stripping black seam sealant

[truckasaurus]

I must say the California plant did a great job sealing the rivet lines on my 60's trailer. Granted it was needed as the riveting was horrible but still there's little evidence of corrosion on the inside of the exterior skin. Now my quest is to remove all the black asphalt like sealer before tearing the trailer down. The 1st hurdle is that the stuff is immune to all known strippers….well so far I've managed to strip the seems on the aft end cap and it's a brutal task and my technique isn't going to cut it on the bows.

I've tried a bunch of the safe environmental stuff; bug and tar remover, WD40, 3M gasket stripper, Blast Off, Varsol and Acetone with mixed results.

I'm thinking of trying Heirloom heavy paint stripper tomorrow and if that fails ordering Citri strip which has to be shipped in quarts to me from the USA and thought it could't hurt to see of anyone has any tips.

In an ideal world I'm after something gel like that I can paint on, wait a few hours and give it a bit of a brush then hose off.

[reinergirl]

The citrastrip worked for me, I brushed it on, covered in plastic, left it overnight and wiped it off with paper towels the next day. I went thru a lot of it though, can't imagine the shipping cost.

post 289 here

http://www.airforums.com/forums/f109...-78136-29.html

[truckasaurus]

Awesome I knew there was something I'd read telling me Citri strip was worth shot. I'm just a bit concerned at the potential cost, so far Im looking at $110 CAD a gallon plus brokerage, duty and tax…. Great pics and detail in your post, thanks

[reinergirl]

Wow! $110.
Can you get 3m products ?
I hear 3m's Safest Stripper is very similar, no personal experience though....

[truckasaurus]

Today's task, hunt down 3M stripper :-)

[truckasaurus]

The curse of the black sealant is being lifted! I was out and about and picked up some furniture stripper as I remember it being strong stuff and better still it said to avoid contact with asphalt. I just tested it and it took about 90 seconds to turn the black death into an easy to wipe off mess. I did miss a few specks and have to scrape them off but I'm super confident that this stuff will have the shell stripped in no time. Here's a pic or two in case it helps out the future restorers.

[flygrrl]

YAY!!
Thanks Truck, good to know.
Leonie