When they changed it, I phoned them up and complained. The person on the phone apologised profusely and conceded that the new version was next to useless.
How to make your own Nitromorse. One packet of Hot Water Lap, ( this is a starch based wallpaper past that uses Hot Water ) and a packet of Costic Soda. Mix Costic with hot water and add wallpaper past till thick. Apply to area to be stripped and cover with plastic sheeting for 45 minutes then strip with scraper.
I used to work as a French Polisher back in the late eighties and back then stripping furniture with wire wool and Nitromors stripper was an essential part of the job. It was great stuff as it would quickly and effectively strip furniture back to bare wood in no time. I couldn't imagine doing the same job today and running a successful furniture restoration business with the useless version of Nitromors that now has to be used. Bring back the 1980's version! In fact bring back the 1980's anyway as life seemed more fun back then.
It doesn't do anything against a virus either, they are surgical masks to stop doctors contaminating an operating theatre with spit and cough droplets. That's about as much use they have.
@@Geo-vw9oz the same spot and cough droplets that covid uses as a medium. You might want to think,(think being the operative word here)about what you just said(wrote).🤔
@@Allencorgan4951 a cough droplet is made primarily of water, covid has a lipid bilayer meaning it doesn't stick to cough droplets. (Think = Oil and water doesn't Mix). Covid will pass through the mask but droplets won't. The N in N95 means Not oil resistant and a lipid is a fat or oil. Meaning covid will even pass through an N95 mask, so it will certainly pass through a surgical mask.
I remember the original Nitromors. It was brilliant. I also remember the newer version coming on the market and wondered what the hell had happened. Never used the product since.
The same has happened with so many once-good products. The new 'safe' Hammerite paint is another one that is absolute rubbish compared to the original.
Yep, the original disintegrated the paint in no time, and your hands if you weren't careful. New stripper needs loads of coats, it just tickles it off after about 4 coats. Useless unless it's the only option. Prefer to burn it off now.
@@V8PropaneBurner so true worked in heavy engineering, use to have very effective degreaser, now the new environmentally products, are bloody useless and have to use a lot more of it.
@@V8PropaneBurner Hammerite is white spirit based now which is definitely not as good as the Coovar which is still based on the old school Hammerite, dries quicker.
Remember going into B&Q a few years ago for some weedkiller. Nothing on the shelves. No pesticides, fungicides, weedicides etc. Sales guy said they had been instructed to clear everything due to new EU health and safety rules. The stuff they sell nowadays is about as effective as vinegar. You may do better at an agricultural suppliers (if they're prepared to sell it to you).
Bought a 106 year old semi with terrible paintwork on all the wooden surfaces. Tried Nitromors and the No Nonsense stuff but struggled to get a good result. Luckily found PeelAway which was incredible. So easy to use, very effective if time consuming. Got great results with very little mess. Highly recommended, especially if you have multiple layers of really thick paint to remove.
You're not slagging em off, you're highlighting the risks of using old materials, pointing out our options, reminding us of the risks involved and giving us an idea of how we can proceed. Thank you for this vid and sharing you're knowledge, 😀👍 P.S, How can we identify old lead paint?
I wondered why it didn’t work when I used it on a job recently. When I used it in the past it was awesome so I bought a large £25 tin and it did bugger all. Now I know why
Same thing happened to me a few years back. Happily trekked back from B&Q with some Nitromors and then it worked about as well as putting porridge on the paint. Was desperate for a while until I went on line and found out about the new formulation.
@@lukee.fokker6715 its funny but that's my first instinct for removing paint, 40 grit sand paper and let the grinder's weight be the only source of pressure, then go over again with a 120 grit wheel.
That's reminded me of a mate who bought an old farmhouse. The place needed a lot of work, and one of the "Round tooit" jobs was that all the solid wood doors needed stripping and repainting. There were something like 25 to 30 of the damn things (called "Z brace" doors IIRC?), and they'd been over painted for generations, without ever being taken back to bare wood, So they looked like they'd been liberally smeared in lumpy porridge by that point. :D He ended up taking them down and carefully dismantling the doors one by one. He kept/straightening all the old hand forged nails he could, Then shoved the planks through his thickness planer before reassembling them (Using the original nail holes as guides) and giving them a coat of decent paint. The planks on the doors started out probably somewhere near 1.5" (About 35mm) thick, and ended up being a little under 1" (25ish mm) thick afterwards, But as things like the locks and hinges were all surface mounted, he had very little trouble reassembling them all to fit again. A few door frames eventually needed adjusting to fit the thinner doors, but most just had draft excluder strips fitted to take up any gaps, and to get a much tighter fit than they'd had before. I thought he was mad when he told me about how he'd done the doors, until he pointed out that it took him 2 days of sanding and refinishing to get the first door looking "OKish", but by dismantling and using the thickness planer he was easily getting 5 doors a day done, They looked brand new, AND he didn't finish the day covered in a shedload of (Possibly) toxic lead filled paint dust. :D
I’m a qualified decorator, left the profession about 7/8 years ago but just took on a job for a family friend. They wanted the handrail stripped back to bare wood. Easy. Only problem is they painted in an acrylic paint so it’s all peeling off, including the skirting. Easy job but very time consuming. I was debating buying nitromors to get the bit near the carpet but this video confirms my doubts. Thanks for your video, the advice is very handy even to those in the trade!
What doubts? nitromors works fine too, each tool got its own purpose and may be handy in areas sensitive to the heat. if you use heatgun you have to be careful being near the carpet etc. Probably cleanest way.
During college I worked at a furniture restoration shop. We stripped most of the paint using a blast system that used walnut shells. It would work great in the corners. We very rarely used a chemical stripper as it would stain some of the woods.
Yeah, crushed walnut shell media works really well at getting varnishes off, but it can apparently dull any detail on intricate carving work underneath. An older relative of mine used to collect/restore antique shotguns, and I remember years back, him seeming annoyed when the quite ornate wooden stock for one project came back from the place he used for specialist blasting work. It turned out that the varnish on this one was so resilient to abrasion that as soon as they got through a patch of it, the walnut media would instantly start to scour the softer wooden edges of the fish scale carving beneath it, and round off all the "Crisp detail" it had. He acted all annoyed, but I'm pretty sure he was quietly happy to have an excuse to get out his tools and spend a week re-carving the details on the stock to his own exacting standards. :D He was a laugh. Half grumpy old git, half perfectionist tinkerer who couldn't do a hash job of anything if he tried. :D
Thanks for confirming what I suspected. I’ve found that the heat gun is the best method. I’ve only used the nitromors in areas where heat could severely do damage, such as near glass.
I've striped a few dozen doors, frames and windows in the last couple of years... and I can assure you... You're doing it wrong. Use the attachment with the square opening. Heat a 2*2 inch section, moving only when you see the paint lifting, and you'll be able to lift all the paint off to the wood in one go. Slow and steady.
Agreed, also it's easier, quicker and cleaner to work from the top to the bottom as you scrape downwards, so gravity assists the removal process when the paint starts to peel away as you work your way down the door/frame.
@@giotto4321 Been years since I last striped a door (got some that desperately need sorting out, but I've been procrastinating for the past month, or thirty). Anyhow, I've only ever done doors horizontal and never even thought about how working top to bottom on a vertical door would have made my life easier. So thanks for the tip. Might even manage to do them before the end of 2025 with this motivation to try it out.
Another useful video thanks. On the mask front, with the solvent based products, if it's organic vapours you are trying to stop yourself breathing in, then a surgical type mask is really of no use, you need one specifically for organic vapors. As you point out good ventilation is your friend. I can see how a particulate mask FFP2/3 would be useful if you are trying to avoid lead based dust.
Yep, A2 P3 vapour and particulate is what you want. I started getting neurological symptoms after using Butanone Acetate upvc cleaner for 15+ years so vapour filters and good ventilation are a must!
I remember the original Nitro Mors. it started bubbling the paint almost instantly upon application, it was real nasty stuff and you definitely did NOT want to get any on your skin!
@@MrStella1976 Would be interesting to see a side by side comparison video. I was sat here watching the video thinking "What are the chances I could find somebody with a tin of the original stuff that'd sell it to me so I could do a comparison?"
TBH, unless you really love the door for whatever reason...I would simply save myself time and hassle...especially time...and just buy a new door. The older you get, the less time you should be fannying around with things like this. I used to be a professional decorator btw.
Agreed, with the single exception that, if you buy an new door, you have to fit and hang it from scratch. Having said that, working on the 'time is money' principle, it is probably still worth it as I get older.
Absolutely agree with this. And don't buy some crap door from BandQ - get something decent and you will find it's actually a plaeasure to paint awell made, brand new door.
I agree!! Paint strippers are a total waste of time, however, I'm pretty sure I could also strip the paint off that door with my belt sander in roughly the same amount of time that it would take me to go shopping for a new door and whatever else I'd need to do to prepare the door to be hung. I did a similar door last year with it, took a couple of hours, but next time I would place the door lower, I had it at workbench height and leaning over it wasn't very comfortable after an hour!
