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metal casting cleaning, and in sandblasting to remove paint, stain, and
rust. ... Filtration sand is used by municipal water departments to remove ...
while silica miners in Pennsylvania provide sand for refractory bricks.
I've heard a lot of good things about Peel Away too, but my understanding was that it was meant primarily for thick layers of paint.
Thanks for the replies.
The paint is on two large "sitting" areas on each side of the fireplace.
The paint splatters are worse than I remember, as there is a large spot (about 6" x 6") where the paint was spilled.
I also did some online research and found a similar issue in which a product called "Peel Away" was used successfully.
If it's just drips, scrape off what you can using a putty knife or razer blade. You can find products out there that will take the rest away although I am not sure how far paint or solvents soaks into brick. I can tell you I removed a rug in my last house that revealed paint on the hardwood from when the house was first built in 1960. I scraped what I could without damaging the finish and then just got out my TKO (orange concentrate cleaner) and put it on full strength for a minute or so and just wiped it up. Apparently products like googone and such work too but I love my TKO for things like that (you can get it most places that sell cleaning supplies).
Obviously if you could give us some idea of how may drops of paint we're talking about and how feasible it would be to just scrape them off, it would help narrow down the choices.
What about just using something cheap and sharp like an inexpensive 1/4 inch wood chisel (like a Stanley or a Fuller) to simply scrape the paint drops off the brick. Then, clean up what's left with a brush and some acetone (which will dissolve latex paint.
I'd wet the brickwork down first tho. This will serve two purposes:
1. There's no way of telling whether it's an acrylic paint or a vinyl acrylic paint. If it's vinyl acrylic, it'll soften up considerably when wet, and that'll make it easier to scrape off the brickwork.
2. With the brick's porous surface wet, you'll reduce the capillary pressure available to wick any other liquid into the brick. That means any paint dissolved by the acetone won't be as readily wicked deeper into the surface of the brick.
That's how I'd proceed anyhow.