Electric Robot and Son Posted April 30, 2009 Share Posted April 30, 2009 I got this Purple Painted Space Patrol Autosonic rifle a couple of months ago with the hope of restoring it to its original non painted colors.Although I have stripped a lot of paint and varnish from antique furniture, as well as paint from tin robots, I have never really done any paint stripping from plastic. I reviewed a post from Tinman 93 about a car he restored and some posts on some model builders chat rooms on the net. There were quite a few suggestions including oven cleaner, brake fluid, simple green, isopropyl Alcohol and others. I tried simple green, oven cleaner and brake fluid and Motsenbockers Lliftoff 4 spray paint remover (home depot) that was safe for plastics. They all worked a little, but dried out or evaporated before making much progress. When I went back and reviewed the posts again they were all stripping little plastic things and were able to soak them for long periods of time. I would need gallons of stripper and a wierd shaped container to submerge the rifle. That wasn't going to work. So I took a couple of days off to think about it and came up with an ideal. I wrapped the rifle in paper towels. I soaked the towels with the liftoff 4. Wrapped it in plastic wrap and then in a plastic bag and put a bunch of rubber bands around it. I let it soak for 24 hours and it removed a lot of the paint and no damage to the plastic. I did 3 more overnight soaks and in between worked the paint off with tooth brushes and toothpics to get the paint out of the raised lettering and edges. The majority of the paint came off very easily with the soaking but it took a lot more manual labor around the lettering and other raised features. I finished it up with Novus scratch removers and polish. I needed to make a small plastic piece to repair the shooting mechanism but I was able to get that to work also. I think it was supposed to shoot little corks. The rifle is not perfect, it has some cracks but I think it has a classic 50's raygun look and was well worth the effort. Here are some Pics of the restored rifle. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dratomic Posted April 30, 2009 Share Posted April 30, 2009 Great job! One of my all-time favorite space guns... Congratulations! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
funkrobotik Posted April 30, 2009 Share Posted April 30, 2009 Yes ER&S, a really superb job and well worth the effort.Amazing though that even plastic safe chemicals didn't touch the surface when sealed up air tight for 24 hrs. Very brave move, but as they say, '' Who dares wins '' Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andyman Posted April 30, 2009 Share Posted April 30, 2009 Nice work, Joe! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phil R Posted May 1, 2009 Share Posted May 1, 2009 Great thought process and work, Joe. but then again this piece is worth the effort. It's a classic piece of art. B) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tinman Posted May 1, 2009 Share Posted May 1, 2009 Nice work Joe and great idea on wrapping the gun! Though wrong, I thought the paint job was pretty impressive and way more professional than my Pyrotomic Energizer's. I love the "Space Patrol" logo too!The gun can be seen on pages 160 & 161 of "Blast Off". The flyer on page 160 says it held "1 to 6 sponge rubber balls" at a hefty price of $2.98! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eagle Posted May 1, 2009 Share Posted May 1, 2009 Worth the effort ! That gun is SWEET ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fineas J. Whoopie Posted May 1, 2009 Share Posted May 1, 2009 Damn nice job Joe!! I love the Auto Sonic rifle. You've got a real gem there my friend - congrats!!!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JimK Posted May 1, 2009 Share Posted May 1, 2009 Very nice job. I liked the gun before but love it now. I have no doubt that any of us would be proud to own it. CongratsJimK Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tinplate6 Posted June 1, 2009 Share Posted June 1, 2009 Wow, much better than the purple paint job. It doesn't look like it suffered any ill effects. Yes, that is a really nice rifle. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gibsart Posted July 4, 2009 Share Posted July 4, 2009 You've done a great job there ,well done ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
robothunter Posted July 4, 2009 Share Posted July 4, 2009 Fantastic work! I can't help but wonder why someone would take such a beautiful toy in those great candy colors and paint it! Maybe a young space cadet trying to make his weapon lok more realistic? I guess we'll never know. :huh: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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