@@jehorigby8778 there is no such thing as ..quarter of an afternoon...in the building game. I was a general builder for 15 years. To get that properly sanded prepped and knotted. Then a coat of sealer, then undercoat maybe two, then two top coats ....is going to take the whole day.
Might be worth pointing out that you should never go over an area with a heat gun that has previously had paint stripper on it. Many people get fed up waiting for the stripper to work and then go at it with a heat gun. The fumes produced can actually kill you.
Many thanks. I had no idea they'd reformulated Nitromors and would have bought it with high expectations and been disappointed. Peelaway really is very good, especially in intricate areas. It stripped all my cast iron fireplaces with no trouble at all.
The problem with peelaway comes when you use it with wood that has multiple coats of paint. In my most recent job I had to use a layer of peelaway 1, then 7, then 1. It got there but it was messy and there was some staining on the wood (it was being repainted so not an issue)
20 years ago I worked in the paint stripping game.We would put doors in a big tank of boiling hot caustic soda solution,about 8 at a time .They were put in edgeways and turned over when half the door was stripped.When the caustic was fresh the paint just melted away.We were doing about 200 doors a week at £7 each with free pick up and delivery.But we also stripped furniture with 100% dichloromethane .We nicknamed it 'Magic' because it was so effective...but very expensive .I was not surprised it was banned for public use as it is lethal and highly destructive to the environment.As a previous post pointed out if it is heated it turns into a gas akin to mustard gas and a even a small percentage in your lungs can kill you!I was glad to get out of that game ,stripping paint and varnish is a horrible business.
1950's we used to go to the chemist for sixpence worth of carbon tetrachloride to clean my Hornby Dublo model train tracks and contacts. Was actually recommended in the instructions. Same stuff as was in those brass fire extinguishers. Slight problem was that it released a deadly poisonous carcinogenic gas so not that good an idea.
Great content as always Rodger. Just to add a bit more info; All paint stripping chemicals are pretty nasty. Tip, after getting off as much paint as you can using paint stripper, there's always some left on. To remove this, a thick'ish coat of caustic left on for about 4 hours dissolves the bits you mist. This can then be rinsed off with a hose pipe. If one has the correct PPA a jet wash will do a better job. But don't get too close with the jet wash as it will rip the wood.
Tip for the heat gun warm it up till crisp let cool down then go over again with the heat gun it drops off real quickly. Wear your safety glasses it stings like a beast if you get it in your eyes 👀
@@bluewanderer9903 I put in oak doors, frames , skirtings and stair handrail and spindles and used Danish oil. Id be lying if I said I did it to eliminate painting. I just like the look of natural wood and the relative ease to which you can achieve a good look.
@@paul756uk2 good stuff, I would love to try something like that. I have only used danish oil once on a pao red deal timber on a work bench and garage shelving, managed to do it right the first time and it looks great. Must try it on more serious timber.
I used a water based paint stripper on our banister which had abot 8 layers of old gloss on top of a dark varnish. Our house is 1930s and one of the paints was a brilliant green - guessing 1960s/70s? It got through all layers in one go although needed a second coat to get the varnish off fully. So impressed. Plus, although eco and water based I still wore gloves...I did get so e of the stripper in my glove and it was there for a while - hadn't realised. No ill effect on my skin at all. Don't see the need for the old chemicles and glad they're banned as they weren't so friendly - found just a drip of the original nitromors made the skin on my have very sore.
After stripping quite a few features in my Victorian house (probably spent 6 months just on stripping and painting), I think that nothing beats heat gun to remove majority of paint, and finish off with paint stripper wherever you were unable to use heat gun properly. Still, it is painfully slow process, smelly and messy. If I was to strip exisiting door or door frame I'd prefer to replace them - more time and cost efective. In some places I did as you said - painted over lead paint (you can buy water based paints that will stick to solvent based ones so it saves you on painting 2 coats of primer) and it works well too. Still, wherever can, I strip to bare wood and repaint it. Do not forget about your knotting solution - my over 100 year old window frames show a lot of knots because I did not think they could be showing 100 years later :).
If you can get hold of industrial cellophane wrapping (the one with a blue hint to it)... cover the paint stripper with that. Works brilliantly and halves the amount of stripper needed and speeds up the result. 👍
The 'Dulux' Effect, living off the name, I try to mist the stripper with water to stop it from drying out or use cling film, Heat gun is the best method but DONT use one on Facias or Soffits you will likely set fire to the roof!!!!
I trained as a house painter & decorator in the 70s. Gas blow lamps were considered expensive and we still just about had parafin blow torches. Every summer I'd see a story in the local paper of a roof catching fire when people burned off at the eaves. I have never ever burned off at the fascia and soffits in forty years. Not worth it. And any burning off around window ends an hour or more before going home just in case something was smouldering quietly. We also carried a fairy liquid bottle of water to squirt just in case a bit got too hot.
I spent a couple of hours this evening using Nitromors for the first time in about 27 years (I'm only 41..) I'd usually use a heat gun, but this was on some detailing around the glazing of an interior door, the glass of which I didn't want to crack with the heat. The results were indeed underwhelming and after nearly a full small tin of the stuff I've only got down to the original layer of paint.
i work for Henkel and Nitromors is no longe is sold in the Uk. if you want any after the stock is sold out in stores that's it so hurry up and stock up.
I always used a blowtorch & shave hook for stripping + repainting, Heatgun for varnish, Nitromors for small / intricate areas ... a Varispeed Mini-grinder with the guard removed & 80, 100, 120 grit Silicon Carbide disc is great for panels, edges etc ...
Yeah, Nitromors USED to be brilliant. I used to use it inside car body panels (inside doors, and on bonnet/boot lid frames mainly) as it was a really great hassle free way to get down to bare metal on complex shaped surfaces. The formula change annoyed the hell out of me because I found out half way through stripping all the paint off a boot lid I needed to weld some fresh metal into and repaint. I used the last of my original formula stuff, but still had a couple square foot of paint left to remove. So I trundled off to Halfords and grabbed another (IIRC) 4 litre tin. It turned out that this was the new formula cr*p. I ended up using that whole tin, but all it did was slightly soften the remaining paint. It was a total mess because this softened paint just clogged emery cloth instantly. Rather than the hour I was expecting it to take me to get the last of the paint off, It took me DAYS of careful scraping, sanding and wire wooling to get this now plasticized paint off (Didn't want to leave any trace of it in any seams or crevasses because I was sure that the Nitromors which HAD soaked into the old paint would react like crazy if I tried to spray fresh stuff over it ). Once I realised the problem, I kept popping into any hardware stores I was passing in case they still had the old stuff on the shelves, but it seems the formula change had happened well over a year earlier. During the time I MIGHT have been able to find some old stock, I wasn't aware that anything had changed because I hadn't had to buy any due to still having a couple of 4L tins of it in the garage. :(
I found by accident that the best remover for water based paints is Johnsons baby shampoo. I spilt some on the bathroom wall and within minuets the paint started to blister, it is also very good for cleaning brushes including solvent based paints. I remember when I was a child back in the 1950's a painter coming to the house and removing paint with a paraffin blowlamp.
I remember when me and the boys were in Vegas, we used a stripper called Jasmine, she took everything off no questions asked. Never seen a better stripper. Gobble gobble gobble
I use a combination of "paint stripper" found discarded in skips 😉 and caustic soda. Covering the stripping compound with cling film helps. For lead paint, there are low temperature heat guns, designed specifically to strip paint without vaporising the lead compounds.
I’ve tried all sorts of paint remover and find nothing works better than a heat gun. With any paint strippers you really have to wash the service down after making sure you get into all the nooks and crannies. Otherwise when you do eventually re paint it will start to blister. I’m talking from experience here. By the way many moons ago. In fact back in the 70s I had four doors which had that black underneath many layers of paint which was a nightmare to get off with nitromors I ended up putting plywood over the top instead which looked nice in the end. I was told later by an old painter that it was a bitumen preserve. Whether that’s true or not who knows what they used back then. 40s/50s
You should go deeper into this. It’s important fir people to know about led paint and other poisonous materials. I’d love (as a plasterer ) to know more about artex and the asbestos or whatever is in it.
Yeh, completely agree as the home I live in had a hot air blower system to circulate heat had asbestos as a protector, before i moved in they had to be removed. After I wanted to make a feature of the placements but needed to be checked for any remaining pieces but fortunately was cleared.😀👍
Years ago as a teen with my Dad we tried using paint stripper and it was of the stronger variety. I was never convinced then that it was ever worth it. The trouble, the time, the danger to health and the cost all make it a massive negative. On the flat areas you may get semi-decent results but any kind of moulding is a PITA to sort. Unless you've got something really vintage which will improve the value, don't bother. Either just replace the wood itself or sand back and re-coat.
Cheers for the video Roger, I’m midway through stripping a load of woodwork with a heat gun, it’s effective but time consuming. Was just about to rush out and buy some Nitromors, think I’ll stick to the gun.
