I have vinyle shutters that are a hunter green color and badly faded. My wi fe wants to paint them black. Can this be done and it last okay? I read som ewhere that you are not supposed to go from a light color ot a dark one. So mething about it building too much heat and causing the paint to peel??
It would be simpler to buy new shutters in the colour she prefers. No paint will adhere to vinyl permanently.
That is an expensive proposition considering I need 12 of them. My only other thought was to make some myself out of pine and prime/paint them.
(My current ones are plastic of some sort. Not sure if vinyle fiberglass or what.)
I'm not so sure there is a big difference in the heat absorbed by green versus black, at least not enough that it's going to make a difference. Modern paints perform across a wide temperature range. If it were me, I'd spray them with a good quality paint.
rust oleum makes paint specially designed for use on plastic
Would you use spray paint or an oil based enamel brushed on? Actually, now that I think about it, I have a large air compressor and a spray gun. Could I use that to spray enamel out of a a gallon paint can from Lowes?
Stryped1:
Yes you can paint vinyl. People paint vinyl siding to change the colour of their house all the time. Vinyl siding manufacturers recommend that the homeowner not paint the vinyl siding a darker colour than the original vinyl.
Window manufacturers recommend that you do not paint their windows, but the reason is not because paint won't adhere to vinyl. It's because their windows are normally made of WHITE vinyl to keep the vinyl as cool as possible. Any other colour would result in the vinyl absorbing more light and becoming warmer. Vinyl has a wide "glass transition temperature", which means that it goes from a hard brittle cold plastic to a soft easily distorted warm plastic over a wide temperature range, and so even a small change in the temperature of the plastic can result in a large decrease in it's stiffness and hardness. The manufacturers know that keeping the vinyl cool will minimize damage to the window from the vinyl stretching and distorting under it's own weight.
The spray paint that's made for plastic is called "Fusion", but I'm not sure who makes it. Any home center should sell it.
So, tell your better half that there's no problem painting the shutters, but she has to pick a colour that's no darker than the Hunter Green the shutters were originally. And, I would use an exterior latex paint to paint them, OR the Fusion paint that comes in a rattle can.
The shutters on my house are 36 years old. They wre first painted when about 6 years and have been painted a few more times. They are holding the paint well and will get painted again, probably next year.
As for the heat, I don't think it will make much difference on a shutter, but a door behind a full glass storm door can get het enough to burn you.
Your paint may not adhere but I painted two vinyl shutters on the front of our office in 1995 and because of them fading I repainted them back in 2011. I think that 16 years without pealing is pretty good. I didn't use special paint for plastic, just plain ole spray paint in a rattle can.
Hi, My last house had them which was detachable. I removed them all and washed clean dried lightly sanded, spray painted. Worked well. It was not made of wood.
I have heard this but haven't tried it...
Armor All can bring new life to faded, chalky vinyl shutters. If you got a couple that are easy to reach, it might be worth trying a small spot to see.
If you arbour all them, forget about painting them for another 10 years. And do NOT paint vinyl shutters black They WILL warp and twist and dance in the sun.
There are ways to remove Armor All. Diluted Woolite (8:1) and a micro fiber cloth should work as does diluted Simple Green, really diluted...
Red Green:
About "100% Acrylic" paint.
Most people that throw that term around don't really know what it means.
In North America, over 90 percent of the latex paint that's made is made from one of two different kinds of plastics.
Note that there is no such thing as a "50% Acrylic" paint or a "75% Acrylic" paint. It's either "100% Acrylic" or "Vinyl Acrylic" or "Styrenated Acrylic".
The problem with this naming system is that people presume that if a paint is 100% Acrylic, there's no point spending more on a higher priced paint because you can never get higher than 100%, right? Really, the wording "100% Acrylic" on a can of paint means about as much as the wording "100% Cow" does on a package of meat. It tells you the kind of plastic the paint is made of, but that's all. You don't know if you're getting prime rib or dog food.
Generally, "100% Acrylic" latex paints are more expensive than "Vinyl Acrylic" paints, and they: a) have better resistance to acidic and alkaline substrates like fresh concrete b) have better UV resistance c) dry to harder and marr resistant films, d) stick better to damp or moist surfaces, and e) don't exhibit any "blocking" which is when a paint remains slightly sticky after it's fully dry.
Essentially ALL exterior latex paints will be made from polymethyl methacrylate because of it's better UV resistance and the fact that the film doesn't soften up and lose it's adhesion if it gets wet like polyvinyl acetate paints and primers.
The problem with polyvinyl acetate paints and primers is that they have lousy Alkaline resistance, lousy UV resistance and they lose their hardness and start cracking and peeling if they get wet. Also, they have poor "blocking" resistance in that an apparantly dry paint film will still retain some residual stickiness.
