Electric paint sprayers

[Doug]

I saw an article on paint sprayers and wondered based on your experience, which are the best for home use and why? I know most serious painters don't consider electric but I figure just for home use, it shouldn't be so bad. Things I'm thinking of ... ease of use, cleanup, decent flowrate, availability of parts in case of repair, etc... . Any gotchas when buying or using one of these?

Is it wise to consider it for painting inside a home with carpet / furniture? Maybe a roller is still better??? Perhaps this is better for outside use vs inside use? I know I spray painted a house inside years ago with gas powered compressor and the prep work was a pain. The paint job was gorgeous but we had to do the trim work by hand. Back then, the house was missing the carpet so the floor was no problem with the spray dust / mist.

[Doug]

I didn't realize after checking Google that these sprayers can get expensive. I saw some around $1000 and perhaps they can go higher so I guess the question I didn't address is how much I want to spend. Therefore let me just ask, based on light use, what you think is a good sprayer for the cost? I don't doubt the $1000 sprayers do a fine job but hard to warrant that based on my useage.

[trader4]

I was recently looking into this myself. I was looking at doing 8 doors, plus future use for possibly spraying cabinets, outdoor siding, etc. I concluded that the Grayco Project Painter or similar fit the bill. Grayco appears to have a good reputation and makes eqpt from DIY to professional.

For painting walls, ceilings, trim in a house I would not use a sprayer. I think all the taping would be a pain. Plus a roller leaves a very nice finish. I've even seen the pros on TV home shows using a sprayer to put the paint down, then another guy using a roller to go over it for a better finish. And they were generally doing that in homes where construction had been done, so a lot less taping was involved.

[bud--]

Far as I know you have to extensively mask with paint sprayers because of overspray. For furniture low pressure high volume sprayers are becoming more common. The overspray is far less. I don't know if they are useful for walls.

[clare]

The Wagner Power Painter is a peice of crap.

[clare]

MOST electric sprayers are "airless" which is even better than HVLP as far as overspray is concerned.

[gregz]

I have used a vibrating sprayer, and drips all over the place. I used one of those power rollers, and I got it to work great. Good for painting large areas, but cleanup, a pain.

Greg

[dadiOH]

I don't know why people seem to have so many problems with them. I used one - a Wagner - for close to 25 years before it gave up the ghost. Didn't use it every day - or even every year - but all my passage doors were lacquered with it; ditto all the kitchen cabinet doors; ditto numerous painted louvered doors; ditto 5 pairs of French doors. Et cetera.

One IS able to adjust the degree of atomization just as one can use the appropriate tip. Yes, there is overspray. There is overspray from pretty much anything..

[clare]

The problem I had with both of mine is the piston siezed so the "bumble-bee" stopped buzzing and the paint stopped flying all over the place.