I enjoyed that Roger, well done. Nice to hear a good builder giving solid advice. I live in France where we can still buy all manner of lethal old school stuff but the EU is gradually removing that from the shelves too.
@@SkillBuilder to be fair, France has always been a bit of a law unto itself when it came to the EU rules and regs that their government didn't fully support. Not always a bad thing, not always a good thing.
When we were in the EU I said to a Portuguese friend who was saying they did something in Portugal which was unlawful according to EU regulations - I said " you can't do that, the EU have banned it so it affects Portugal as well as the UK" . The response was "yes well you take notice in the UK. We don't take any notice in Portugal" .
Great video. My preferred method (and I have used it on all the skirting boards in my Edwardian house to get them back to the original wood) is the Wagner heat gun and then finish off with a cheap chemical stripper (I use Wilko's paint remover) with those steel ball scouring pads for cleaning pans that you can pick up for about £1 - not the ones with soap in them like brillo pads! It is true there will be some small patches of scorching from the heat gun, but I have found these come off easily with the chemical stripper and scourers. And an additional tip. You will find the scourers get all soggy and sticky and gunged up after a while. Rather than go through loads of them, if you soak them in hot water with some washing-up liquid and pull them apart a bit, the gunge will all clean off. Dry them on a radiator and there is plenty of use left in them. As everyone says, Nitromors these days is nowhere near the product it was and is very expensive and frustrating to use. Invest in a decent Wagner heat gun and you won't regret it - one of my best DIY investments.
Totally agree with you. I’ve tried both in the past along with a very expensive pro paint stripper. All of them useless. The time you spend applying the stuff, scraping a minuscule amount of paint off, then cleaning up the mess, my heat gun would have done it in a fraction of the time.
Generally absolutely agree with using a heat gun. Although I have had to resort to nitromors on a couple of occasions where the surface was previously painted with a pesky rubberised water based paint which a heat gun would not touch (it would scorch the surface but not cause the paint to peel/bluster).
Thanks Roger. Agree 100%. Very disappointed with Nitro Mors and, based on your demo, I won't be trying the Screwfix alternative. I agree entirely that a heat gun is by far the best solution. I note you use the Wagner and I think it is an excellent choice. Mine has a variable fan speed and heat temperature select and it is brilliant on any type of paint I have tried to strip so far.
Just remember that when heating lead paint and stripping it back if you get grey lines on the insides of your lips.... It's too late. You'll end up with lead in your joints and be weak as a kitten. Mask up boys with a chemical vapour mask, p ratings do nothing, you'll be looking for a k rated one. Something a car sprayer would wear. We've all burnt paint off and had the headaches. We don't need to do that anymore, if you don't have a mask like that politely say to the customer you don't have a capable mask for the task but you would willingly accept the task if they funded the cost of the mask. Because cancer and having a weird pausey thing going on for 25 years. Mask up chaps.
It's a good thing to mention, some people have the impression a mask is a mask; or worse, realise there are different types but can be bothered to use the correct one with the logic a wrong mask is better than no mask. I've seen plenty of you tube videos with people using an incorrect type and / or very poor fit. Once your health is damaged it's too late.
This is scare mongering. As long as you are reasonably careful you won't, as an adult doing DIY work, ingest amounts of lead into your body by stripping lead paint with paint stripper or by handling lead, which will cause you harm. What is not a good idea is stripping lead with a heat gun - if you do, take the item outdoors or open a window and set up a fan to blow air over the work towards the window. Similarly, try NOT to sand lead paint, if you do, vacuum the dust as you're going BUT you will need a vacuum that will filter the dust properly (generally expensive ones) - cheap vacs will just expel dust into the air, which will makes things far worse. It's a good idea to wear a PROPER mask that will filter fumes, not a cheap paper mask. Lead is most dangerous to children, and they should be kept well away. Remember that lead was added to petrol for about 80 years and consequently sprayed out into all our cities, towns and countryside. Get the danger into perspective BUT remember that once lead is in your body it's VERY difficult to get it out. Always WASH YOUR HANDS after handing lead, and preferably wear gloves. Lead was in paint because it protected the wood really well and gave a shine to paint that is impossible to reproduce today.
Bang on, i thought it was weaker, im a painter and decorator with 37yrs experience & used the old version & recently used the same product but found it wasn't as good, dont use newspaper as its absorbent, use cling film for it to not just seal in the fumes but more importantly it will stay wet & sweat when trapped underneath & stay active for longer ,it will start to peel & stick to the cling film when removing & leave you less to do, if it tears too easily use plastic sheeting
Best method I've ever found was a heat gun followed up by paint stripper to clean the wood. In my older age, after stripping some shutters, I developed vertigo. Yes, I was well ventilated but it still hit me. Be careful!
The screwfix stuff is ok, but i found its best to slap it on thick, cover it in plastic and leave it overnight. The best stuff is still the oldschool stuff by far, car bodyshop supplies still carry it.
I've used the no nonsense stuff and it works. Niromors is a lot more money and doesn't always work much better - really dependent upon the paint. You do need to work it in to the paint as the layers start to come off as it won't usually go through more than one or two at a time but its cheap enough to just lash on. I have discovered on very old heavy oil based paints that it turns it to a sort of melted chocolate mess. Best way I've found is to work that well and then use a good detergent to cause it to clump a little and then rinse well with a stiff bristle handbrush - the latter will go in the bin as you'll never get it removed. Heatgun inside with old paint that may have lead in it isn't always an option....
@@guffermeister I wonder if scoring through the paint would improve its results, especially on multiple layers. Risks leaving score marks on the underlying wood if not careful, which might be a concern.
Back in the 80's we bought an old house as our first place. There was a lot of gorgeous old pine doors etc and we wanted to see the wood. Husband was a decorator so went straight for the Nitromors. I hated it, the smell especially. I was just becoming eco aware - this was the time when what was in our aerosols & fridges was becoming known. So I really wanted to go the heat gun route. We did, it was fun actually. Watching it all bubble up and very satisfying to scrape off. But heaven knows what we were burning through! There were so many layers of paint and wallpaper in the place that the whole house was a few inches bigger by the time we were done 😆😆. It was worth it, the pine was beautiful, and we found a some little birds etc had been carved into some places at some point. Definitely worth the effort.
Roger. By far the best and cheapest method is to make a simple mix of 50 -50%plain flour and caustic soda. Mix dry in a stainless container, (not aluminium), add water with care, it gets warm. Apply as a poultice and cover with clingfilm, leave for a few hours and scrape off. Usual safety precautions, gloves, goggles, disposal etc
@@jack1d1XB yeah so dangerous we all died from using it... One of my fav evil trucks back then, a light coating on the palm of the hand, then slap someone on the back of the neck where there's more sensitive skin so they would feel the burn.... Grabbing them by the wrist worked too.... (If doing this remember to really wash hands before a trip to the toilet...) Oh the fun of the old days....
I used Peel Off Ronstip many years back, started as a powder bit like polyfilla, mixed it with water to form a paste and then slathers it on the wood to be stripped. Worked great on vertical or even upside down surfaces. After an hour liquid would statrt to seep from the dried paste and that was an indicator - ready to take off. Great for doing detail such as cornices or newel posts. But like everything that worked or was good the EU or someone banned it and as you say Nitromors is useless. I've got an old cable jointers propane blow lamp, I'm a dab hand at softening many layers of paint without burning the wood. All the wood is stripped outdoors and yes I wear proper PPE with a lead fume rated filter in the mask.
Agreed, heatgun the best way. The other problem with paint stripping formulations, is having to wash and clean up afterwards. Just be careful not to overheat and burn the wood.
@@MrJTJINX Just go very easy with it. It's seemingly very easy to blast the face of the brick off and then you're screwed and you'll be back to painting it forever.
We use Dichloromethane (same magical ingrediant as removed from Nitromors)based stripper at work, propper nasty stuff - reduces the oxygen absorbsion of the body whilst exposed so we have to use forced air breathing. Still hard work with the polyurethane and epoxy paints/primers we have to remove.
The one i like most at the moment is the Home Strip water based paint remover. On the point of it drying out, if I think it's quite thick paint I'll cover it in that plastic sheet you can get for sealing up rooms, better than newspaper that'll still dry out eventually.
I use paint stripper on complex shapes and hard to get to spaces. Couple tips: after applying the paint stripper cover with cheap catering plastic wrap and wait till the paint blisters and the bubbles begin to join up into sheets. the plastic both insulates and keeps the stripper moist (yes yes yes I know) Also wear a respirator not a mask - the mask you are wearing is for particulate matter not vapour and paint stripper often uses dichloromethane a very nasty carcinogen thats banned all over the place. Sometimes I drag a wire brush over the surface before applying the stripper to accelerate penetration (sigh). I use a heat gun almost exclusively as its the most environmentally friendly way to get rid of old paint.
