The Secret to a Great Paint Job

The secret to a great paint job. If there’s one message that professional painters would like to send to all homeowners and anyone else who plans to use a paintbrush or roller, it’s this:

Spend more of your time preparing the surfaces you’re going to paint and less time actually painting them.

Franklin Painting of Farmington, CT, offers three painting prep tips for those of you who plan to do a home painting job yourselves.

The Secret to a Great Paint Job. 3 Prep Tips:

1. Fix Surface Blemishes

This includes:

Leaks

If a water leak might affect the surface that’s going to be painted, get the leak fixed before you do anything else.

Nail Holes, Chips and Dents

Fill in with a quality putty or wall-repair compound.

Peeling Paint

Scrape away and then sand. You can use a basic scraper, wire brush, nylon drill brush or disc sander, based on how much paint needs to be sanded and how hard it is to remove.

Broken Wood in Trim or Molding

Replace the broken sections.

Do these and other surface repairs first, before any other preparation work. If left unaddressed, these blemishes will mar the appearance of the finished paint job and, in the case of leaks and peeling paint, pull new paint away from the surface.

2. Sand, Sand, Sand

After the surfaces are repaired, it’s time to sand. Every inch of the area to be painted needs to be sanded well. You can use sandpaper and do it by hand, or you can use a belt sander. If you don’t have a belt sander, you can rent one.

The slight roughness created by sanding makes a surface to which paint can adhere well. When painting anything, a key to a quality result is having all surface areas equal in their composition, i.e., sanded down and clean.

3. Clean the Surfaces

Finally, it’s time to clean the surfaces you’re going to paint. Walls, trim, molding, permanent decorative accents – they all pick up dust and grime over the years. There will probably also be dust and minuscule pieces of debris left over from your prep work that will need to be cleaned off.
Start by using a gentle cleaner and see if it does the job. For stubborn stains or very dirty surfaces, a cleaner like TSP will usually produce a great result.

Although you might not be able to see all the dirt that’s on your surfaces, trust us, it’s there. And if you paint over it, it will eventually break through the new paint and destroy all your hard work.

A Few Other Painting Tips

Don’t spend all that time prepping the surfaces and then go out and buy cheap paint, brushes and rollers. Quality breeds quality, so do some shopping and select the very best paint, brushes and rollers you can buy.

You’re going to spill paint – no paint job has ever been done by a pro or a novice without spilling paint. Keep water, cleaning solvents and towels or rags handy in the work area at all times.

Last but not least: don’t rush it. Painting is a process, and it can take a long time to do it right. Plan your painting project for when you have enough time in a day or across several days to spend the necessary time to create a lovely finished result.

Hire Professionals for your Next Paint Project

If you’d rather have the experts at Franklin Painting handle the job, we’re standing by and ready to work. Speak with a painting expert in the Farmington, CT, area by phone or get in touch through our handy contact form.