Soak them in Brake Fluid for awhile and use an old tooth-brush to brush it off with. Simple as that.

Be careful of brake fluid, it attacks some plastics, most noteably that used by Kato.

You can also try 90% isopropyl alcohol.

In all cases, test it first on a car or shell you are okay with losing if it attacks the plastic.

Yes I mean give the lettering a rub with a steel brush. This way the dissolvant can get under the lettering, loosen the paint and off comes the printing.

Before you start scratching your car up with wire brushes try Acetone Free finger nail polish remover and apply it lightly with a Q-tip to the letters only!!! Then let it set watching it continuously for 20-30 seconds. Then take a second Q-tip and rub the letter up and down from top to bottom motion on each letter before the remover dries that way if it has any reaction with the plastic it will look like weathering rather than a swirling big blob. I've used the acetone free remover before and it has never bothered any plastic except for a real cheep orange plastic car. The remover comes in a small PLASTIC bottle in the Make-up section of all drug stores and Walmart super stores. If your married ask your wife if she has any so you can try it before buying any.

Dan

A fiberglass pencil sold in some good art shops will take away stubborn lettering and do much less damage than a wire brush. A mini-blaster like the Paasche Air-Eraser also works well and is easy to control.

If you have Q-tips (cotton swabs) and decal setting solution, you could start there. Small-run custom lettering jobs used to be pad-printed using ink and the equivalent of a rubber stamp, so paint removers aren't going to work well.

The nail polish remover is something I'll have to try.

I became a bit sidetracked with some other things, hence the delay in my reply.  In using the 90% alcohol, will the paint strip off, or do I still need to scrub.  I am having a hard time removing the paint from 55-Ton hoppers because of all the groovers and ladders and small pieces on the car body.  Brushes can't reach all the spots.  I noticed if I let the pine-sol soak longer the letter will come off, but no matter how long I let the car body sit in the stuff, the paint won't come off without some kind of brush scraping it off. I need to find something to literally strip the paint off after droppign it in.  Any ideas?! Thanks

Ken L.

Scalecoat wash away will take paint off of almost anything.  Just be careful with Kato or Atlas models since it may damage the plastic.  The new paint on Athearn models is a lot better than the paint used on the older models.  The paint on older Athearn models would disolve easily with 90% isopropel, Denatured alcohol, brake fluid, or Pinesol, but I found that none of these products does a thing to the paint on the new Athearns.