We live in an 80-year-old house which probably has a dozen coats of oil-base white paint on the exterior wood windows.
We are coming up on a painting cycle and sooner or later will have to switch to latex paint.
I assume this will mean starting with a coat of good primer. Should this be oil, or water-based primer?
Why switch to latex? If it's exterior, it should be oil-based paint.
Oil-based primer under latex paint is the current standard. I used a latex primer once, and it lasted less than a year. Peeled right off down to the bare wood in just a few months. What's weird is that it did that on all four sides, not just the front, which is the side which gets all the sun and blowing snow. Paint usually lasts years longer on the other three sides, but not when I used a latex primer. Also, the latex primer was runny and generally bad to work with, although it was "the best" primer HD had. Now I go to a real paint store for paint.
I am under the impression that oil is being phased out and is beginning to be hard to get, although I'm sure white oil will be available for sometime.
I'd use oil-based because it seems to protect better than water-based, but it doesn't really matter which you use. Select a premium primer and paint of the same brand, and carefully follow the preparation instructions. Allow the paint to fully cure for a month or two before setting anything on it.
Where can you get oil-based paint? Oil-based primer, yes, but there isn't anyone around here (upstate NY) who carries oil-based paint. My local paint store can't get any.
I believe NY, and a few other states have banned 1 gallon containers of oil based paint (claiming some sort of emissions nonsense). You can still buy it in other sizes.
Especially with an older house, the prep-work will largely determine the quality of the job. Removing _all_ loose paint, and roughening surface. You might want to plan on stripping windows down to wood; I would. :')
Alkyd (oil-based) paints have problems: flaking, "alligator"-ing, sealing in water that enters via cracks that _will_ occur in the hard surface.
Acrylic (latex) exterior paints gradually "chalk" over time.
In any case, thorough prep, spot-priming a/r and quality acrylic would give you the best long-term results, IME.
Consumers Union would be a good place to research paints.
HTH, J
on 9/10/2007 10:13 AM Ray said the following:
A dozen coats of paint? Maybe you ought to strip the old paint and start over.
OH please....
Oil, from a good paint store, followed by alkyd paint. At this stage, I think latex would be a very poor choice. Are you considering removing the old paint? Is it sound or cracking/alligatoring?
I sort of truncated my inquiry. The "house" of which I speak is actually a six-unit cooperative apartment building with a huge number of windows -- close to 200, I think.
To strip the paint to the wood would be terribly expensive -- maybe $100,000 or more, in my city.
I'd love to take that route, but don't think we could afford it.
-- Ray
That choice may be limited by where the OP lives. From the Benjamin Moore site...
"On January 1, 2005, significant VOC restriction standards were enacted in Delaware, the District of Columbia, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, and northern Virginia. These standards have been taken primarily from the California Air Resource Board that led the way in VOC restriction measures.
These standards revisions are driven through a multi-state organization called the Ozone Transport Commission (OTC). The OTC focuses on developing regional solutions to ground-level ozone problems in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast regions of the United States.
Most recently Maine and New Hampshire have adopted AIM (Architectural and Industrial Maintenance) regulations based on the OTC Model rule as of January 2006 and 2007, respectively. Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island have all decided to adopt OTC AIM regulations and are currently in the legislative process of rule creation and adoption. The Massachusetts regulation will likely be implemented in January
2009 and Rhode Island and Connecticut are pushing for late 2008, early 2009 implementation. Finally, the state of Vermont has decided not to adopt an AIM Regulation."
Ooooooh, goodness. That changes the picture somewhat. I am thinking that latex and the old alkyd/oil expand and contract differently and that would cause the latex adhesion problems. Are you planning on doing it yourself or having a contractor? If a contractor, the paint company may have "certification" for contractors or some other arrangement to guarantee proper product and preparation. When our condo was painted, the paint co. delivered paint, inspected after pressure washing that prep was adequate. Part of their warranty process for commercial jobs, I guess. I believe it was instigated by the contractor, as it wasn't at the request of the condo. assn.
Not to mention the high likelihood of an 80 year-old house having lead paint, which might complicate the removal.
No, the lead based paint scrapes off just as eaisly as non lead.
s
You must be kidding. In some jurisdictions (e.g. Washington, DC), it is illegal without a permit.
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