Letter 20566

Aluminum Soda Can Paint Removal

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My company is using standard aluminum soda cans for one of our applications. This is for small quantity orders, and our customer has approved us using these. It's great to "recycle" these cans, but is there an "easy" way to remove the paint, and prep them for our painting process? These cans are subjected to around 600 degrees F on a regular basis in their application. We've been just spray painting them now, but I'd like to strip the old paint before adding a new coat because, (correct me if I'm wrong) I feel the paint will adhere better.

Craig Bodie
Boco Productions - Columbia, SC

Hi Craig,

A solvent-based paint stripper may be able to remove the old coating from the cans.

In general, the new coat of paint will stick better to the metal surface than it will to the old paint. But this will be dependent on how you preapre the metal surface. Do you have the ability to clean the cans and apply a conversion coating at your facility? If not, you may be better off just recoating the cans and not bothering to strip off the old paint.

George Gorecki
- Naperville, Illinois 

i need "blank" upainted soda cans for a project. i wanted to know if the paint remover worked well for you.

vanessa j.
studant - Portland OR

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