VIDEO Review - Carbolift

article & images by Nick Salazar

Feb 1, 2011 4,698

Carbolift Paint Lifter

Removing paint or logos can be a tedious, time-consuming job. And it must be done carefully, especially when working with today's high-tech carbon fiber parts. Typically, paint and logos are removed with sandpaper. But sand too much carbon, and you might damage its structural integrity. There are chemicals out there that lift paint for you, but these are often unsafe to use on composites, like carbon fiber.

That was the specific void that Carbolift sought to fill. They designed a chemical paint lifter that is absolutely safe to use on carbon, and moreover, it's bio-friendly. Their compound is water soluble, and can be poured straight down a sink drain. How cool is that? We are kindof smitten with stealth bikes, and like the look of nude carbon, so we find ourselves removing logos whenever the payoff seems worth the herculean effort required to sand through it all. So when we caught wind of Carbolift, we figured it could be a lifesaver. How did we like it? Watch the video, and prepare to be amazed as the logos on our test part literally melt off the bar.

The one quirk we noticed was that while Carbolift makes short work of lifting paint and logos, it takes significantly longer to chew through clearcoat that's applied directly to carbon. So on the part in the video, because the logos came off so quickly, and the clearcoat hadn't finished coming off yet, we were left with a silhouette of where the logos used to be. A little touch-up sanding and an additional layer of clearcoat took care of that problem, but it's something to be aware of. All-in-all, this is a product that works as advertised, and is staying on our shelf for the foreseeable future.

Pros