I have just finished using the one from screw fix no nonsense and it works absolutely fantastic it actually works well and i was able to remove paint with in ten minutes of putting it on you do have to put another layer on after scraping the first layer off but it worked well and performed well with very low owder I would give it 10 out of 10 but a warning it does eat threw rubber gloves so beware of that when using as of stpling it on is a no no it needs to be brushed on and a HARRIS HEAVY DUTY TUNGSTEN CARBIDE WOOD SCRAPER 2" which is very good to help with the job at hand
I would say more like informing the public of dodgy advertising. One of my hobbies is Locksport (lock picking) and the false advertising there with security products is horrendous. It's the end user that pays it and doesn't get what it says on the tin. To steal someone's phrase.
My Grandad was restoring a Norton in his cellar, and used Nitromors on the headlamp switches : the damned things completely melted. That was powerful stuff, back in the day.
How to make your own Nitromorse. One packet of Hot Water Lap, ( this is a starch based wallpaper past that uses Hot Water ) and a packet of Costic Soda. Mix Costic with hot water and add wallpaper past till thick. Apply liberally to area to be stripped and cover with plastic sheeting for 45 minutes or longer ( The longer the better up to 6 hours if applied liberally ) then strip with scrapers. I've been doing this for over 40 years and has saved me fortunes. 👍 PLEASE REMEMBER CAUSTIC IS DANGEROUS AND GLASSES AND GLOVES SHOULD ALWAYS BE WORN. Please Read the Instructions on the pkt of Caustic Soda first before mixing.
a good stripper (steady on...) only dips the door as long as necessary, so damage to joints etc is virtually nill.... its the drying time that's the pain. Lay door flat and cover with clingfilm when using stripper for best results, but a heat gun is much faster
Spot on with the hark back to lead paints. I had to fix and repaint some wooden window frames a few years ago. The new paint, a 'quality' brand, turned translucent after only one year. Absolutely useless! I have uPVC frames now and the investment was worth it if only because I don't need to sacrifice all of my annual leave doing repainting. Btw, I'm old enough that I used to strip paint using a paraffin blowlamp. Probably considered horrifically unsafe/unhealthy now, and a tad terrifying, but very effective. Basically a hand-held pulse jet!
Hi Roger, I preferred the Nitro Mors to the Non Nonsense in my tea, and the heat gun came in handy for warming the cup back up after it got cold. Great video though, I love your work.
I've been stripping paint from my old car. The top two or three layers are re-spray work done, I think, with cellulose. They have come off very easily with a hot air gun. The original facrory paint beneath is a bit more difficult, but the hot air still works. Even hot air guns are not risk free. The nozzle gets very hot and a light touch on your skin can cause a nasty burn and scar. I minimise the fumes by moving along as soon as the paint starts to bubble; there's no need to burn it.
Just get Robin to make you a new door :-) On a more serious note, I hope the younger generation take the health risks from heat guns and strippers more seriously than in the past - as with a lot of things, when you're young, you think you're invincible, and the consequences only show up years later.
in my first flat i stripped all the old gloss with a blowtorch and scraper worked really well but stunk winter too so the windows werent open.... what a pillock i was
Agree that Nitromors or any other supposed paint strippers are not what they used to be. I was once given an alternative method by somebody that specialised in paint stripping/restoration to mix my own paint stripper: Mix Caustic Soda with wall paper paste Works a treat just like the old school paint strippers but also like those care must be taken... Disclaimer: This is just information and I am not responsible for anybody else's actions
Totally agree with this. Nitro Mors no longer justifies being known as an effective paint stripper. It simply does not work as well as it did (especially in cooler temperatures). Heat guns are the best method by far and a fraction of the cost. Great video with very balanced conclusions.
@@jimh4072 so many product that are really bad for us smelt so good... Barely anything smells as good now as it did several decades back. But maybe that's not a bad thing... I definitely wasn't as careful about breathing in fumes when opening containers as I should have been.
I tried stripping the paint off a metal gate a few years back with Nitromors. It never even touched it, no matter how much I dabbed on, or how long I left it. Eventually, I mixed up some caustic soda, used wallpaper paste to thicken it up into a jelly and covered it in that. That did the job alright, quick blast with the pressure washer afterwards got all the paint right off.
The old nitromors was great stuff, but this new stuff is crap And with all the deadly stuff in paint stripper where is the harm in bringing back the old recipe 🤔
Just what I needed to see! For stripping metal I use caustic soda but anyone reading this READ THE WIKIPEDIA PAGE FIRST!!! Caustic soda dissolves protein and fat which is most fo human beings.
Outside job - Caustic soda mix with wallpaper paste or just with hot water, add crystals to water not vice versa... keep kids pets away... slather it on... leave it half a day go back scrub it in, paint on some more... ( use gloves and a face and eye covering - wash down with hose... you may need to repeat a few times but it definitely beats any proprietary concoction and it's cheap as chips
Thanks Roger, fair review of the two products. Nitromors went from being a great product to one that smells like a great product (it absolutely stinks now) but doesn't do the business...why did they bring out a product that was so poor and got a reputation for it virtually overnight...another case of believing what their own marketing people write. Paint panther is my go to stripper.
Nitromors used to be a paint stripper. It was called that because it stripped paint. It’s now a very effective wallet stripper.
Ha Ha.
Good one.
It's sure a wallet stripper😁
It sells, that’s all that matters. Nobody is going to take them to court because it’s inadequate. As you say, it’s a nice little earner.
When they changed it, I phoned them up and complained. The person on the phone apologised profusely and conceded that the new version was next to useless.
How to make your own Nitromorse. One packet of Hot Water Lap, ( this is a starch based wallpaper past that uses Hot Water ) and a packet of Costic Soda. Mix Costic with hot water and add wallpaper past till thick. Apply to area to be stripped and cover with plastic sheeting for 45 minutes then strip with scraper.
I used to work as a French Polisher back in the late eighties and back then stripping furniture with wire wool and Nitromors stripper was an essential part of the job. It was great stuff as it would quickly and effectively strip furniture back to bare wood in no time. I couldn't imagine doing the same job today and running a successful furniture restoration business with the useless version of Nitromors that now has to be used. Bring back the 1980's version! In fact bring back the 1980's anyway as life seemed more fun back then.
I agree with you re the 80’s. What a time to be alive!
And what most people don't know is that you could neutralise Nitromors with white spirit.
You probably have undiagnosed cancer
Try a respirator with the appropriate filter. All that ones good for is walking round shops.
Ring 3M and read the MSDS and they'll tell you the one to use.
It doesn't do anything against a virus either, they are surgical masks to stop doctors contaminating an operating theatre with spit and cough droplets. That's about as much use they have.
@@Geo-vw9oz the same spot and cough droplets that covid uses as a medium.
You might want to think,(think being the operative word here)about what you just said(wrote).🤔
Hes in the open air,"adequate ventilation"is being applied here me thinks.
Just an informed opinion I guess.
@@Allencorgan4951 a cough droplet is made primarily of water, covid has a lipid bilayer meaning it doesn't stick to cough droplets. (Think = Oil and water doesn't Mix). Covid will pass through the mask but droplets won't.
The N in N95 means Not oil resistant and a lipid is a fat or oil. Meaning covid will even pass through an N95 mask, so it will certainly pass through a surgical mask.
I remember the original Nitromors. It was brilliant. I also remember the newer version coming on the market and wondered what the hell had happened. Never used the product since.
The same has happened with so many once-good products. The new 'safe' Hammerite paint is another one that is absolute rubbish compared to the original.
Yep, the original disintegrated the paint in no time, and your hands if you weren't careful. New stripper needs loads of coats, it just tickles it off after about 4 coats. Useless unless it's the only option. Prefer to burn it off now.
@@V8PropaneBurner so true worked in heavy engineering, use to have very effective degreaser, now the new environmentally products, are bloody useless and have to use a lot more of it.
@@V8PropaneBurner Hammerite is white spirit based now which is definitely not as good as the Coovar which is still based on the old school Hammerite, dries quicker.
Remember going into B&Q a few years ago for some weedkiller. Nothing on the shelves. No pesticides, fungicides, weedicides etc. Sales guy said they had been instructed to clear everything due to new EU health and safety rules.
The stuff they sell nowadays is about as effective as vinegar. You may do better at an agricultural suppliers (if they're prepared to sell it to you).
You need to get the one from the Dulux Decorating Centre. It's identical but 8 times the price so it must be better......
😂😂👍😂😂
The higher the price does NOT necessarily mean the best 🤔🤔🤔🤔
@@tof3275 .........................................
@@tof3275 Certainly not now .
Like B&Q’s masonry bits, twice the price, twice as shiiite.
Bought a 106 year old semi with terrible paintwork on all the wooden surfaces. Tried Nitromors and the No Nonsense stuff but struggled to get a good result. Luckily found PeelAway which was incredible. So easy to use, very effective if time consuming. Got great results with very little mess. Highly recommended, especially if you have multiple layers of really thick paint to remove.
If its time consuming then it is pretty useless .
At 106 getting a semi with stripper is a result 👍😂
@@stepheng8779 under rated comment here. Bravo sir.
@@stepheng8779this is 2 years later and this is still a brilliant comment 😂
That’s sorted then - I’ll go and buy a new door.👍🏻
😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
Me too 😂
Or a heat gun !😊
@@ruthgadders8437 or maybe avoid huffin lead fumes an just get the new door.
