in light of the copper? Thanks.
Kurt, I haven’t tried it on copper so I don’t have any advice. I would just try it in a small out of the way test spot first. Love to hear how it goes.
Did you ever hear back about stripping coppet?
Which chemical stripper is best for lead paint that’s peeling so badly that you can see the bare wood!?
Thanks.
If it’s peeling that badly you may not even need a chemical stripper.
Thanks for the reply. What if some of the lead paint that’s peeling so badly you don’t even need a chemical stripper is stuck on the wood?
What’s the best way to remove it, especially from fascia?
Hi Scott! We just got a new home that had hardwood underneath carpet. All it needs is a little pick me up and remove the cracked varnish (?) that is awfully shinny. I used an orbital sander for 2 days and it left spots of sanded and no sanded still. So in the places where the sander didn’t touch, I tried to remove the shine, which I can only assume is varnish, with Citristrio today. I left on floor thick for 2 hours and tested the entire master bedroom. Nothing happened and all is cleaned up and neutralized. Let’s just say, all windows are open and I hope this horrible smell goes away- how do I know what finish it is and how to remove? And how long with the smell last from the Citristrip? Does the product evaporate or just stay in the floor and loose the smell?
Alisa, try this post to find out what the finish is and that will tell you how to remove it then.
https://thecraftsmanblog.com/how-to-determine-different-types-of-wood-finish/
Also, where can Peel Away 1 be purchased?
Amazon or most paint stores should carry it.
Is it okay to use mineral spirits after using Citristrip. I did and wonder now if I made a mistake. If I did so in error, is there s way to correct my mistake?
No problem if you used mineral spirits but I would clean the area with water to neutralize the citristrip before you try to repaint.
I just used citristripe and it work like a charm on some pine.. Can I use vinegar and water as the chemical wash(step 4) instead of buying and using the chemical wash?
By the way
I’m not painting in going to stain the pine to a dark ebony color 🙂
Sorry for the typo. I plan to stain the pine not paint 🙂
Why are you using vinegar? Just curious. I just hose my pieces down in the yard, actually, with a garden hose. i.e. water.
I’ve never understood why someone would go to all the trouble of buying Citristrip, or something else so enviro-friendly, then add back in a flesh-eating chemical at the end.
Hope you’ve read the info about laying plastic bags on your pieces and leaving them for several hours. (Don’t peek!) It holds the Citristrip against the wood so it can continue to work. It should pull the paint off in layers. On some antique cabinets, I actually forgot about it and it dried. Guess what scraped off anyway? Yup. Layers and layers of paint. I love clean, raw wood with no need to sand! I’d love to see the pine you’re stripping. I have some antique trim….
Tim, vinegar and water should work just fine.
I am in the process of trying to take the paint off my basement stairs. I am using Klean-Strip. In most cases, it is turning the paint into a liquid mess (essentially wet paint). Is there a better way to get this to work, or is it worth switching products? Also, what do you do about the paint that is in cracks? I need to stain this over when I am finished and I want it to look professional…
Mike, chemical strippers are messy and there is really very little you can do about that. Latex paint will bubble and become a gooey mess and oil paint will turn back to liquid. To get into the cracks you’ll have to be creative (toothpicks, stiff bristle brushes, whatever implement you can come up with to get into those hard to reach areas) Good luck!
I’m new here, but I think I have something to offer with Citristrip.
Put it on thick and press plastic bags into it and LEAVE it ALONE. Really. “A couple hours” is fine, if you don’t fuss with it. I go to work or bed and leave it 6-8 hours. I’ve lifted the bags to find it pulling off as many as 7 layers of paint. SEVEN. (That’s my record.)
A 2nd coat turns stain into BBQ sauce and you can squeegee it off into a garbage bag.
Neutralize with water and a plastic dish scrubby. Don’t use mineral spirits, which liquifies the stain back into the wood. Purple. I’m here to tell ‘ya. This will take the piece back to unpainted, raw wood.
Let it dry thoroughly and lightly 220 it. No steel wool, no metal scrapers, no flesh eating chemicals, no space suit.
I’ve done 15 antique doors, one a weekend. 1 day for paint layers, 1 day for stain. I’ve done my kitchen cabinets in place. Other pieces in my pajamas in front of the TV. Get it on yourself, wipe it on your jeans. I swear by this stuff because it makes stripping old pieces actually fun. “Easy” takes on new meaning.
BTW. Press plastic into it on horizontal, stucco walls and it’ll wash everything off.
As you can tell, I rave about this stuff and don’t think twice about last century’s evil chemicals. I’m looking at 15 1920s windows to strip next week. Believe it or not, I can’t wait.
I am stripping the baseboards and trim on an 1880’s house the first three-four layers come off pretty easily with stripper but the last two layers won’t budge…at all. I have left the stripper on longer tried sanding then using stripper but it just won’t come off. It will sand off but with course 60 sandpaper it took over two hours to get most of it off of one small board. I don’t know what to do to get this stuff moving. its like trying to smash concrete with a cotton ball. Please Help.
Jacqueline, Try some different strippers or try scraping with carbide scrapers. Its hard work but I haven’t found a paint that can stand up to a sharper pull scraper.
Have you ever had to remove paint from a stucco wall? Would love to hear if you have any experience or advice. Ultimately, we’re trying to remove 70% of the paint so that the thinset we’re using to lay subway tile over the stucco wall will create a strong bond to the stucco.
Joseph, to remove paint from stucco I like PeelAway1 paint stripper. You can’t really scrape stucco and this stuff is applied and then a paper coating is placed over it overnight. The next morning you peel it off and the paint comes with it.
Thank you so much! I am stripping a piece of furniture today and sure enough the primer was down in the pores of the wood. I would not have had a clue how to fix it without this info. The tooth pick trick worked too.
We have purchased a 110 year old house and are stripping at least 3 layers of paint and 2 layers of wallpaper (the bottom wallpaper looks to be a green fern/forest design.
We’ve tried 3 methods – stripper, vinegar and steam. All three work pretty good but the steam goes all the way down to the plaster. We haven’t tried a heat gun yet. In your opinion should we stay with the steamer? Thanks.
Tim, when you find something that works…stick with it! I’d stay with the steam.
Thanks… steam it is!
What do you use to mask off areas from the paint stripper? We are trying to take the paint of molding but not destroy the stucco that abuts the molding. I assume the paint stripper would eat through standard masking?
Thanks.
Thick plastic sheeting should do the trick for masking off areas from paint stripper. I recommend 3 mil. plastic.
Scott – Thanks for the quick reply. We will give that a try.
Krystia
Hi
Would you recommend the plastic to mask off upvc windows too? I have a wooden window sill but plastic window frames. I want to strip the wood sill
A lot of good information here. Thank you for making it easier to understand.
Thanks Art!