Paint stripper, given up. When can we use the heat gun?

[ClaireEclair]

Hello. We are currently trying to strip the paint of our staircase. It’s hell. There’s about 3 coats (one which we painted a year ago) and a coat of varnish. We tested for lead, doesn’t appear to be any.

At the advice of our local DIY shop we decided to use TX 10 paint stripper. At first we thought it was great! But it’s only stripped off the first coat and has turned very patchy and sticky. DH now wants to use a heat gun (his original idea).

We have washed down the wood twice with soapy water and then just water. When can we use the heat gun? DH has a day off tomorrow and wants to get it done. I’m paranoid about fumes! I wish we’d just got new woodwork instead!

Try cling strip. You have to leave it on for at least a day but it is great stuff.

Ooh I’ve never heard of that. I’ll look it up. DH has decided to bash on with the heat gun on the banisters. Seems to be okay so far.

Fumes wise you should be ok with windows and doors open. Heat gun really is the way to go, much better imo than the super toxic stuff you get in decent paint stripper.

This stuff. It's amazing - paste it on, put cling film over it, leave it a few days, peel the cling film off and all the paint comes with it. Messy, but virtually effortless. We completely stripped all the millions of old layers of paint off everything in our centuries-old house when we moved here. We've just renovated a 250 year old window with it that was so caked in layers of paint that we were told it was not salvageable by window experts, but the conservation officer would let us replace, so we stripped and restored it ourselves. Brilliant stuff.

Link doesn't work for me, what is it) (I also have a century's worth of paint to remove)

Hmm, not sure what happened with link. Website is called StrippersPaintRemovers and it's KlingStrip.

Thanks, will give it a go

Might be worth reading this thread from MSE about various peoples experience using those types of strippers.

MSE thread

When we did a Victorian house Connor it would take one day to do one spindle. With heat gun. In the end, knocked them all out carefully, numbered them on the ends, not on the paint, with a permanent marker, and took them to a dip and strip place to soak them, which removed all the paint. Worked a treat.

Heat gun all the. I did our 70 year old stairs and architrave. Quite satisfying, no stripper chemicals and less dust than sanding.
Old gloss blisters and scrapes off in long strips.

Another vote for Klingstrip. I hate the gun, I find paint comes off patchy and rehardens so sanding is a mare, and it’s so laborious. Klingstrip does get pricy over a large area though