Exactly. Heat gun takes ages aswell...
You're not slagging em off, you're highlighting the risks of using old materials, pointing out our options, reminding us of the risks involved and giving us an idea of how we can proceed. Thank you for this vid and sharing you're knowledge, 😀👍
P.S, How can we identify old lead paint?
You can buy a little lead paint test kit from decorators merchants
@@SkillBuilder cool ta 4 info,😀👍
I wondered why it didn’t work when I used it on a job recently. When I used it in the past it was awesome so I bought a large £25 tin and it did bugger all. Now I know why
Same thing happened to me a few years back. Happily trekked back from B&Q with some Nitromors and then it worked about as well as putting porridge on the paint. Was desperate for a while until I went on line and found out about the new formulation.
I used a 40 grit sanding wheel on an angle grinder, doors a bit thinner now.
LMFAO ...
@@lukee.fokker6715 its funny but that's my first instinct for removing paint, 40 grit sand paper and let the grinder's weight be the only source of pressure, then go over again with a 120 grit wheel.
@@BType13X2 Use a festo unit .
I've seen that attempted on a fibreglass speed boat. Not the best results.
That's reminded me of a mate who bought an old farmhouse. The place needed a lot of work, and one of the "Round tooit" jobs was that all the solid wood doors needed stripping and repainting. There were something like 25 to 30 of the damn things (called "Z brace" doors IIRC?), and they'd been over painted for generations, without ever being taken back to bare wood, So they looked like they'd been liberally smeared in lumpy porridge by that point. :D
He ended up taking them down and carefully dismantling the doors one by one. He kept/straightening all the old hand forged nails he could, Then shoved the planks through his thickness planer before reassembling them (Using the original nail holes as guides) and giving them a coat of decent paint. The planks on the doors started out probably somewhere near 1.5" (About 35mm) thick, and ended up being a little under 1" (25ish mm) thick afterwards, But as things like the locks and hinges were all surface mounted, he had very little trouble reassembling them all to fit again. A few door frames eventually needed adjusting to fit the thinner doors, but most just had draft excluder strips fitted to take up any gaps, and to get a much tighter fit than they'd had before.
I thought he was mad when he told me about how he'd done the doors, until he pointed out that it took him 2 days of sanding and refinishing to get the first door looking "OKish", but by dismantling and using the thickness planer he was easily getting 5 doors a day done, They looked brand new, AND he didn't finish the day covered in a shedload of (Possibly) toxic lead filled paint dust. :D
I’m a qualified decorator, left the profession about 7/8 years ago but just took on a job for a family friend. They wanted the handrail stripped back to bare wood. Easy. Only problem is they painted in an acrylic paint so it’s all peeling off, including the skirting. Easy job but very time consuming. I was debating buying nitromors to get the bit near the carpet but this video confirms my doubts. Thanks for your video, the advice is very handy even to those in the trade!
What doubts? nitromors works fine too, each tool got its own purpose and may be handy in areas sensitive to the heat. if you use heatgun you have to be careful being near the carpet etc. Probably cleanest way.
During college I worked at a furniture restoration shop. We stripped most of the paint using a blast system that used walnut shells. It would work great in the corners. We very rarely used a chemical stripper as it would stain some of the woods.
Yeah, crushed walnut shell media works really well at getting varnishes off, but it can apparently dull any detail on intricate carving work underneath.
An older relative of mine used to collect/restore antique shotguns, and I remember years back, him seeming annoyed when the quite ornate wooden stock for one project came back from the place he used for specialist blasting work. It turned out that the varnish on this one was so resilient to abrasion that as soon as they got through a patch of it, the walnut media would instantly start to scour the softer wooden edges of the fish scale carving beneath it, and round off all the "Crisp detail" it had.
He acted all annoyed, but I'm pretty sure he was quietly happy to have an excuse to get out his tools and spend a week re-carving the details on the stock to his own exacting standards. :D
He was a laugh. Half grumpy old git, half perfectionist tinkerer who couldn't do a hash job of anything if he tried. :D
Excellent video!
Thanks for confirming what I suspected. I’ve found that the heat gun is the best method. I’ve only used the nitromors in areas where heat could severely do damage, such as near glass.
I've striped a few dozen doors, frames and windows in the last couple of years... and I can assure you... You're doing it wrong. Use the attachment with the square opening. Heat a 2*2 inch section, moving only when you see the paint lifting, and you'll be able to lift all the paint off to the wood in one go. Slow and steady.
Agreed, also it's easier, quicker and cleaner to work from the top to the bottom as you scrape downwards, so gravity assists the removal process when the paint starts to peel away as you work your way down the door/frame.
@@giotto4321 Been years since I last striped a door (got some that desperately need sorting out, but I've been procrastinating for the past month, or thirty).
Anyhow, I've only ever done doors horizontal and never even thought about how working top to bottom on a vertical door would have made my life easier. So thanks for the tip. Might even manage to do them before the end of 2025 with this motivation to try it out.
Confused are u refering to a heat gun to use or the paint remover? Pls confirm.
Another useful video thanks. On the mask front, with the solvent based products, if it's organic vapours you are trying to stop yourself breathing in, then a surgical type mask is really of no use, you need one specifically for organic vapors. As you point out good ventilation is your friend. I can see how a particulate mask FFP2/3 would be useful if you are trying to avoid lead based dust.
Yep, A2 P3 vapour and particulate is what you want. I started getting neurological symptoms after using Butanone Acetate upvc cleaner for 15+ years so vapour filters and good ventilation are a must!
100% chaps. I work in the respiratory protection industry, only one set of lungs look after ‘em
Also, don't touch the mask with your dirty gloves; especially if it's a paper one.
Came to say the same. These "surgical" covid masks are egress filters; won't stop much, least of all organic solvent fumes getting in.
@@dougsaunders8109 Not just the lungs... heart, brain, kidneys, liver too. Chemicals can get in anywhere!
I remember the original Nitro Mors. it started bubbling the paint almost instantly upon application, it was real nasty stuff and you definitely did NOT want to get any on your skin!
Was ok on thick parts of your skin but any getting on your wrists/arms face etc really miffed you off!
I’ve still got half a tub of the old stuff that’s going on eBay now 😂
@@MrStella1976 Would be interesting to see a side by side comparison video. I was sat here watching the video thinking "What are the chances I could find somebody with a tin of the original stuff that'd sell it to me so I could do a comparison?"
@@damionlee7658 I have roof purlin ends to strip I’m going to give one of those a go with it
@@damionlee7658 you can still buy it, sysnstrip. The 'banned' product was dichloromethane. thats what was in the original nitromors.
Tried the new style Nitromors a year or so ago. Did nothing. Wickes refunded it without a whimper, suspect they did a lot of refunds!
I'd call this new stuff sh*t, but the residual stomach acid in sh*t would probably do a much better job of stripping paint than modern Nitromors. :D
TBH, unless you really love the door for whatever reason...I would simply save myself time and hassle...especially time...and just buy a new door. The older you get, the less time you should be fannying around with things like this. I used to be a professional decorator btw.
Absolutely. Life's too short for such nonsense
Agreed, with the single exception that, if you buy an new door, you have to fit and hang it from scratch. Having said that, working on the 'time is money' principle, it is probably still worth it as I get older.
Absolutely agree with this. And don't buy some crap door from BandQ - get something decent and you will find it's actually a plaeasure to paint awell made, brand new door.
I agree!! Paint strippers are a total waste of time, however, I'm pretty sure I could also strip the paint off that door with my belt sander in roughly the same amount of time that it would take me to go shopping for a new door and whatever else I'd need to do to prepare the door to be hung. I did a similar door last year with it, took a couple of hours, but next time I would place the door lower, I had it at workbench height and leaning over it wasn't very comfortable after an hour!
@@jehorigby8778 there is no such thing as ..quarter of an afternoon...in the building game. I was a general builder for 15 years. To get that properly sanded prepped and knotted. Then a coat of sealer, then undercoat maybe two, then two top coats ....is going to take the whole day.
Might be worth pointing out that you should never go over an area with a heat gun that has previously had paint stripper on it. Many people get fed up waiting for the stripper to work and then go at it with a heat gun. The fumes produced can actually kill you.
Especially if you're relying on completely the wrong breathing apparatus, like the pointless rubbish he's wearing in this video.
Many thanks. I had no idea they'd reformulated Nitromors and would have bought it with high expectations and been disappointed. Peelaway really is very good, especially in intricate areas. It stripped all my cast iron fireplaces with no trouble at all.
The problem with peelaway comes when you use it with wood that has multiple coats of paint. In my most recent job I had to use a layer of peelaway 1, then 7, then 1. It got there but it was messy and there was some staining on the wood (it was being repainted so not an issue)
I've always used a heat gun as my 1st step stripping wood. Then nitromors which was great back before they changed it.
I always preferred a heat gun, even back when Nitromors actually worked. It's just a much cleaner, faster and cheaper method.
