Residential Painting And Decorating Tasks

Nowadays, most people opt to carry out their home decorating and residential painting works themselves. Ever since the wave of DIY evolved in the 20th century, many have opted to carry out interior home decorating or renovation works primarily to save money, but in many cases because of an enthusiastic interest as a hobby. Such adventurous people have been found to begin a painting and decorating career from such interests.

Traditionally with residential painting, the majority of first class painters had a lot of preparation to do prior to wall painting. They had to prepare their desired colours from coloured pigments furnished by paint companies of repute. Depending on the finished colour they aim to achieve, colour pigments were slowly added to a mixture of a base and binder. The thoroughly blended mixture is then tested constantly and painstakingly with colour comparisons until the desired sample is achieved.

Luckily today, there is a vast range of colour palates available for painters to choose from, ranging from softly comforting pastel hues, to bold primary colours or metallic tones! Now finding the exact colours required for residential painting works by the modern day professional painter or the enthusiastic do-it-yourself(er) is as easy as pie! The majority of paint producers supply readymade paints in a vast variety of colours in numerous hues and tones.

Care must however be taken when choosing paint materials for residential painting. The manufacturers reputation is undoubtedly the only guarantee of quality materials for residential painting.

The majority of residential painting works - including commercial wall painting - are carried out using synthetic paints. Because synthetic paints production has been subject to constant innovations and improvements due to new discoveries, it has become the popular choose for residential painting - DIY or professionally. A single coat application is usually sufficient for interior painting, except on new walls, and its application is quite simple for the novice painter.

PREPARATION OF WALLS FOR RESIDENTIAL PAINTING

Before proceeding with residential painting, the condition or state of the existing walls and ceilings must first be considered.

• Are they new walls?
• Are they old walls, painted over and over again through many years?
• Does the wall have wallpaper that needs to be removed before paint application?

The wall plaster must have dried completely before any form of residential painting of new walls commences. It is strongly advised that you give fresh new walls a coat of thin varnish or shellac to ensure that chemicals from the new plaster walls do not end up seeping through a freshly painted interior wall causing unsightly discolouration.

At times, newly erected walls may have slight cracks in them. These cracks definitely need to be worked on before residential painting commences. If the cracks are noticeable, widen them slightly with a sharp tool or knife. This is referred to as a 'cut-out' - the inside of the widened crack must be wider than the outside. Fill up these openings with the relevant filler plaster, and because it is wider on the inside, the plaster filling ensures a safer and effective binding for the patch.

Remember to apply a varnish or shellac to the widened crack before filling. This is an important aspect of filling cracks prior to residential painting or decorating tasks.

Next, smoothly trowel the filling and then sandpaper manually or with a small sanding power tool until the surface is as smooth as the wall itself. This you can test by running your palm lightly against the amended area. Then when you are satisfied, shellac or varnish once again. You are now ready for your residential painting task.

The traditional way of preparing old walls for interior painting was to wash the old walls - already with its many coats of paint - with soda and water. This was commonly done before cracks and holes are filled. Old walls tend to have many cracks and holes over the years so before starting any residential painting tasks on an old house, ascertain that all holes, cracks and depressions found on the wall surface are adequately filled and sanded till smooth. They are to be prepared and filled the same way as it is done for cracks on new walls.

Today, there are various paint strippers with simple tools which can be used to strip old paint off old walls effectively. However before commencing with residential painting projects of old walls, you must know and identify the actual type of paint on the existing surface that requires painting, be it the wall or the ceiling.

Why is this so? You will find that water based paint finishes have a hard time adhering to oil based paint finishes. An ideal way to do this is by wiping a small area of the surface with denatured alcohol solution making sure you use a clean rag. Whilst wiping, if the old paint work is softened and removes, then it is a latex or acrylic paint finish. To see clearly if interior paints comes off on the rag, use a dark rag for light colours and light rag for dark colours. This makes it better to see the removed paint. Latex or acrylic paint must never be used over an oil base finish for residential painting without first using a primer.

Now when the old wall paint has been removed, resulting depressions which do occur should be filled up with a specially produced filler which dries quickly, becoming a nice and smooth patch when sanded. These nice and smooth new patches must be coated with varnish or shellac to prevent more absorption of the paint than in the surrounding areas of the fresh patch.

For the interior painting of walls and ceilings, another traditional way - which many still use in 'ancient' homes today - is to "canvass" the old walls before applying paint. Canvassing is using a high grade muslin type material which gives an excellent surface for painting. It can be applied to walls with wallpaper adhesive. For residential painting, canvassing walls, though more expensive, is quite cost effective because the walls can be re-painted many many times without the necessity of patching cracked walls or plaster.

The layers of wallpaper on walls need to be thoroughly removed if a decision is made to change walls with wallpaper to painted walls. Prior to proceeding with residential painting tasks, thoroughly soak the walls before beginning the removal process. The use of warm water to soak and a calcimine brush to scrape off the wall paper is needed.

Removing wallpaper is a difficult and sometimes challenging job, and it's sometimes best left to the professional wallpaper stripper. But if you wish to try out residential painting by yourself, then the help of a steamer can not be over-emphasised. Hold the steamer nozzle (when the steamer is on of course!) about 4 inches away from the wall. The steam will eventually become absorbed then soaked in by the paper. Leave it for some minutes and then feel it to see if the paper is soft enough to be scrapped off. If right, then the wallpaper on the old walls can be pulled off carefully, strip by strip.

When all paper and traces of glue has been carefully removed, the wall can then be treated as a new wall ready for the interior painting procedure.

The most important and also the most challenging part of interior painting is the preparations required which apart from repairing cracks and holes also entails another set of preparations prior to the paint application.

The paint colour desired must be tested for colour choice satisfaction. Colours, when it comes to residential painting have the tendency to dry to a slightly different tone than when wet. The placement of the rooms and depending on the light which floods the rooms from the window openings can alter the shade after it may have dried up. If an exact match to the sample swatch or palette is required it is necessary to test the colour on a small portion of the wall, or on a piece of plaster board and allow to dry thoroughly.

Once you are okay with the resultant tone then your residential painting task is ready to go. Read manufacturers labels very well and follow to the letter all instructions to ensure your interior painting job comes out perfect.

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