Best Way to Get Peeling Paint Off House

To penetrate and remove the x layers of paint on the siding and trim at the Winchester projection, painting contractor Jim Clark (shown here) and his coiffure used a newly developed, not-caustic stripper that breaks the bond between pigment and wood. Before choosing their approach, they considered several methods, detailed in the post-obit slides.

Photo by Keller & Keller

From a distance, the house in Winchester, Mass., site of the 2002 This Quondam House TV projection, was a movie of yellow siding and white trim. Closer inspection revealed a craggy clapboard landscape of cracks, chips, and flakes where 10 coats of paint, applied during the 80-year life of the house, were failing by degrees.

"The clapboards are cypress, I think—a full 10 inches wide and 7/8 inches thick at the butt," said TOH full general contractor Tom Silva. "Cute wood in peachy condition, except that it won't hold any more than pigment."

Painting contractor Jim Clark concurred: "We could feather out the failed areas with scrapers and sandpaper before priming and top blanket, but a year after we end, the flaking and chipping could start again. And so all the paint has to go. That means a lot of work, just when we're finished, we'll have a baby-smooth surface that will hold nice, even coats of pigment for a long time to come."

Lead Paint in Homes

Stripping paint from any house congenital before 1978 raises the question of atomic number 82. Given the number of coats on the Winchester house, Clark had no doubtfulness about the presence of the heavy metal. In the past, scraping lead paint required hiring a licensed—and plush—abatement contractor to remove and dispose of the lead-laced paint.

But that inverse in Massachusetts in 2001, according to Jim Roberts, an environmental analyst with the land's Department of Environmental Protection: "Massachusetts adopted federal Environmental Protection Bureau guidelines that reclassify lead pigment residue from a residence equally household waste material. The idea is that if it is easier for homeowners to dispose of atomic number 82, they volition be more likely to remove it from their homes."

For Clark and crew, it meant that they could practise the work—if they took the mandated safety precautions—and that all the paint they removed from the house could simply be bagged up and chucked into the trash.

Grinding
(power sanding deejay or clapboard sander)
Pros: Fast, efficient, leaves no residual on surface; relatively cheap (no chemicals to buy).
Cons: Only works on non patterned siding like clapboards. In inexperienced hands, can scar wood. Noisy; creates airborne grit that'due south a pb business concern and requires a HEPA-filter mask. Some states require vacuum connection.

Photo past Keller and Keller

Paint Stripping Methods

In that location are three basic methods for stripping paint—grinding, applying estrus, and using chemicals. All of them are hard work because the same binders that cause pigment to adhere get in hard to remove. Clark and his crew considered using several dissimilar methods on the Winchester siding before making a final pick. As the paradigm slides in this article reveal, all these approaches have advantages and disadvantages. But every pigment-stripping job is a trivial unlike, and past feel, along with some empirical testing, helped Clark decide what would work best for the Winchester house.

Grinder Paint Removal

For instance, grinding—using power sanding disks or clapboard sanders—is very efficient on siding that's in good shape, but it generates lead-laden dust. Although the tools can be fitted with a vacuum hose, the concluding thing Clark wanted, in a cheek-to-jowl neighborhood like Winchester, was to release any lead-contaminated grit. "The work was scheduled for high summertime," says Clark, "when everyone has their windows wide open up. On top of the grit, there's the abiding loud scouring noise the tools brand."

Heat Paint Remover & Chemical Strippers

Heat and chemical strippers were also given a effort. The big downside of most heat methods is the hazard of burn down. "Whatever stripping contractor tin can tell you a story he's heard of a house burning down," says Clark. "A coiffure finishes at the end of the day, there'southward an ember under a dry out clapboard...next morning, ashes."

Chemicals are less straightforward because of the different types. The one-time standard, methylene chloride, is effective but very nasty stuff. Also on the market are some "environmentally friendly" strippers, some of which piece of work better than others. "Information technology's unfortunate," Clark says, "but it seems that the least caustic chemicals are the slowest, and some of the orangish-based products I've tried don't really work well."

Burning
(rut plate or heat gun)
Pros: Relatively fast, thorough, and inexpensive (no chemicals to buy).
Cons: Can release some lead along with fume, then a respirator is recommended. Biggest danger, though, is fire (often delayed when an ember under a clapboard ignites).

Photograph by Keller & Keller

Final Choice: RemovAll Chemical Stripper

Ultimately, the production that won the twenty-four hour period at Winchester was a h2o-based chemic stripper called RemovAll. Information technology doesn't attempt to dissolve the paint as other chemical strippers practise but instead breaks the bond betwixt pigment and substrate.

