Bathroom cabinet door repaint how to?

Hi all I have a small bathroom cabinet door which the paint is peeling off due to the damp, I’m just wondering what the best way to restore it is? Should I use a heat gun and strip back to wood then repaint or just patch up and repaint? Any help or advice would be great thank you

It's not wood, it is MDF. The water has blown the surface, that is to say that it has caused the MDF to swell.

It can be sorted. You need to sand the areas flat with 80 or 100 grit paper. The surface will be "punky" (hairy and rough). I normally use either Owatrol oil or shellac based paints to seal the area. Once dry I then sand with 180 or 220 grit paper and apply more oil/paint if I accidentally go through the the sealant. Do not use waterbased primer as a sealer, it will just raise the "grain" even more. You can use waterbased finishes if you wish though, however I would advise against it given that they are less tolerant of water than oil based paints.

You might find the cost of Owatrol or shellac paints prohibitively expensive for such a small job. Knotting solution would be cheaper but at a push you might get away with diluted oil based undercoat (diluted with white spirit), followed by a few full fat coats of the same undercoat. You can use the extra coats as a very fine filler, sanding them prior to applying oil based eggshell, satinwood or gloss.

Thank you for the advice

You are welcome.

Take the doors off to work on them. If the hinges are not quick release you will need to loosen the screws at the far end of the fittings. Try not to tamper with the screw the screw nearest to the "cups" (that fit to the door). Those latter screws adjust the left to right orientation of the hinges. The former screws fix the hing to the cruciform on the frame and allow back and forth adjustment. If you are worried about re-adjusting the doors, in most cases you can just remove the two screws that hold the "cup" part of the hinge in the door.

So I take the back screws out? The ones that attach the doors to the frame? Can I also please ask the previous house owner damaged the door frame to the bathroom and filled and painted it but it doesn’t look too good? Should I maybe removed the dent and wood filler and paint not sure thank you

Mojo12345 said:

View attachment 204198 View attachment 204199 View attachment 204200 So I take the back screws out? The ones that attach the doors to the frame? Can I also please ask the previous house owner damaged the door frame to the bathroom and filled and painted it but it doesn’t look too good? Should I maybe removed the dent and wood filler and paint not sure thank you

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If you remove the circled screws then you will not need to worry about door alignment



The correct way would be to loosen the screw furthest from the circled screws but doing so will require you tweak the back and forth alignment- which is fairly trivial though.

Apropos the door frame. I can't be sure from the quality of image but I suspect that they used a powder based filler. They have a tendency to blow over time. I prefer to use 2 pack (polyester) fillers but they are harder and hence require more sanding. Annoyingly, you will need to remove the old filler. Alternatively, use a soft filler such as Toupret RedLite (or RedDevil OneTime). It is dream to sand and the dust doesn't cling to everything, but it is less durable (read: dent proof than 2 pack filler).

Thank you for the advice