Comments on: Hot Or Not? Environmentally Friendly Paint Stripper

By: Lane

Lane — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 06:10:50 +0000

Hot.
I have gone through almost 4 gallons of the Soy Gel in stripping my 100 year old home’s woodwork. I’ve been working in place, so the product I used needed to work well, be low odor and safe. Soy-Gel has met all these requirements. Having said that I can say that it is significantly slower than methylene chloride but the fumes won’t kill you either.
I found the best way to use it was to goop it on and cover it with thin plastic sheeting. In 3 hours it would soften 2 to 3 layers of paint. Since I was removing up to eight layers I scraped, then reapplied to get to bare wood.
I can’t think of many jobs worse than stripping paint (well maybe I can…) but Soy Gel works as claimed and gets the job done.

By: jASON

jASON — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 23:39:46 +0000

I’ve got a quart of this in the basement for cleaning paint brushes. Like it a lot cuz I can clean up inside without stinking up the house. Haven’t used it to strip paint yet.

By: michael masterson

michael masterson — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 19:32:49 +0000

hot… I recommended it to a friend who was having her kitchen redone, and she said it was the best stuff she’d ever used, wasn’t nasty, and cleaned off all the cabinets and other woodwork quite nicely.

By: Chris

Chris — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 14:22:14 +0000

Hot. I used it and like it. There is not really an odor, but I leave my garage door open anyhow. A quart is looking like its enough to strip an entire desk with multiple layers of paint. I would say its not quite as good as the regular strippers, but its pretty close. I will buy and use this again, no doubt. Its even getting the paint out of the intricate details pretty well.

By: B. Foo

B. Foo — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 14:19:09 +0000

In my experience all this “green” stuff is a waste of time that I think is just to make people feel good. I like to use what works correctly. I tried the orange based stuff and it was a waste of time. As someone else commented, it is too slow and takes multiple tries. No thanks. I’m not into this “green” scam (and it is a scam, the company I work for is behind some of it) and will continue to use the correct products for the what they are intended.

By: Shopmonger

Shopmonger — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 13:14:12 +0000

Measure: where is it, can you use a pressure washer? If not, maybe a wire wheel, or a flap disk form HF with like 60 grit..

ShopMonger

By: MeasureOnceCutTwice

MeasureOnceCutTwice — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 01:03:41 +0000

Any suggestions for getting cement/concrete residue off rough tile surfaces?

By: Bill

Bill — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 00:12:00 +0000

Hot but slow. I just used Soy Gel to strip two cast iron radiators in place. It clung to vertical surfaces very well but I did go out and mow the lawn between application and removal. Odor is minimal.

By: Kris

Kris — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 19:40:23 +0000

I have not used this soy based stuff, but have used the Orange based stripper, which works but is slow and takes multiple trys. If you have a lot to do or not much time, you probably need to use the nasty stuff.

By: TravisS

TravisS — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 16:44:29 +0000

In my experience, the worked great in cleaning tile mastic off of a slab, but the residue kept the new sealant we put down from ever curing. Had to remove the sealant and degrease three times before putting down the sealant again. I’m all for it, just be sure to research how the residue will interact with any product you put down over it.

By: ToolGuyd

ToolGuyd — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 16:02:52 +0000

Looks interesting, I might give it a try. I like to avoid methylene chloride strippers whenever I can help it.