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Home and garden projects

Old May 8th 2020, 12:54 pm
  #1591  
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Default Re: Home and garden projects

Originally Posted by Steerpike
How to best paint a raised-panel door?

I have a door not unlike this one:

Which I want to re-paint with a regular indoor latex paint. I've only ever done this once or twice before, and when I've done it, I've started out painting the 'recessed' panel parts, then moving on to finish the inside panels, and finally doing the outside 'flat' parts. The problem I've run into doing this is that by the time I'm ready to do the outer 'flat' parts, the paint used to paint the inner recessed parts of the panels has started to dry, to the point where brushing the new paint tends to 'drag' the drying existing paint, leading to obvious marks which then need sanding out (on non-final coats) or ... living with them if it's the final coat. Is there a way to better handle this? Of course one can try not to get any paint from one 'area' into another area, but that's not possible to avoid in all cases. I think I've tried using a roller and doing the whole thing at once, side-to-side, but using a roller ends up with excess paint in the panel recesses that is hard to deal with. I will, of course, be laying the door flat so at least I have gravity on my side. Part of my challenge is I'm doing this in AZ where it is 80 degrees inside my home and 15% humidity, so paint is drying fast! I wonder if I should look into some sort of drying inhibitor to keep the paint more fluid so that when I have to paint up against an existing (already drying) section, there's less of a clash... ? Spraying would be ideal but that's not practical for me.
I always adopt a hybrid approach, starting with the top panels, (I wouldn't recommend taking the door off its hinges just to paint it) then the top rails, then the flat outer area, and work progressively down the door, working side-to-side such that there are no "seams" where wet paint meets paint. that is already dry. The trick is to work fairly quickly, and I have got better at it the more doors I have painted, but I still find it an annoyingly time-consuming activty.

Last edited by Pulaski; May 8th 2020 at 12:57 pm.
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Old May 11th 2020, 4:50 pm
  #1592  
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Default Re: Home and garden projects

Originally Posted by newadventure
I spent the weekend like a giant mole, digging what looked like random holes and trenches in our front yard. I was attempting to resurrect our irrigation system, which has not been used for at least the 4 yrs we have been in the house. First task, find the inline valves (finally found by tracing pipes back towards the house). Then locate sprinklers - 5 out of 6 found. One still AWOL. Then fix leaks. 3 done so far, another 2 that i know of and presumably 1 more that is preventing the final sprinkler head from popping up. The ground is pretty much pure sand here and would be easy to dig through if it weren't for the many tree and shrub roots that are everywhere. What fun
Have made progress, in case you are following with bated breath. 9 leaks fixed, all sprinkler heads found, inline valves checked and cleaned and front yard seems to be fully functional. Project extended in back yard to now include a drip irrigation system to the two raised beds, awaiting delivery of the bits and pieces. Only one painful issue - apparently turning the main valve perpendicular to the line does not turn it off completely. It needs to go beyond 90 deg (the only valve i have come across that does this). Cost to learn this lesson: $50 in overnight water charges
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Old May 11th 2020, 5:12 pm
  #1593  
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Default Re: Home and garden projects

Originally Posted by Pulaski
I always adopt a hybrid approach, starting with the top panels, (I wouldn't recommend taking the door off its hinges just to paint it) then the top rails, then the flat outer area, and work progressively down the door, working side-to-side such that there are no "seams" where wet paint meets paint. that is already dry. The trick is to work fairly quickly, and I have got better at it the more doors I have painted, but I still find it an annoyingly time-consuming activty.
I presume you use a brush for all this, as opposed to a roller? I was thinking I could use brush for the recessed bits, and a roller for the 'flat' parts, but probably too much trouble.
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Old May 11th 2020, 5:34 pm
  #1594  
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Default Re: Home and garden projects

Originally Posted by Steerpike
I presume you use a brush for all this, as opposed to a roller? I was thinking I could use brush for the recessed bits, and a roller for the 'flat' parts, but probably too much trouble.
Yes, I usually use the really cheap 2" "chip" brushes from Lowes or HD. Sometimes I use the 3" one, which saves a little time on the flat ares.
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Old May 11th 2020, 6:01 pm
  #1595  
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Default Re: Home and garden projects

