Paint recommendations please

Alison556 · 5 Oct 2015

I'm bracing myself to start decorating my mum's living room for her but can't make up my mind which paint to use for the woodwork.

I've tried Crown, Dulux and Johnstone's water based and have established that I'm pretty cr@p with water based paint (I can paint with oil based no problem but do like the fast drying time of the water based).

The skirtings are the originals from when the house was first built and have loads of layers of old paint on (which I'll sand down as much as possible) but the original stuff on the skirtings has been this horrible brown varnish stuff with the consistency of treacle when you try to get it off.

Any tips please? It's been previously suggested Bedec Aqua Advance - is it worth a try?

Chri5 · 6 Oct 2015

Paint of any type over a poor surface will look poor.

Why not buy a heat gun and spend a day burning off and preparing the wood for a complete 'start from raw' job.

You don't mention the skirting type. If it's a generic less fussy skirting if might be easier to take it all off and replace it with a pre primed mdf moulded skirting.

If you go the heat gun route, burn, sand, fill indents, sand, prime, de-nib and then a self UC top coat x 2. Dull trade web satinwood is great. If you struggle with drying time, add 5% water to give better flow and a tad extra user time.

Nige F · 6 Oct 2015

i'd leave the stuff on the skirtings - sand lightly and cover with Zinsser shellac (BIN?) then go for the Bedec, I've found it the best of the water based

Alison556 · 6 Oct 2015

I've tried taking the paint off these old skirting before - and whatever it is that's on it from original, is nigh on impossible to get off - it just turns into the sticky mess - like treacle. It's awful stuff.

Is the Zinsser shellac water based or oil based? I read somewhere to use coverstain but that's oil based and I thought you couldn't put WB over oil based?

Would you go with the Bedec MSP or the Aqua Advance? Been reading good things about the MSP

Grenage · 6 Oct 2015

I'd be pretty tempted to rip off the skirting and replace it; that might just be me.

Alison556 · 6 Oct 2015

That's what I did in my own house but mother is in a council house and she grudges the expense

Grenage · 6 Oct 2015

if you include effort, it's certainly cheaper to replace it.

Alison556 · 6 Oct 2015

I don't want to use oil based - too smelly and takes too long to dry - don't want it covered in dog hairs or the dog to have paint on his nose or something!

Grenage · 6 Oct 2015

Johnstones Aqua is supposed to be pretty good.

I used Crown non-drop satin; don't use that, it was terrible.

sparkwright · 10 Oct 2015

Just sand, fill, sand the skirting boards. Life is too short to mess about with stripping paint or replacing skirting boards.

Alison556 · 17 Oct 2015

sparkwright said:
Just sand, fill, sand the skirting boards. Life is too short to mess about with stripping paint or replacing skirting boards.

Would you still prime with Zinsser BIN before painting? As I said, the original finish on the skirtings is some horrible brown stained varnished stuff, probably from the 1920's or thereabouts

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Paint recommendations please

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