How can aluminum anodizing be safely removed from aluminum? Sanding it off is not always easy in some cases, due to it traveling in spots i cant reach, or easily damaged with sandpaper. Buffing compounds dont always work either.

Jetpack try Tim at HyperColor Anodizing www.hypercolor-anodizing.com He does all my anodizing on my show engines and such and should know the best way to remove it.

Bob Harris
Early RC Models
www.earlyrcmodels.com

Here is a post I made, quoted, from the other side of RCU... Oh yeah EZ Off (Easy Off?? I forget how it's spelled) is the brand we use, get the "original".

Easy-off is the easiest way to remove that stuff other wise you'll be sanding till your fingers fall off.......it can be a mess though....to keep it clean if you have an orbital sander w/120 grit paper that works well to with less of a mess, just sand it right off.....if you go the ez-off way then spray it on....let it sit for 15 min then wipe with a damp sponge....then sanding by hand is a breeze. Just don't get this stuff on anything else because it will stain the hell out of it..... Hope this helps

Shawn

the best way to do and the safest way is to bead blast it.

Well, I tried the Easy Off and it worked well on removing the anodizing, but it blackened the part just as Easy was doing its thing. Since this was an old spare, I decided just to let it blacken all the way...just to see how far it would go, or if it would damage beyond repair.
After about fifteen minutes, the easy off stopped bubbling and the part was completely black. The chemical process had stopped. I rinsed the part and it had a well coated patina finish, but easily rubbed off in spots, leaving it looking like nick and dent special. Other spots were harder to remove just by rubbing with my finger or nail. I could tell this finish was not going to polish well, as it was pitted now.
Knowing this blackening was from oxidation, I decided to use TarnX (silver dip) to remove the blackening. After a short five to ten minute soak, all the blackening had vanished leaving behind what looked like a galvanized finish, all bright and silvery....with a grain pattern to it.
I suppose the easy off crazed the aluminum, but the blackening hid that until it was washed off by the silver dip solution. Not really what I wanted to see for a polishing base, but like i said this was just a trial deal, and to tell you the truth, I kinda liked the effect that it gave after all and decided to keep it. I included a couple pictures below for you to see, and tried to capture the grain of the aluminum the best I could. Both pictures are of a Cox TD...one just has the needle valve body done, and the other has the body and the venturi done this way.

I don't leave it on more than 2-3 minutes. Most parts take 2 to 3 applications, but you don't have any of the pitting or blackening. Keeping it short provides the perfect surface for polish, look at the chassis in the pic, you can see yourself in the flawless bottom... We used Mother's polish on all the bits.

I can see where the one to two minute applications could work, as I noticed some light spots happening right away with the first application. After rinsing it and trying it again, some spots were not comming off, especially around the fuel nipple where it would be harder to polish. I kinda gave up after that, thinking it would just need to soak longer....and thats when the blackening occured and I just went with it and ended up with what you see. I suppose if I were working with larger parts, and maybe a different color of anodizing (in this case - gold) it would be easier to see it work, and where more work was needed with the brush, and staying away from areas that were already stripped. I have bead blasted anodizing before and it DOES do a nice job of things, but in this case I wanted to stay away from that, as this was a "fuel" area and would be too hard to completely clean off the glass residue powder left behind, especially in the steel needle valve threads. A word of warning here that wasn't mentioned, is NEVER glass bead-blast INTERNAL areas of an aluminum motor...the glass "powders" itself into the aluminum, and no matter how clean you think you have rinsed it....it will continue to release itself into the motor, killing its life span. You can still do the outside, just make sure you tape off the all the openings (tapped holes also) before you bead blast with duct tape is all.

Anderson Archery sells phosphoric acid for etching aluminum arrows so you can glue the feathers/vanes on. If you submerge an anodized aluminum arrow in it for more than a minute or two, the anodizing tends to disappear. The acid is a weak mixture and rinses off with water. Jim

i spilt battery acid on some anodized aluminum once and it took it right off like now!