the woeful quality of painted kitchen cabinet doors

[Rob]

I'm in the process of getting my kitchen sorted. at the moment the preferred (although not necessarily mine) design is to have a simple "quaker" look with light oak doors on the cupboards and draws below the counter and soft white painted doors above the counter.

The thing that really bugs me about this is that the paint job for the painted is doors is rubbish and is not what you would want to achieve when painting wood work yourself or employing someone else to do it. I look at these painted doors and the first I think is; that looks bad, it needs to be rubbed down and repainted.

I have looked at doors in different areas of the country and checked in local (quality) firms as well as John Lewis and Leekes to see if there is any variation but everything seems to be the same.

Help me to get rid of my "Emperors Clothes" feeling as I cant believe that I am the only one who has this opinion.

Can I really get kitchen cabinetdoors with a decent paint job?

[Martin Bonner]

Easy: Rub them down and repaint them.

... or did you mean "buy without having to DIY"?

[Rob]

Yes.

I was hoping to draw upon the wealth of skills and experiences in this newsgroup as to whether there is a suitable supplier in this country.

[jkn]

somewhat OT, but..

I got a guy to make and fit an fitted MDF wardrobe for us at the back end o f last year. This wasn't my preferred design style but it was the best way to make use of the space. We chose simple 'Shaker' style doors; they are pr etty simple to make and look decent.

I resigned myself to painting the whole thing. I am not a fan of MDF and it is the first bit of 'large scale' MDF painting I've done. Since 'domestic acceptance factor' is high, and I like to do things well, I resolved to do it properly.

Ye Gods, it's March and I'm still at it ... the carcase was pretty straight forward, just need a fair few coats of white. But since I'm trying to get t he doors decent, and I hate seeing the 'end grain' on MDF edges:

- fill the edges with a sloppy Polyfilla mix; sand down

- two coats of primer (ie. paint; turn; paint turn; paint; turn; paint; tur n)

- full sanding

- two coats of undercoat (as above)

- light sanding/denibbing

- two coats of topcoat

I've used top quality paint but water-based, so I have still ended up with brush marks, grr. Only another three doors to go...

J^n

[sm_jamieson]

You must be a very good painter. The kitchen doors will be sprayed and I ha te painting as I always gets specs of dust in the finish. My B&Q (Cooke and Lewis brand) painted ash kitchen is very well, er, painted. They look like they are sprayed in a dust free environment, which they are. However, I have seen painted foil-covered doors, where the foil is the prob lem. There is also a slightly translucent finish where the timber grain just sho ws through the paint. Simon.