Me too.
Do they work for lacquer as well as paint?
To quote Father Ted:- 'It's banned in most European countries, that means it's very good!'
If it doesn't have an orange square with a black cross, it's no good.
Father Ted should be the basis of a philosophy degree
You wouldn’t say that if you had any idea how dangerous methylene chloride is.
It is banned in the USA too. But hey if snorting dichloromethane turns you on then you should be allowed to in my opinion.
@@executivesteps humour isn't your strong point .. 🙄😂
20 years ago I worked in the paint stripping game.We would put doors in a big tank of boiling hot caustic soda solution,about 8 at a time .They were put in edgeways and turned over when half the door was stripped.When the caustic was fresh the paint just melted away.We were doing about 200 doors a week at £7 each with free pick up and delivery.But we also stripped furniture with 100% dichloromethane .We nicknamed it 'Magic' because it was so effective...but very expensive .I was not surprised it was banned for public use as it is lethal and highly destructive to the environment.As a previous post pointed out if it is heated it turns into a gas akin to mustard gas and a even a small percentage in your lungs can kill you!I was glad to get out of that game ,stripping paint and varnish is a horrible business.
Dichloromethane will actually break down epoxy resin,albeit slowly,so it’s got to be pretty powerful stuff!
@@MrJTJINX I
1950's we used to go to the chemist for sixpence worth of carbon tetrachloride to clean my Hornby Dublo model train tracks and contacts. Was actually recommended in the instructions. Same stuff as was in those brass fire extinguishers. Slight problem was that it released a deadly poisonous carcinogenic gas so not that good an idea.
@@MrJTJINX He meant Dichloromethane!
I like to slow down the drying by placing a plastic wrap or bag over the stripper. It dries slower so does more to remove the paint. Good video!
In my experience strippers don't take too kindly to the suggestion of putting a plastic bag over their head.😆
Great content as always Rodger. Just to add a bit more info; All paint stripping chemicals are pretty nasty. Tip, after getting off as much paint as you can using paint stripper, there's always some left on. To remove this, a thick'ish coat of caustic left on for about 4 hours dissolves the bits you mist.
This can then be rinsed off with a hose pipe. If one has the correct PPA a jet wash will do a better job. But don't get too close with the jet wash as it will rip the wood.
Tip for the heat gun warm it up till crisp let cool down then go over again with the heat gun it drops off real quickly. Wear your safety glasses it stings like a beast if you get it in your eyes 👀
Great video. I left the Screwfix stuff on for 24 hours. 2 coats. It worked
Fortunately, I achieved my aim of not having a single piece of painted woodwork in my house. Just walls and ceilings. I absolutely detest it.
I do like the sound of that, but how?
@@bluewanderer9903 I put in oak doors, frames , skirtings and stair handrail and spindles and used Danish oil. Id be lying if I said I did it to eliminate painting. I just like the look of natural wood and the relative ease to which you can achieve a good look.
Same here. Used Osmo wax-based oil. Amazing stuff but a bit pricey.
@@paul756uk2 good stuff, I would love to try something like that. I have only used danish oil once on a pao red deal timber on a work bench and garage shelving, managed to do it right the first time and it looks great. Must try it on more serious timber.
I can't stand the sauna look tbh but each to their own
I used a water based paint stripper on our banister which had abot 8 layers of old gloss on top of a dark varnish. Our house is 1930s and one of the paints was a brilliant green - guessing 1960s/70s?
It got through all layers in one go although needed a second coat to get the varnish off fully.
So impressed.
Plus, although eco and water based I still wore gloves...I did get so e of the stripper in my glove and it was there for a while - hadn't realised. No ill effect on my skin at all.
Don't see the need for the old chemicles and glad they're banned as they weren't so friendly - found just a drip of the original nitromors made the skin on my have very sore.
It was pleasure to watch and listen. Thanks a lot!
After stripping quite a few features in my Victorian house (probably spent 6 months just on stripping and painting), I think that nothing beats heat gun to remove majority of paint, and finish off with paint stripper wherever you were unable to use heat gun properly. Still, it is painfully slow process, smelly and messy. If I was to strip exisiting door or door frame I'd prefer to replace them - more time and cost efective. In some places I did as you said - painted over lead paint (you can buy water based paints that will stick to solvent based ones so it saves you on painting 2 coats of primer) and it works well too. Still, wherever can, I strip to bare wood and repaint it. Do not forget about your knotting solution - my over 100 year old window frames show a lot of knots because I did not think they could be showing 100 years later :).
"We'll be slagging more products off!" 😆😆
If you can get hold of industrial cellophane wrapping (the one with a blue hint to it)... cover the paint stripper with that. Works brilliantly and halves the amount of stripper needed and speeds up the result. 👍
The 'Dulux' Effect, living off the name, I try to mist the stripper with water to stop it from drying out or use cling film, Heat gun is the best method but DONT use one on Facias or Soffits you will likely set fire to the roof!!!!
I was going to mention the fire risk but forgot so thanks for that. Let's hope people read the comments.
Or near glass
Or sash window frames, the weight box's act like a chimney!
Pin this comment to the top. Safety first.
I trained as a house painter & decorator in the 70s. Gas blow lamps were considered expensive and we still just about had parafin blow torches. Every summer I'd see a story in the local paper of a roof catching fire when people burned off at the eaves. I have never ever burned off at the fascia and soffits in forty years. Not worth it. And any burning off around window ends an hour or more before going home just in case something was smouldering quietly. We also carried a fairy liquid bottle of water to squirt just in case a bit got too hot.
I spent a couple of hours this evening using Nitromors for the first time in about 27 years (I'm only 41..) I'd usually use a heat gun, but this was on some detailing around the glazing of an interior door, the glass of which I didn't want to crack with the heat. The results were indeed underwhelming and after nearly a full small tin of the stuff I've only got down to the original layer of paint.
i work for Henkel and Nitromors is no longe is sold in the Uk. if you want any after the stock is sold out in stores that's it so hurry up and stock up.
I always used a blowtorch & shave hook for stripping + repainting, Heatgun for varnish, Nitromors for small / intricate areas ... a Varispeed Mini-grinder with the guard removed & 80, 100, 120 grit Silicon Carbide disc is great for panels, edges etc ...
Yeah, Nitromors USED to be brilliant. I used to use it inside car body panels (inside doors, and on bonnet/boot lid frames mainly) as it was a really great hassle free way to get down to bare metal on complex shaped surfaces.
The formula change annoyed the hell out of me because I found out half way through stripping all the paint off a boot lid I needed to weld some fresh metal into and repaint. I used the last of my original formula stuff, but still had a couple square foot of paint left to remove. So I trundled off to Halfords and grabbed another (IIRC) 4 litre tin. It turned out that this was the new formula cr*p.
I ended up using that whole tin, but all it did was slightly soften the remaining paint. It was a total mess because this softened paint just clogged emery cloth instantly. Rather than the hour I was expecting it to take me to get the last of the paint off, It took me DAYS of careful scraping, sanding and wire wooling to get this now plasticized paint off (Didn't want to leave any trace of it in any seams or crevasses because I was sure that the Nitromors which HAD soaked into the old paint would react like crazy if I tried to spray fresh stuff over it ).
Once I realised the problem, I kept popping into any hardware stores I was passing in case they still had the old stuff on the shelves, but it seems the formula change had happened well over a year earlier. During the time I MIGHT have been able to find some old stock, I wasn't aware that anything had changed because I hadn't had to buy any due to still having a couple of 4L tins of it in the garage. :(
Glad to see Im not the only one that's had problems with this messy crap! As a restorer I've tried all sorts of methods, they've all been hard work!!
Don't think you will find anyone dipping doors anymore Roger, we've all been shut down, the old 'elf n safety!! Great channel thanks for posting
I know a Romanian guy working in a farmyard who does it, or to be more precise he gets his wife and kids to do it.
@@SkillBuilder Hee hee! I also do know someone that is still doing it , but all a bit hush hush! Stay safe cheers
I found by accident that the best remover for water based paints is Johnsons baby shampoo. I spilt some on the bathroom wall and within minuets the paint started to blister, it is also very good for cleaning brushes including solvent based paints. I remember when I was a child back in the 1950's a painter coming to the house and removing paint with a paraffin blowlamp.
I remember when me and the boys were in Vegas, we used a stripper called Jasmine, she took everything off no questions asked. Never seen a better stripper.
Gobble gobble gobble
But how did she get paint off? Perhaps I shouldn't ask !
@@thetessellater9163 paint is the least of your worries if shes called Jasmine.
haha funny guy....
How did she smell though, did you need a mask?
@@Martyfartini Yes a leather one with a zipped mouth 🤐
I use a combination of "paint stripper" found discarded in skips 😉 and caustic soda. Covering the stripping compound with cling film helps. For lead paint, there are low temperature heat guns, designed specifically to strip paint without vaporising the lead compounds.
Hi Roger! Great video. FYI your mask needs to be of a much higher standard to protect against fumes/vapours. Thanks
I’ve tried all sorts of paint remover and find nothing works better than a heat gun.
