[78 GHOST]

Stripping metal yourself will require a decent sized compressor and the appropriate rig for blasting. A 33 gallon Sears special will probably not fit the bill for serious blasting.

Blasting with abrasive media won't work on sheet metal. The basic rule is that if you can ding/dent/or oilcan the metal by hand, it's too thin to blast with abrasives. In fact, certain thicker sheet can still be deformed by blasting.

So, your remaining choices are to blast the frame, suspension bits, and other heavy gauge stuff. You can Soda blast the rest of the sheet metal. You can also use aircraft stripper to clean the paint if blasting or soda blasting aren't an option. Keep in mind any kind of blasting is terribly messy. Read that again about 10 times and really consider what size mess you're capable of living with.

Once you've gotten the metal clean, you need to quickly seal it. Frankly almost anything will work as long as you safely seal the metal from the elements. The ideal scenario is to clean the metal, prime it with etching primer or some PPG DP-40 which seems to be the catchall primer for me. As long as you comply with the manufacturer's instructions, really any kind of paint is OK, just stick with one paint line and follow the instructions.

The reason is this: All manufacturers design their products to work with one another to promote the best mechanical and chemical bond. So, if PPG says to do things one way for the primer, and you use a DuPont topcoat, you will likely have a paint failure. Either use all of one brand, or all of another, don't mix.

PPG may state you must finish the bare metal with a certain grade of sandpaper, this part ensures the primer has enough mechanical bite to maintain a sound bond with the substrate. Then they say you must prepare the primer in a certain way, with application performed in a specific manner to ensure the ensuing topcoats develop the ideal mechanical and chemical bonds. This is a system.

Back to cleaning metal, I've used a combination of a number of popular methods and apply them as needed in a given circumstance. There is only one method I absolutely will never repeat.. acid dipping. There are vendors who perform a process which cleans the metal and provides an EDP finish for you to work with. The nice thing about EDP is it's a safe finish to leave your project in for a lengthy period of time. But just acid dipping, I'd certainly shy away from. I don't like the residue which is virtually impossible to totally eliminate.

Good luck and keep us posted. -Matt