Seven Ways to Remove Paint

Depending on the job, any paint-stripping option may be best—or a failure. Consider cost, effort, health risks, and potential damage to the wood.

- By Justin Fink

On nearly every old-house project, you will at some point be faced with the unpleasant reality that the thing standing between you and a beautifully finished room is original woodwork wearing about 13 layers of old paint. Removing paint may feel like an overwhelming task, especially when you're looking at a house full of doors, baseboard and casing, built-ins, and windows (or exterior siding and trim). It’s tempting to just spruce things up with one more fresh coat of paint—we’ve all been there and done that. Still, there’s no denying that the “just-one-more-coat” mentality works for only so long. Once you've come to terms with what must be done, you're faced with the next decision: How the heck am I going to get all this paint off? Here’s an overview of options that get the job done.

1 SCRAPERS

An old saying goes, “There's no escaping the scraping,” and I think that's true for every method on this list. No matter which option you choose, there is always some paint that will need to be touched with a scraper, and some methods—such as heat guns, IR lamps, and chemical strippers—depend on scrapers as part of the process. Inexpensive “hook scrapers” rely on a sharp steel edge to shave away layers of paint. Carbide scrapers are typically more expensive but have longer-lasting, replaceable blades. Scrapers can be purchased in a wide variety of shapes, and it's fairly easy to grind your own custom-profile into a steel, flat-blade scraper in order to fit a specific job. Standard scrapers will leave you with a pile of lead-laden shavings, but there are also ones that can be connected to a vac hose for impressive levels of chip collection. The hand tools usually cost less than $20, though you will need to replace or sharpen the blades to keep the tools working well.

2 POWER STRIPPERS