Tips DIY Painting

Getting the surface ready

The first thing to do before you start painting a room and probably the most important thing is to get the surfaces ready for painting. Not preparing the surfaces properly is probably the most common paint failure problem.

The first thing obviously is before you start put your drop sheets down. And cover all your furniture.

Next thoroughly wipe down the room from cobwebs and large collections of dust anywhere.

Then, sand down anything that is shiny so the paint will stick to it. Shiny paint as a rule will not let latex paint stick to it very well.

Check the room out for any flaking paint, cracks or holes. If you have wallpaper on the room that you want to remove you should remove it now, and then check what was behind the wallpaper on the wall again for cracks or holes.

Then you have to plaster up these cracks or holes with some sandable patching compound. Make sure that you buy definitely a soft sanding dry mix compound. These compounds you mix by hand in a trough to a thinner than dough consistency but not too wet otherwise it will sag and fallout of the hole.

After the compound has dried, it's time to sand it smooth to the rest of the wall. But be careful not to stand a crater into the repair, I usually use a flat pad for sanding. If you try to sand by hand these spots you might end up with a dimple.

Next what I do if I'm trying to do a very nice job and I know I will be placing some lighting into the room I should be aware that this lighting might cast shadows on the defective walls. Usually the way I prevent lighting from emphasizing bad detail on the walls is to go around the room with a portable handheld trouble lamp. Hold the trouble lamp to the wall by few inches, the shadow it casts on the wall looking ahead of the light will show you all the little defects on the wall. What I suggest to do is mark all these spots while shining a light on them so you will be able to identify them later without the light. Now you will be able to do your final finishing repairs to get your walls perfectly smooth.

Written by Vic Nagy owner of Hollywood Painting since 1979 This is the first of a series of articles I will be writing on DIY painting projects. You will be able to find me at: http://www.hollywoodpainting.com/

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