Latex VS Oil Based Paints
Latex paint is water-based, and it’s probably the most common type of paint used today. Oil-based paint had its heyday; it was great for leaving a high-gloss finish and it had a lot of good qualities, but latex has come so far that it’s now surpassed oil-based paints. Latexes are so much easier to clean up when you have it on your hands or on your brushes. They don’t blister and peel like oil paints sometimes do. Plus there’s not that odor when you’re painting inside your house. So latex has a lot of great features, especially touch-up. If you touch up oil paint you can see where you touched up. With latex paint you go right over it and it blends in. And if you have kids and they leave handprints on the wall, with most latex paints you can now wash the prints right off the wall and not remove the paint.
Removing Old Paint
If there are layers of old paint that has built up over the years, you’re going to have to remove it, and there are several different ways to do that. One is with a grinding wheel. You have sandpaper on it and you just make up and down strokes. But with trim and around smaller details, you won’t be able to use a large wheel but will have to choose a smaller wheel. Another way to do it is with a heat gun. You’ve heard “it’s so hot that paint peels”? Well that actually happens. You put a heat gun up against paint, get it hot enough, it will start to peel off. The old-fashioned way is to do it by hand with some sandpaper. Just rub it up and down. Now if you wanted a great finish for your new paint, you will have to remove all of the old paint all the way down to the wood or sheetrock.
Once you have it sanded down and got it fairly smooth, you need to put a layer of primer on top. The primer should fill in all the gaps and holes. You need a primer to help the paint really stick to the trim or to your walls. Primer is always important when you paint. Put it down first, then come back with some sandpaper and do a light sanding on the primer. Then put a couple coats of paint on top of that. When applying over brand new sheetrock, go ahead and put primer over the sheetrock, and then we would paint on top of that primer. You always want primer as your first coat, then you can put layers on top of that — as long as you keep it smooth and dry. That’s very important when you’re painting a home.
Paintbrushes
When it comes to putting on the paint, there’s a lot of choices to make. You need to get the right brush for the paint you’re using. Sit down with someone from the paint store and ask them what’s the perfect brush, and also make sure that it’s the right size for the job you’re doing. If you have very intricate trim, you might need a little bit smaller brush to get into those tight spots so get the right tool for the job. On the walls themselves, if there are going to be a lot of walls to cover, go with a roller. It does a great job, you’ll cover a lot of area in a short amount of time, and paint is very hard work, you don’t want to spend a lot of time doing it, so go with the roller. Get one with a long nap. It’s going to leave a much nicer finish — more solid, you’re not going to see little strings running up and down in your wall.
Choosing a Finish
On the finish itself on the paint, there’s thousands of choices of paint, but basically we have three finishes. Here we’ve got flat, then we have semi-gloss, then we have high gloss. Use the flat for your walls and the semi-gloss or the high gloss on your trim, around the base molding, the windows and doors, even on your crown molding. It really sets off the room and adds a lot of detail.
For best results
When you paint a house, whether it’s an existing home or a brand new home, you need to get down to that wood surface, and you need to put on a coat of primer. It really makes the paint adhere to the walls, and then two full coats of paint.
