New Kegs, Plastic Bottom

I'm in the begining stages of building my own all grain brewery. I aquired some 15 gallon kegs on line but there may be a problem. The kegs have plastic or a hard rubber on the tops and bottoms. I was wondering if anyone else has run into this before and if you have succesfully removed the plastic.

I don't want to tear into them if I can't use them, I'll just resell them =)

The kegs are from the Hudepohl Brewing Co. if that helps.

Thanks

Do you have a picture or a link?

Here's the top and the bottom

http://show.imagehosting.us/show/946091/0/nouser_946/T0_-1_946091.JPG

http://show.imagehosting.us/show/946098/0/nouser_946/T0_-1_946098.JPG

So they have a plastic/rubber bonded to them a bit like corny kegs?

In my opinion I guess they'd use some pretty tough bonding adhesive and it could be a hassle to get of. Are they cheapy enough to sacrifise one to try?

Does the plastic form the upper handles and lower skirt? If they do then you are going to be left with a vessel that is dificult to handle and stand up.

Never seen anyhting like that. I'd take a knife and determine if it is just a thin anti-skid coating or an actual plastic piece bonded to the ends. My engineer's sense is leaning towards the former, which could be removed without too much trouble by scrapping. I wouldn't both cleaning it off of the top, just the bottom.

Pretty sure it's just a plastic coating. Much like that liquid plastic dip stuff you can use to coat the hadles on tools, but probably more heavy duty. You could try blowtorching it off or trying some acetone. Can you peel it off with a knife?

Try a wire brush on a drill or some other method to scrape it off.