Clark adds, "The best thing about the product, every bit far as my crew and I are concerned, is that it's nontoxic. No gloves, HEPA filter masks or respirators, no safety glasses. Spray information technology on in the late afternoon, allow it sit overnight, and past forenoon the paint comes off in sort of rubbery sheets. We scraped information technology off easily with long-handled, 3-inch-wide putty knives."

Most areas of the building took 2 coats of the stripper—not surprising considering the multiple layers of paint. The cost of the RemovAll—virtually twice that of methylene chloride —was, Clark feels, outweighed by its ecology benefits.

As luck would have it, when the house was three-quarters finished, Clark was shown a revolutionary tool that may change his mind about how he strips pigment from here on. It uses infrared rays to heat up the substrate behind the paint, totally loosening its bond to wood or metal.

Silent Paint Remover

"The Silent Paint Remover" heats to a maximum temperature of only 500°F—well below woods's immolation indicate. "Concur it over an surface area for 20 to thirty seconds, requite it a quick scrape, and all the paint layers come off downward to the blank wood. Information technology's lightning fast," said Clark. "Nosotros'll apply information technology on the front of the house and the garage."

As with all stripping methods that involve scraping down to bare wood, some sanding is necessary before the kickoff glaze of primer goes on. "Scrapers accept a tendency to burnish the wood, making information technology likewise shine and shiny to take pigment," says Clark. "We ever hit all the surfaces with a random-orbit sander and eighty-grit paper to get skilful molar for that first coat of primer."

Infrared heat
Pros: Very fast (nearly xx-30 seconds exposure); low operating temperature won't ignite wood; removes all paint with ane pass. Requires no mask, gloves, or goggles; inexpensive to operate (no chemicals to buy).
Cons: Non yet widely available; $395 initial toll.

Photo past Keller & Keller

How to Choose Exterior Pigment Colors for Your House

While the exterior paint was stripped, homeowners Kim Whittemore and Bruce Leasure searched for new, historically accurate colors for their Colonial Revival dwelling house. Kim consulted a book past Roger Moss called Paint in America: The Colors of Historic American Buildings (Preservation Press, 1994; Amazon). It's arranged by firm periods, with each section showing appropriate colors for an era. "It's like one of those 'idiot'due south guides' to whatever," she says. "I flipped to Colonial Revival, and there were lots of interesting choices."

Bruce and Kim narrowed the range to four color families: blues, grays, taupes, and greens. Armed with preliminary picks, they hit the streets of their neighborhood. "We didn't want to friction match, and we didn't want to clash with, any of the houses around u.s.," Kim says.

TOH master carpenter Norm Abram had this to offer: "In one case a paint is on the building, information technology looks several shades lighter and brighter than what'southward on the stamp-stamp-size chip you go at the paint store." The best manner to gauge truthful colors is to invest in quarts of the shades you lot're considering, paint function of the building with each, then stand up back and look.

After a trip to the local pigment shop, Kim painted test swatches of seven colors for clapboards and five for trim. "It came downwards to a final choice between stone gray for the body with cream-colored trim, or a greenish-gray with nighttime, bottle-green trim," she says.

Jim Clark helped with the final decision, painting a department of clapboard and window and shutter with each combination. "In the end, we chose the green-grey for the clapboards, foam for the trim, and night green for the shutters," says Kim. "Information technology was a lot of work, but yous know, it took u.s.a. a while to observe the correct business firm. Why wouldn't it take at to the lowest degree as long to discover the right colors?"

Peel-Away
(available in different formulas, depending on paint type)
Pros: More often than not quick to apply and nonflammable. Can be sprayed or brushed on. Most dissolved paint adheres to proprietary paper, which is peeled off.
Cons: Mixed results, often requiring 2d application; paper is extra hassle.

Photograph by Keller & Keller

Where to Discover Information technology

Paint contractor

Jim Clark

Clark Painting

Sudsbury, MA

978-443-5091

Paint strippers

RemovAll

Napier Environmental Technologies

Delta, BC, Canada

800-663-9274

Peel Away Paint Removal Systems

Dumond Chemicals Inc.

New York, NY

212-869-6350

Massachusetts DEP guidance for residential pb disposal

"Getting the Lead Out" fact sail

Infrared paint stripper

Silent Pigment Remover

IMG/Viking Sales

Pittsford, NY

585-383-0740

royaltymamed1941.blogspot.com

Source: https://www.thisoldhouse.com/winchester-house/21014958/how-to-strip-years-of-paint-off-a-house

Share this post