Painting over nasty paint job on sheetrock - need advice

[Charlie]

so, a person significant in my life decided to paint my son's room a manly color. I was perfectly happy with it the way it was. Anyway, we went from a shell white to a dark brown. Looked ok for a while (I don't go back into that part of the house that often). Significant person is not big on prep work - slap the paint type - so now I have eggshell brown peeling, chipping, and generally looking bad. *I* need to paint it again.

But, I'm a prep guy - I'll spend a week on prep, paint in a day. I do not want to slap Kilz or some other primer over this mess. How bad is it? I'm considering replacing the sheet rock in the bedroom. Pretty bad.

So, ideas? Any suggestions from anyone who may have dealt with this before?

cg

[Joe]

If it's peeling, cracking, etc., it is likely a latex, quality unknown. If so, a latex can respond to either acidic or alkaline substances. With one or the other in weak water solution it may be possible to weaken the bond to the substrate enough to make further peel off effective. Try a spritz of dilute ammonial on a selected area. If results are negative, then try vinegar or some diluted CLR. Or oxalic acid. In my experience, ammonia puckered the latex enough to do a decent scrape job. These approaches are obviously tedious but cheap. But if nothing seems to work, it might be just as well to put up new drywall.

Joe

[Mike Paulsen]

"Some other primer" might be worth a try.

Scrape off what you can, prime with the above, and see how it holds up. If it seems to be working, a skim coat and some light sanding should get you back to a decent surface.

[BobR]

It will depend on rather the base coats are latex or not and rather any texture surface is of a latex base. Since you are willing to do the necessary prep work, I would work with a small area first and see how the walls will respond. Use a fine sprayer and spray with warm water to just dampen surface. Repeat this a couple of times until the paint softens and can be scraped clean. You want the water penetration to go through any texture as well since the scraping will take the texture off as well. Be careful with the scraping so that you don't remove the paper surface of the drywall.

When you finish the above you will have to do some sanding and filling since you are sure to have some gouges into the wall. Clean and sand the wall then reapply prime and texture before painting.

[benick]

I agree...Scrape off what you can , prime with above , skim the bad areas with joint compound sand and prime joint compound and paint away...Good luck....

[Charlie]

appreciate the feedback. Yes, it is definitely latex over latex - kind of weird in that I've never seen interior wall paint do this before. I'll see if the removal suggestions work. y'all have a good weekend.

[ransley]

If it was over gloss dirty latex then it could peel , usualy it takes years to happen, are warm interior walls peeling. I have seen latex over gloss that would scrape of easily even with your finger, that was over gloss oil. I would just scrape, wash, sand prime and paint. If its real bad and loose after you wash and scrape you might need to scrape again and prime with oil first so it all doesnt fail, tough to actualy say without seeing it and what it does.

[HeyBub]

Wallpaper.

[BobR]

Wallpaper would require MORE preparation than painting and could even worsen the problem since the moisture in the paste would loosen the paint and cause additional peeling. If there is any texture on the wall, paper would end up looking like crap.

[HeyBub]

Nailed wallpaper.

[Norminn]

What kind of paint is the base and the peeling coat? Smoothe or textured (not counting the peeling)? Peeling/chipping all over, or just areas that get a lot of wear?

[BobR]

Thanks for the clarification!