If you ever look in someone's bathroom and see that the paint is cracking and peeling above the shower, the problem is almost always attributed to poor surface preparation prior to painting, but that's a misdiagnosis of the problem. It's the fact that a cheap PVA paint was used in the bathroom.
Also, if you've ever had doors and windows that tend to "stick" when they're closed, the usual cause of that is a PVA paint being used on them. When a door painted with a PVA paint closes and presses gently againts a frame painted with PVA paint too, the two will stick to one another causing problems. Again, the fix is to paint over the "vinyl acrylic" paint with a "100% Acrylic" paint.
There are literally hundreds of different "100% Acrylic" resins used to make primers, paints, floor finishes, nail polish for the ladies, grout sealers and water based "varnishes". And, there are hundreds more "vinyl acrylic" resins used to make mostly primers and budget priced interior latex paints. So, specifying a "100% Acrylic" paint is no more precise than specifying "cow" when you order a hamburger.
wife wants to paint them black. Can this be done and it last okay? I read s omewhere that you are not supposed to go from a light color ot a dark one. Something about it building too much heat and causing the paint to peel??
So the consensus is that a latex is better than an enamel to repaint a viny le shutter? Mine are really chalky and have been on the house since 1998. I wonder what a pressure washer would do for them?
If black is going to cause vinyl shutters to warp, twist and dance, then why is one of the most popular colors for vinyl shutters black? You can buy them in that color right at the store. Good grief.
y wife wants to paint them black. Can this be done and it last okay? I read somewhere that you are not supposed to go from a light color ot a dark one . Something about it building too much heat and causing the paint to peel??
nyle shutter? Mine are really chalky and have been on the house since 1998. I wonder what a pressure washer would do for them?
You could try it and find out. They should be washed thoroughly before painting anyway. Also, if you want to spray paint them with a can, I think Bob Haller pointed out that there are spray cans of paint available specifically for plastic. What any difference in formulation might be, IDK. But HD, etc carries them and they are only like $3 a can. You could try that on one and if it works, you have a reasonable, easy solution.
Most people would use an exterior latex paint on your outdoor vinyl shutters, but any paint will work.
A pressure washer will remove any existing loose paint from your shutters, but won't do anything for chaulked plastic. Plastics are coloured by adding tiny coloured particles (called "pigments") to the plastic before it is molded into the final product, so plastics don't just have a colour on their surface but are coloured all the way through the plastic. That is, the plastic gets it's colour from the tiny coloured particles that are distributed inside it very much like the raisins in raisin bread, not just on it's surface (like a paint). If your plastic has a "white-ish" discolouration to it, it's because the surface of the plastic is rough, and is scattering light. Your eye sees scattered light as the colour "white", and that's where the whitish discolouration of your shutters comes from. This is precisely the reason why clowds, water falls, snow banks and the head on a beer are all white in colour even though nothing inside any of these things is actually white in colour. It's also the reason why when you scratch something, the scratch itself will be WHITE in colour.
A pressure washer won't make the surface of your shutters smooth again, and therefore won't remove the white discolouration that's on them.
Hope this helps.
Stryped:
If the white discolouration of your shutters is due to their rough surface (due to deterioration from UV light), then it occurs to me that you may be able to eliminate that white discolouration by eliminating the rough surface of your vinyl.
Try this:
Take a wet sponge and wipe down your worst shutter to see if the white discolouration disappears as long as the surface of the shutter is wet (and therefore smooth).
If so, you should be able to give your shutters a permanent "wet look" by painting them with a clear coat (like Minwax's "Polycrylic") instead of repainting them a different colour.
I just don't know if Minwax's Polycrylic latex "varnish" is suitable for use outdoors or not.
But, this at least gives you another alternative to repainting the shutters another colour.
PS: Those infomercials you see on TV for getting rid of scratches on cars and restoring the white discoloured plastic on cars are based entirely on getting rid of the rough surface and replacing it with a smooth one. Fresnel's law says that the amount of light reflected off a surface is proportional to the ration of the refractive indices on each side of an interface squared. So, by covering a rough surface with a clear solid material, MOST of the light reflected is reflected off the air/smooth solid interface and only a tiny amount is reflected off the smooth solid/rough solid interface. Since very much more light is reflected from the air/smooth solid iterface, the light you see behaves very much like it would if the rough solid were smooth. And, this is how these infomercial products get rid of scratches and restore the appearance of roughened plastic. Those products wouldn't work if the scratch were deep enough to go right through the coloured coat into the primer below.
Did you see my suggestion to try Armor All to "remove" the chalkiness?
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