Originally Posted by Pulaski
Yes, I usually use the really cheap 2" "chip" brushes from Lowes or HD. Sometimes I use the 3" one, which saves a little time on the flat ares.
If you have a harbor freight nearby they sell some fairly good brushes cheap. Much better than chip brushes.
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Old May 11th 2020, 6:04 pm
  #1596  
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Default Re: Home and garden projects

Originally Posted by ddsrph
If you have a harbor freight nearby they sell some fairly good brushes cheap. Much better than chip brushes.
I actually like the chip brushes and even though I have some other "fancy" brushes in my pain brush tub, I find the chip brushes light and easy to use and rarely ever use the fancy ones - which I have had for well over ten years, and probably fifteen.
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Old May 11th 2020, 6:22 pm
  #1597  
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Default Re: Home and garden projects

Originally Posted by Pulaski
I always adopt a hybrid approach, starting with the top panels, (I wouldn't recommend taking the door off its hinges just to paint it) then the top rails, then the flat outer area, and work progressively down the door, working side-to-side such that there are no "seams" where wet paint meets paint. that is already dry. The trick is to work fairly quickly, and I have got better at it the more doors I have painted, but I still find it an annoyingly time-consuming activty.
Change of plan! I've decided to take on a bigger project this morning! I have a bunch of cabinets that are currently 'wood finish' and I'm going to paint them 'white'. Here's my assembly line, setup on my never-used dining table:


So - 8 fiddly doors to deal with! I'm thinking of doing all the recessed parts first, then circling back and doing all the flat panel surfaces, then circling back and doing all the rails/stiles. POSSIBLY sanding down any unavoidable paint bumps at the boundaries (the primer I'm using is specific to this task of painting on the satin finish, and is extremely fast drying). It's already 79F (26F) in my dining room and only 22% humidity. The paint dries rock-hard on the upper part of the brush very quickly so I have to do a wash of the brush very frequently to deal with that.

I don't like the design (shape) of these doors and was actually going to buy replacements from an online store such as this -
https://www.cabinetdoorworld.com/painted-cabinet-doors/
But since these cabinets are in a little-used area (they aren't my kitchen cabs), I figured I couldn't lose by trying to paint them first. If the result is not to my liking, I'll go back to the idea of replacement doors. The idea of getting pre-painted doors custom-made is very appealing, but - the costs were quite high. The cabinet doors above have an area of about 23 sq. ft., and at a rough cost of $50/sq ft, that comes out at over $1,000 when you include the boring for hinges, etc. But I'm really curious to know how such replacement doors turn out!
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Old May 11th 2020, 6:25 pm
  #1598  
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Default Re: Home and garden projects

Originally Posted by Pulaski
I actually like the chip brushes and even though I have some other "fancy" brushes in my pain brush tub, I find the chip brushes light and easy to use and rarely ever use the fancy ones - which I have had for well over ten years, and probably fifteen.
I guess they vary in quality but I have a box of them and mine are very poor quality. When on sale the HF 2 and 3 inch brushes are very cheap and rival the quality of brushes costing 3 or 4 times as much. They are so cheap I never clean just discard after use. I painted my whole house with them plus rollers when building three years ago.
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Old May 11th 2020, 6:31 pm
  #1599  
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Default Re: Home and garden projects

Originally Posted by Steerpike
Change of plan! I've decided to take on a bigger project this morning! I have a bunch of cabinets that are currently 'wood finish' and I'm going to paint them 'white'. Here's my assembly line, setup on my never-used dining table:


So - 8 fiddly doors to deal with! I'm thinking of doing all the recessed parts first, then circling back and doing all the flat panel surfaces, then circling back and doing all the rails/stiles. POSSIBLY sanding down any unavoidable paint bumps at the boundaries (the primer I'm using is specific to this task of painting on the satin finish, and is extremely fast drying). It's already 79F (26F) in my dining room and only 22% humidity. The paint dries rock-hard on the upper part of the brush very quickly so I have to do a wash of the brush very frequently to deal with that.

I don't like the design (shape) of these doors and was actually going to buy replacements from an online store such as this -
https://www.cabinetdoorworld.com/painted-cabinet-doors/
But since these cabinets are in a little-used area (they aren't my kitchen cabs), I figured I couldn't lose by trying to paint them first. If the result is not to my liking, I'll go back to the idea of replacement doors. The idea of getting pre-painted doors custom-made is very appealing, but - the costs were quite high. The cabinet doors above have an area of about 23 sq. ft., and at a rough cost of $50/sq ft, that comes out at over $1,000 when you include the boring for hinges, etc. But I'm really curious to know how such replacement doors turn out!
Check out “Raw Doors” website. I think they are in Kansas or Nebraska. I bought all my cabinet doors from them and built my own kitchen cabinets for new house. Their prices are very good.

