Powdercoating steam radiators

This has come up from time to time, and powder coating does work. It is also an appalling amount of work just to get the radiators to the shop and then reinstalled.

As an alternative, many people — myself included — have had excellent results by very thoroughly cleaning, including wire brushing, radiators, leaving them in place, and then painting them with a high quality acrylic, such as Benjamin Moore's Aura series (I use a brush). I've never had a problem with outgassing or failure of the finish — and the beauty of it is that one can select whatever colour one wants, including matching the walls.

I recently was told that Castrads the UK radiator manufacturer also does powdercoating of legacy radiators. The person I spoke to had success. Does powdercoating have off-gassing problems? It seems like after the baking step there wouldn't be any gassing left to be offed.

Hose it off gently, trying to keep the paint chunks inside the kiddy pool. Scrub with a brush to remove any stubborn spots.

Drain the water into a bucket with some sort of strainer to catch the chunks of paint.

What do you do with the liquid component? It is full of lead dissolved by the stripper, right?

@ethicalpaul I'm sure we'd need the EPA to give us the correct response but the paint doesn't really dissolve and disperse into the liquid. It lifts off and remains somewhat intact. Another method could be compressed air to blow the chunks off followed by a brush or scraper. The point was to contain the paint within the kiddy pool so you don't shoot lead paint chunks all over your lawn and then create a lead dustcloud when you mow it.

I'm stripping some 100 year old doors with an indoor, environmentally friendly chemical… "Smart Strip Advanced" made by Dumond. It goes on as a gel, sits for 24 hours and lifts/loosens the multiple layers of paint. Then you scrape the gunk off. The directions say any paint removed can be disposed of in the trash, including lead based paints.

@ChrisJ The "good" Aircraft Remover with the Methyl-Deathyl is banned to regular consumers but the replacement stuff is still about as aggressive as it gets these days. Stinks bad and is probably still pretty hazardous so use it outside.

@ChrisJ The Smart Strip Brand by Dumond makes three different versions. I've used them all. All three are safe to use indoors and do not produce any hazardous or objectionable odors. You need to cover all of them with butcher paper or plastic wrap to prevent the product from drying out so it can take time to do its work.

The "Peel Away" version is like a dry-ish paste and is very basic (pH). I think it is lye based. After removal it needs to be washed/neutralized with something acidic. I think they sell a product for that, but a water/vinegar solution also works.

The "Smart Strip Advanced" goes on like a thick gel and is thick enough to stay put on vertical surfaces. It is my favorite. It is pH neutral and can be washed off with water.

The "Smart Strip Pro" is similar to the Advanced version but is a little chunkier. It doesn't spread as easy as the Advanced and didn't seem to work as well either. It is pH neutral and can be washed off with water.

I've also used "Citrustrip" from your local hardware store or even Wally World. It works well but is a little thinner than the Smart Strip products and will be slightly drippy on vertical surfaces. Keep it covered in plastic wrap to prevent it from drying out. It does stink pretty bad though! A chemically/citrus smell that was pretty strong. The wife was not enthusiastic about this one. You also need to scrub with mineral spirits to clean off the Citrustrip residue. Then wipe with Acetone or denatured alcohol to clean up any mineral spirit residue.

Franmar makes an environmentally friendly product called "Blue Bear Soy Gel", formally just known as Soy Gel. It works great but like Citrustrip is a little drippy on vertical surfaces. Same story, cover with plastic wrap to keep if from drying out.

For all of these products, the latex gets wrinkled quickly and lifts up from the surface making scraping them off easy. Oil paints tend to just get mushy and need to be scraped with a little more attention. If it is only multiple coats of latex or oil one thick layer of these stripping products for 24 hours usually does the trick. When there is latex on top of oil (my doors) the first coat really gets the latex off but the chemical does not penetrate well enough through the latex and into the oil coats. A second coat then gets the oil layers.

For rusty metal things I have a 3.5 gallon bucked of CRC's Evaporust that comes with an internal parts basket. Let it soak overnight and the parts come out brand new!

My wife and I recently had a very tall(45 inch) Rococo radiator sandblasted and powder coated and we are very happy with the results. As stated above they are extremely heavy, so I would have 3 or 4 guys to help. This was a first floor radiator and only required going up/down 4 or 5 stairs.