A Little Footstool with a Past

[talesofthesevenseas]

Looks like Napier, the company that made this product no longer produces it. OK a vat may be the way to do this.

[bigwull]

As this stool is so small,..you could easily give it a caustic bath,in your back yard,...ideally you would need a container big enough for the stool to be submerged in,..Caustic soda works best when it is heated,..i have used it in the past, when i had an old Triumph Bonneville,i used to give the engine casing a hot caustic bath,...and then a lot of elbow grease polishing,..i used a 45 gal drum with the top cut off, and put a portable gas pot burner underneath,then brought the solution up to 140/160deg,...this is ok if you are going to be doing it on a regular basis,..but for this teenzy weenzy stool, you,d be better off,giving it to a stripper.. ....No Not that kind.... .

[talesofthesevenseas]

I've got a message in to a furniture restoration company, asking them how much just to do a "dip" to remove the paint, and no further refinishing. I really don't want to deal with it in my backyard for this one piece. Interesting to know how it's done though!

[fancypants]

One problem , other than the 'rough treatment' of wooden antiques stripped via a 'vat-dipping' method , is that the chemicals will often damage wood glue (since the stripping chemicals  pretty much penetrate every nook & cranny , esp those in even 'tight' joints) .
The slurry residue created by the solvent process will also be left behind , in some quantity , in hidden/unseen areas ... often stripping businesses claim to fully wash & neutralize the solvents , but that is something I've yet to see .
Compressed air is frequently used , in the 'wash/neutralizing bath' process , and in this old mans' opinion , serves to further force the old ca-ca into the joints .

Dip-stripping antique wooden furniture is like using a bulldozer , when a small shovel would do the job (IMO) !

....not to say that folks don't refinish via this method & find it satisfactory , though .

[talesofthesevenseas]

Thanks Fancy, that is good to know. I'll skip that option then. Painting the paint is probably the most responsible thing I can do and it won't do any further damage.

[wendy177]

Oh Tales I love her! Maybe try a  pickled finish,  of a white or off-white pastel to tone down the pink & gold to a more gentle sweet color.

[bigwull]

what is it with you lot....have you all gone nuts...and as for not getting it vat dipped...i,ve had it done many times,...on much larger items, and, yes i will admit, i,ve had to re-glue joints here and there...but the end result..far out-weighed that....as for this minute stool, how hard can it be,for you, ..Tales....to give it a good soaking and rinse yourself,after getting it back from the stripper...then.if you are unhappy with what you see, you can paint it with a more eco-friendly paint,instead of still having that lead shit...underneath.. .

[ghopper1924]

what is it with you lot....have you all gone nuts...and as for not getting it vat dipped...i,ve had it done many times,...on much larger items, and, yes i will admit, i,ve had to re-glue joints here and there...but the end result..far out-weighed that....as for this minute stool, how hard can it be,for you, ..Tales....to give it a good soaking and rinse yourself,after getting it back from the stripper...then.if you are unhappy with what you see, you can paint it with a more eco-friendly paint,instead of still having that lead shit...underneath.. .

Hear hear! Wullie's best post yet! Deserving of a mango!!

I will ALWAYS keep the original finish if possible, but in this case it's not. There may be nice wood grain undernearth, in which case you would be doing a diservice to the stool and to yourself to paint it. If not, THEN you can paint  it. Like Wull says, the end results of stripping in this case will FAR outweigh any issues it may cause.

[Rauville]

Tales;
If you decide to clean it up yourself, look into the following product...just follow the label, and let it do the work.
(That lil' stool is as cute as a bug's butt.)

http://www.franmar.com/paint-removal/

[bigwull]

.Those Soya Beans,...Love them or Loathe them,but you can,t beat them,..you can eat them...wear them...drink them....and now you can strip lead based paint with them....Mmm!....Wonder what they do to your Intestines......

[talesofthesevenseas]

Well, I've been mulling the options over in my head and since I want to use it with the Chinese bed and match it to that, the best solution seems to be to paint it to match. If I remove the paint, I would then have to paint it red anyway, since there is no wood showing on the bed. This way there is no harm done and I get the match that I want and I can leave it unharmed for someone to restore at a later date.

[bigwull]

Humbug....never took you to be a cut corner kind of person...Like me....

[talesofthesevenseas]

Well, there's a bit more to it than meets the eye. After going through breast cancer a few years ago I have done my best to reduce my exposure to chemicals as much as possible. Even though it probably was not the cause, I prefer not to be exposed to stuff if I don't have to. Stripping the lead paint inside my hutch was horrible, the mask alone cost me $50 and there was blue lead paint everywhere. The best stripper I could buy at the time only did a marginal job when I unexpectedly hit a lead layer beneath the modern layer and ultimately I had to sand it because it was down in the grain. This was even worse, making the particles airborne. I really don't want to go there again, even with this little stool if I don't have to. I also lean strongly toward preservation. Since stripping it would still require refinishing or painting to match anyway, why do it, since I can paint over it and match it that way without doing any damage to what is underneath? If I were going to use it with a piece of wooden furniture, that would be different. But since it is going with my Chinese bed, which is red lacquer with gold paint, It doesn't make sense to strip it.

[ghopper1924]

From the general tone of things in this thread I figured you'd end with this decision. I could counter that having someone else do the chemical work would obviate your concerns, but I think this race is run.

Glad I got to express my views though!

[bigwull]

Its been a bit like swings & merry go rounds,....