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Old May 11th 2020, 7:09 pm
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Default Re: Home and garden projects

Originally Posted by ddsrph
Check out “Raw Doors” website. I think they are in Kansas or Nebraska. I bought all my cabinet doors from them and built my own kitchen cabinets for new house. Their prices are very good.
Thanks for the tip! Looks like this is the company you are referring to - https://rawdoors.net/ . Sadly, they don't seem to do painted finishes, and that's one of my goals - I'm trying real hard to get away from the 'wood' look! But - they have a link on their site to a 'sister' company - 'Kitchen Reface' - https://www.kitchenreface.com/ .
On that site, I can see painted finishes. Interestingly, they have a 'fixed' pricing structure - "Our painted shaker doors are $130 each ...
The remaining eight styles have the same price. Any door style, any door size, just $70". Which is weird - the two painted finishes are almost double the 8 natural finished doors! My current setup has two doors per opening, but I would actually prefer to replace that with a single door per opening, so I can cut my door count from 8 to 4, and the pricing would then be 4 * $130 = $520 - which is not bad! I'll give them a call and see if they have any better painted finish options (don't really want 'shaker').
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Old May 11th 2020, 7:19 pm
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Default Re: Home and garden projects

Consider going with popular wood. Paints well and maybe costs less. My doors from raw doors came sanded to a suburb smoothness that were ready to stain or paint.
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Old May 11th 2020, 7:23 pm
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Have you considered spray paint in can such as krylon or rustoleum? Spray thin coats to avoid runs and it should do a good job. Flat or semigloss paint would be easier to do if like that look. Just use some kind of solvent like paint thinner to clean before painting.
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Old May 11th 2020, 8:13 pm
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Default Re: Home and garden projects

Originally Posted by ddsrph
Have you considered spray paint in can such as krylon or rustoleum? Spray thin coats to avoid runs and it should do a good job. Flat or semigloss paint would be easier to do if like that look. Just use some kind of solvent like paint thinner to clean before painting.
I have certainly considered spraying, but not from a can. Back in the 90s I bought a 'home kit' for spraying latex paint and thoroughly hated the experience - the machine was deafeningly loud, application was hard, etc. I'm sure a LOT of the problem was my inexperience. Using a aerosol can of paint might be much easier, but - can you get a range of colors? More importantly, can you match the colors in the can with a commercially available regular tin of paint for brush work? In this current project, there's adjacent 'white' woodwork that I need to match, and as you probably know, there are 1,000 shades of 'white' so it would be important to match closely. Also, how much space do you need to 'protect' if spraying indoors? I don't have anywhere really 'safe' for spraying, other than the garage, and that is getting up to 100F every day now.
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Old May 11th 2020, 8:36 pm
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Default Re: Home and garden projects

Originally Posted by Steerpike
I have certainly considered spraying, but not from a can. Back in the 90s I bought a 'home kit' for spraying latex paint and thoroughly hated the experience - the machine was deafeningly loud, application was hard, etc. I'm sure a LOT of the problem was my inexperience. Using a aerosol can of paint might be much easier, but - can you get a range of colors? More importantly, can you match the colors in the can with a commercially available regular tin of paint for brush work? In this current project, there's adjacent 'white' woodwork that I need to match, and as you probably know, there are 1,000 shades of 'white' so it would be important to match closely. Also, how much space do you need to 'protect' if spraying indoors? I don't have anywhere really 'safe' for spraying, other than the garage, and that is getting up to 100F every day now.
Another idea is foam brushes. You would need a lot as they don’t last that long but they do give a smooth finish. You could paint inside with them by placing door on paper or plastic.
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Old May 11th 2020, 11:27 pm
  #1605  
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Default Re: Home and garden projects

Originally Posted by Steerpike
Also, how much space do you need to 'protect' if spraying indoors? I don't have anywhere really 'safe' for spraying, other than the garage, and that is getting up to 100F every day now.
Spraying indoors, bag the whole room, better still make a plastic sheet 'booth' around the work surface, which saves farting around with covering furniture or else you take your chances. Overspray is a bitch to clean up if there's any amount of it.
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