With any paint strippers you really have to wash the service down after making sure you get into all the nooks and crannies.
Otherwise when you do eventually re paint it will start to blister. I’m talking from experience here.
By the way many moons ago.
In fact back in the 70s I had four doors which had that black underneath many layers of paint which was a nightmare to get off with nitromors I ended up putting plywood over the top instead which looked nice in the end. I was told later by an old painter that it was a bitumen preserve. Whether that’s true or not who knows what they used back then. 40s/50s
You should go deeper into this. It’s important fir people to know about led paint and other poisonous materials. I’d love (as a plasterer ) to know more about artex and the asbestos or whatever is in it.
Well it took until 2000 to make asbestos illegal and they knew it was toxic in 1930
Yeh, completely agree as the home I live in had a hot air blower system to circulate heat had asbestos as a protector, before i moved in they had to be removed. After I wanted to make a feature of the placements but needed to be checked for any remaining pieces but fortunately was cleared.😀👍
Years ago as a teen with my Dad we tried using paint stripper and it was of the stronger variety. I was never convinced then that it was ever worth it. The trouble, the time, the danger to health and the cost all make it a massive negative. On the flat areas you may get semi-decent results but any kind of moulding is a PITA to sort. Unless you've got something really vintage which will improve the value, don't bother. Either just replace the wood itself or sand back and re-coat.
Good review Roger. It'll save a lot of people a lot of money!
Cheers for the video Roger, I’m midway through stripping a load of woodwork with a heat gun, it’s effective but time consuming. Was just about to rush out and buy some Nitromors, think I’ll stick to the gun.
I enjoyed that Roger, well done. Nice to hear a good builder giving solid advice. I live in France where we can still buy all manner of lethal old school stuff but the EU is gradually removing that from the shelves too.
That makes me laugh. The E.U is less effective in France than it was in the U.K
@@SkillBuilder to be fair, France has always been a bit of a law unto itself when it came to the EU rules and regs that their government didn't fully support. Not always a bad thing, not always a good thing.
When we were in the EU I said to a Portuguese friend who was saying they did something in Portugal which was unlawful according to EU regulations - I said " you can't do that, the EU have banned it so it affects Portugal as well as the UK" . The response was "yes well you take notice in the UK. We don't take any notice in Portugal" .
Thanks for being honest and direct, which is most helpful.
Great video. My preferred method (and I have used it on all the skirting boards in my Edwardian house to get them back to the original wood) is the Wagner heat gun and then finish off with a cheap chemical stripper (I use Wilko's paint remover) with those steel ball scouring pads for cleaning pans that you can pick up for about £1 - not the ones with soap in them like brillo pads! It is true there will be some small patches of scorching from the heat gun, but I have found these come off easily with the chemical stripper and scourers. And an additional tip. You will find the scourers get all soggy and sticky and gunged up after a while. Rather than go through loads of them, if you soak them in hot water with some washing-up liquid and pull them apart a bit, the gunge will all clean off. Dry them on a radiator and there is plenty of use left in them. As everyone says, Nitromors these days is nowhere near the product it was and is very expensive and frustrating to use. Invest in a decent Wagner heat gun and you won't regret it - one of my best DIY investments.
Totally agree with you. I’ve tried both in the past along with a very expensive pro paint stripper. All of them useless. The time you spend applying the stuff, scraping a minuscule amount of paint off, then cleaning up the mess, my heat gun would have done it in a fraction of the time.
Generally absolutely agree with using a heat gun. Although I have had to resort to nitromors on a couple of occasions where the surface was previously painted with a pesky rubberised water based paint which a heat gun would not touch (it would scorch the surface but not cause the paint to peel/bluster).
Thanks Roger. Agree 100%. Very disappointed with Nitro Mors and, based on your demo, I won't be trying the Screwfix alternative. I agree entirely that a heat gun is by far the best solution. I note you use the Wagner and I think it is an excellent choice. Mine has a variable fan speed and heat temperature select and it is brilliant on any type of paint I have tried to strip so far.
Just remember that when heating lead paint and stripping it back if you get grey lines on the insides of your lips.... It's too late. You'll end up with lead in your joints and be weak as a kitten. Mask up boys with a chemical vapour mask, p ratings do nothing, you'll be looking for a k rated one. Something a car sprayer would wear. We've all burnt paint off and had the headaches. We don't need to do that anymore, if you don't have a mask like that politely say to the customer you don't have a capable mask for the task but you would willingly accept the task if they funded the cost of the mask. Because cancer and having a weird pausey thing going on for 25 years. Mask up chaps.
Good advice
It's a good thing to mention, some people have the impression a mask is a mask; or worse, realise there are different types but can be bothered to use the correct one with the logic a wrong mask is better than no mask. I've seen plenty of you tube videos with people using an incorrect type and / or very poor fit. Once your health is damaged it's too late.
Know that feeling ….. knocked me bandy!
This is scare mongering. As long as you are reasonably careful you won't, as an adult doing DIY work, ingest amounts of lead into your body by stripping lead paint with paint stripper or by handling lead, which will cause you harm. What is not a good idea is stripping lead with a heat gun - if you do, take the item outdoors or open a window and set up a fan to blow air over the work towards the window. Similarly, try NOT to sand lead paint, if you do, vacuum the dust as you're going BUT you will need a vacuum that will filter the dust properly (generally expensive ones) - cheap vacs will just expel dust into the air, which will makes things far worse. It's a good idea to wear a PROPER mask that will filter fumes, not a cheap paper mask. Lead is most dangerous to children, and they should be kept well away. Remember that lead was added to petrol for about 80 years and consequently sprayed out into all our cities, towns and countryside. Get the danger into perspective BUT remember that once lead is in your body it's VERY difficult to get it out. Always WASH YOUR HANDS after handing lead, and preferably wear gloves. Lead was in paint because it protected the wood really well and gave a shine to paint that is impossible to reproduce today.
@@johnblanning2500 not going to day you are wrong or right all i do know is lead position put me on my arse sir
Bang on, i thought it was weaker, im a painter and decorator with 37yrs experience & used the old version & recently used the same product but found it wasn't as good, dont use newspaper as its absorbent, use cling film for it to not just seal in the fumes but more importantly it will stay wet & sweat when trapped underneath & stay active for longer ,it will start to peel & stick to the cling film when removing & leave you less to do, if it tears too easily use plastic sheeting
The best one I have ever used is paint panther I used it on a 200years fireplace in my house with about 30 layers of paint took 4 days to strip it
Best method I've ever found was a heat gun followed up by paint stripper to clean the wood. In my older age, after stripping some shutters, I developed vertigo. Yes, I was well ventilated but it still hit me. Be careful!
The screwfix stuff is ok, but i found its best to slap it on thick, cover it in plastic and leave it overnight. The best stuff is still the oldschool stuff by far, car bodyshop supplies still carry it.
Good tip, I will try it
I've used the no nonsense stuff and it works. Niromors is a lot more money and doesn't always work much better - really dependent upon the paint. You do need to work it in to the paint as the layers start to come off as it won't usually go through more than one or two at a time but its cheap enough to just lash on. I have discovered on very old heavy oil based paints that it turns it to a sort of melted chocolate mess. Best way I've found is to work that well and then use a good detergent to cause it to clump a little and then rinse well with a stiff bristle handbrush - the latter will go in the bin as you'll never get it removed. Heatgun inside with old paint that may have lead in it isn't always an option....
@@guffermeister I wonder if scoring through the paint would improve its results, especially on multiple layers. Risks leaving score marks on the underlying wood if not careful, which might be a concern.
Back in the 80's we bought an old house as our first place. There was a lot of gorgeous old pine doors etc and we wanted to see the wood. Husband was a decorator so went straight for the Nitromors. I hated it, the smell especially. I was just becoming eco aware - this was the time when what was in our aerosols & fridges was becoming known. So I really wanted to go the heat gun route. We did, it was fun actually. Watching it all bubble up and very satisfying to scrape off. But heaven knows what we were burning through! There were so many layers of paint and wallpaper in the place that the whole house was a few inches bigger by the time we were done 😆😆. It was worth it, the pine was beautiful, and we found a some little birds etc had been carved into some places at some point. Definitely worth the effort.
Peelaway and klingstrip are great. Leave 24hrs and it’ll rip through many layers of paint. I think it might just a lime paste - does anyone know?
I have a bucket of Klingstrip that I got years ago on a conservation job, great stuff that actually works and a lot nicer to use than Nitromors.
Roger.
By far the best and cheapest method is to make a simple mix of 50 -50%plain flour and caustic soda. Mix dry in a stainless container, (not aluminium), add water with care, it gets warm. Apply as a poultice and cover with clingfilm, leave for a few hours and scrape off.
Usual safety precautions, gloves, goggles, disposal etc
90's nitromors was great
And dangerous!
