painting with can of blue paint and roller top view
If you fail to plan, you plan to fail; harsh words, but couldn’t be further from the truth and it applies to pretty much everything. When it comes to something like a painting project that takes a lot of consideration and precision, you don’t want to go into it without a sound strategy.
What colour am I going to choose? How many coats should be applied for an optimal appearance in the room? These are some of the questions that you should ask yourself before you even begin moving forward with any paint. Whether you decide to hire a painting professional or you choose to make your project DIY, here are a few things that should be considered:
‘The Planning Stages
Most costs related to paint applications are heavily weighted toward labor. Managers can verify a project’s relative costs by comparing these factors in their experiences with painting projects, or by checking the current manuals of painting-cost estimates, which break down labor and material unit costs separately.
For instance, the manuals show that costs for interior floor, wall and ceiling paint and coating applications typically are comprised of 70-80 percent labor and 20-30 percent material. Managers also can note the exceptions, such as floor coatings, by checking specific kinds of paint applications to determine their relative labor-material weights.
Proper preparation also is essential for ensuring attractive, long-lasting, low-cost jobs. This step includes ensuring that paint crews have the right tools, file and sand rough spots, clean surfaces thoroughly to remove grease and loose material, and dry the surface well.
Application Considerations
Using a pressure-feed device to keep the roller filled is faster than manually dipping the roller in a paint tray each time. These methods make a tremendous difference in the application rate and labor hours. Using a spray application, rather than a roller or brush, for open web steel ceiling joists or other irregular surfaces also can increase application rates substantially.
On trim applications, using masking tape and a trim brush or roller guide is faster than brushing or rolling the paint on free-hand. Workers can use natural or synthetic bristles with oil-based paints, but they should use only synthetic bristles for latex paints because natural bristles tend to absorb water and clog.
Equipment spotlight
Selecting the right brush size might mean buying brushes, but it is worth the price when the result is shorter application times. Crews should use 3- or 4-inch square brushes for wide moldings and 1- or 11⁄2-inch angle brushes for window sashes and narrow moldings. For larger flat surfaces and wall areas, workers should use a 4- to 51⁄2-inch brush, a roller, or a pad.
In specifying rollers, managers have four considerations to keep in mind: the handle, frame, roller core, and roller nap.
The handle should be threaded for an extension that can provide access to ceilings and hard-to-reach wall areas from the floor.
The frame is the part of the roller on which the core fits. A heavy wire frame adjustable for the core’s width adds size flexibility for different jobs from a few inches to 18-inch widths.’
The benefit of aligning yourself with an Ottawa professional painter is that they will work closely with you to create a painting strategy that works for your walls as well as your wallets!