Originally Posted by kstang

Painting it yourself is fun, It will take a little bit of time and effort, but if you do a good job you can be proud of it. I know you will read this other places but it really is in the prep. And when painting, Do lots of light coats. Not so light that you don't get full hiding, but not so much that you will get runs. It is better to have many light coats then one heavy one. The paint won't Hide anything, in fact a nice paint job will make flaws show up even more. So get your prep right!

Chemical Stripper with a scraper will get 95% of it. The rest use some sand paper. Once its ready, clean it off in your tub with soap and water. Dry it really well and use some wax and grease remover.
Expect at least one day of taking the bike apart and stripping and prepping the bike, and one day for painting and letting it dry. Then a third day to re assemble. With that being said I stripped painted and assembled that blue bike in one night, but it shows.