@@jack1d1XB yeah so dangerous we all died from using it... One of my fav evil trucks back then, a light coating on the palm of the hand, then slap someone on the back of the neck where there's more sensitive skin so they would feel the burn.... Grabbing them by the wrist worked too.... (If doing this remember to really wash hands before a trip to the toilet...) Oh the fun of the old days....
I used Peel Off Ronstip many years back, started as a powder bit like polyfilla, mixed it with water to form a paste and then slathers it on the wood to be stripped. Worked great on vertical or even upside down surfaces. After an hour liquid would statrt to seep from the dried paste and that was an indicator - ready to take off. Great for doing detail such as cornices or newel posts. But like everything that worked or was good the EU or someone banned it and as you say Nitromors is useless. I've got an old cable jointers propane blow lamp, I'm a dab hand at softening many layers of paint without burning the wood. All the wood is stripped outdoors and yes I wear proper PPE with a lead fume rated filter in the mask.
Great honest video. Exactly why I subscribe. Keep it up
Agreed, heatgun the best way. The other problem with paint stripping formulations, is having to wash and clean up afterwards. Just be careful not to overheat and burn the wood.
Hi, what would you recommend for stripping paint from brickwork?
@@MrJTJINX Just go very easy with it. It's seemingly very easy to blast the face of the brick off and then you're screwed and you'll be back to painting it forever.
We use Dichloromethane (same magical ingrediant as removed from Nitromors)based stripper at work, propper nasty stuff - reduces the oxygen absorbsion of the body whilst exposed so we have to use forced air breathing. Still hard work with the polyurethane and epoxy paints/primers we have to remove.
Thank you so much for your practical videos. I really appreciate the time and effort you put into sharing your experience, knowledge, and skill!
The one i like most at the moment is the Home Strip water based paint remover. On the point of it drying out, if I think it's quite thick paint I'll cover it in that plastic sheet you can get for sealing up rooms, better than newspaper that'll still dry out eventually.
With the old nitromors the paint would literally run off as a liquid.
Ooo that doesn't sound safe 😂 but would definitely be easier to deal with.
I use paint stripper on complex shapes and hard to get to spaces. Couple tips: after applying the paint stripper cover with cheap catering plastic wrap and wait till the paint blisters and the bubbles begin to join up into sheets. the plastic both insulates and keeps the stripper moist (yes yes yes I know) Also wear a respirator not a mask - the mask you are wearing is for particulate matter not vapour and paint stripper often uses dichloromethane a very nasty carcinogen thats banned all over the place. Sometimes I drag a wire brush over the surface before applying the stripper to accelerate penetration (sigh). I use a heat gun almost exclusively as its the most environmentally friendly way to get rid of old paint.
Apply remover, then cover with a sheet of plastic. Increases effect.
This guy should be presenting on the tele! Brilliant! Top guy!
Should have another door so you can say "Here's one I did earlier" blue peter style.
I'll get my coat
Or just cover them in sticky back plastic?
@@thetessellater9163 Damn, beat me to it.
I have just finished using the one from screw fix no nonsense and it works absolutely fantastic it actually works well and i was able to remove paint with in ten minutes of putting it on you do have to put another layer on after scraping the first layer off but it worked well and performed well with very low owder I would give it 10 out of 10 but a warning it does eat threw rubber gloves so beware of that when using as of stpling it on is a no no it needs to be brushed on and a HARRIS HEAVY DUTY TUNGSTEN CARBIDE WOOD SCRAPER 2" which is very good to help with the job at hand
I would say more like informing the public of dodgy advertising. One of my hobbies is Locksport (lock picking) and the false advertising there with security products is horrendous. It's the end user that pays it and doesn't get what it says on the tin. To steal someone's phrase.
My Grandad was restoring a Norton in his cellar, and used Nitromors on the
headlamp switches : the damned things completely melted.
That was powerful stuff, back in the day.
How to make your own Nitromorse. One packet of Hot Water Lap, ( this is a starch based wallpaper past that uses Hot Water ) and a packet of Costic Soda. Mix Costic with hot water and add wallpaper past till thick. Apply liberally to area to be stripped and cover with plastic sheeting for 45 minutes or longer ( The longer the better up to 6 hours if applied liberally ) then strip with scrapers. I've been doing this for over 40 years and has saved me fortunes. 👍
PLEASE REMEMBER CAUSTIC IS DANGEROUS AND GLASSES AND GLOVES SHOULD ALWAYS BE WORN. Please Read the Instructions on the pkt of Caustic Soda first before mixing.
a good stripper (steady on...) only dips the door as long as necessary, so damage to joints etc is virtually nill.... its the drying time that's the pain. Lay door flat and cover with clingfilm when using stripper for best results, but a heat gun is much faster
Spot on with the hark back to lead paints. I had to fix and repaint some wooden window frames a few years ago. The new paint, a 'quality' brand, turned translucent after only one year. Absolutely useless! I have uPVC frames now and the investment was worth it if only because I don't need to sacrifice all of my annual leave doing repainting.
Btw, I'm old enough that I used to strip paint using a paraffin blowlamp. Probably considered horrifically unsafe/unhealthy now, and a tad terrifying, but very effective. Basically a hand-held pulse jet!
Hi Roger, I preferred the Nitro Mors to the Non Nonsense in my tea, and the heat gun came in handy for warming the cup back up after it got cold.
Great video though, I love your work.
Heat gun the bulk off then use the nitromores with wire wool to clean it up like you said. Best way
Yep, been doing that way for years. Hard work but the results are worth it.
Wallpaper steam stripper works well, surprised he didn't mention.
X-Tex which is an organic artex remover also works very well on gloss paint.
Rustins is still pretty good. Never had much luck with nitromors to he honest
@Hazels88 Yes , but not much better ... have used both recently ...
I've been stripping paint from my old car. The top two or three layers are re-spray work done, I think, with cellulose. They have come off very easily with a hot air gun. The original facrory paint beneath is a bit more difficult, but the hot air still works. Even hot air guns are not risk free. The nozzle gets very hot and a light touch on your skin can cause a nasty burn and scar. I minimise the fumes by moving along as soon as the paint starts to bubble; there's no need to burn it.
Just get Robin to make you a new door :-) On a more serious note, I hope the younger generation take the health risks from heat guns and strippers more seriously than in the past - as with a lot of things, when you're young, you think you're invincible, and the consequences only show up years later.
in my first flat i stripped all the old gloss with a blowtorch and scraper
worked really well but stunk
winter too so the windows werent open.... what a pillock i was
Agree that Nitromors or any other supposed paint strippers are not what they used to be.
I was once given an alternative method by somebody that specialised in paint stripping/restoration to mix my own paint stripper: Mix Caustic Soda with wall paper paste
Works a treat just like the old school paint strippers but also like those care must be taken...
Disclaimer: This is just information and I am not responsible for anybody else's actions
My former mother in law could strip the paint off that door with one of her 'looks' in about 4 seconds.
Godzilla?
Totally agree with this. Nitro Mors no longer justifies being known as an effective paint stripper. It simply does not work as well as it did (especially in cooler temperatures). Heat guns are the best method by far and a fraction of the cost. Great video with very balanced conclusions.
Went the way of creosote. Now we have creocote: supposedly safer but doesn't do the job. You can still get the real thing if you have a licence...
Love the smell of creosote 😃
@@jimh4072 so many product that are really bad for us smelt so good... Barely anything smells as good now as it did several decades back. But maybe that's not a bad thing... I definitely wasn't as careful about breathing in fumes when opening containers as I should have been.
I tried stripping the paint off a metal gate a few years back with Nitromors. It never even touched it, no matter how much I dabbed on, or how long I left it. Eventually, I mixed up some caustic soda, used wallpaper paste to thicken it up into a jelly and covered it in that. That did the job alright, quick blast with the pressure washer afterwards got all the paint right off.
The old nitromors was great stuff, but this new stuff is crap
And with all the deadly stuff in paint stripper where is the harm in bringing back the old recipe 🤔
Just what I needed to see! For stripping metal I use caustic soda but anyone reading this READ THE WIKIPEDIA PAGE FIRST!!! Caustic soda dissolves protein and fat which is most fo human beings.
It's quicker with a hot air gun and cheaper
Outside job - Caustic soda mix with wallpaper paste or just with hot water, add crystals to water not vice versa... keep kids pets away... slather it on... leave it half a day go back scrub it in, paint on some more... ( use gloves and a face and eye covering - wash down with hose... you may need to repeat a few times but it definitely beats any proprietary concoction and it's cheap as chips
Does that mean the large tin of old style nitromorse sitting in my garage is worth putting on eBay? 😆
You can still buy methelyne chloride from specialist trade centres but not from DIY outlets. The trade outlets presume you know what you are doing.
@@SkillBuilder - something like that, anyway - methylene chloride, or dichloromethane.
Thanks Roger, fair review of the two products. Nitromors went from being a great product to one that smells like a great product (it absolutely stinks now) but doesn't do the business...why did they bring out a product that was so poor and got a reputation for it virtually overnight...another case of believing what their own marketing people write.
Paint panther is my go to stripper.
Pine Mash. I am going to try Paint Panther, thanks for the tip.