Spraying cabinets, doors and trim

[JontyG]

Hi all,

I am going to be repainting kitchen and bathroom cabinet doors, wardrobe cupboard doors, skirtings, architraves and bedroom doors in the near future.

I was hoping to use a spray gun to paint these items, in an oil-based enamel.

From what I've read, it seems a HPLV gun may be suitable for these jobs, but there seems to be a lot of conflicting info out there.

I am hoping that someone can confirm whether or not a HPLV gun is suitable, especially for the kitchen and bathroom cabinets & doors, and if so, would a full size gun, or a touch up gun be better?

Also, any recommendations as to brands and suitable compressors would be appreciated.

Many thanks,
Jonty

[durwood]

Have you ever sprayed enamel before?

If not you may be unaware that it is difficult to spray (if you mix or spray it badly it will result in a terrible finish) So you will need to practice if unexperienced before doing anything that matters.

Unless you have a suitable area to paint it you can cause yourself and the neighbours a lot of drama.

Enamel dried very slowly so when you create overspray it will float around and deposit itself on everything within a wide area. So if you spray outside and the wind is blowing the next doors' dog, washing on the line the house, the car and anything else will get coated with overspray which will stick like glue. If its not removed while the paint is still wet the surface may have to be sanded down and repainted. A contractor painting a building in Wollongong had to pay for the respraying of over a dozen cars when he painted a building and all the cars in the street got overspray on them.

Besides that you will be covered in paint which will be sticky, don't wear a mask and protective clothes you will have apint in your hair all over your skin and be blowing paint out of your nose for a few days. Being slow to dry the paint is subject to contamination, so you will get dirt in it easily unless you are in suitable conditions such as a spray booth.

Don't let me put you off, I have sprayed successfully many things with this paint in the backyard. You need to pick a fine calm morning, water down around the area you are spraying in to lay any dust. You can then spray the paint and you should then place them somewhere which is enclosed (garage-shed) till they are dry -12 hours - depending on paint)

An HVLP gun for enamel (gravity feed - pot on top) will spray the paint no problem, (ask for one to spray enamel) depending on how much use you think the gun and compressor will be put to and your budget will depend on how much you spend. Just going to do the things you mentioned then nothing much after then go for a cheap compressor and gun from Bunnings. A cheap compressor is usually a direct drive (less than $200 a good one (belt drive $400-800) You will also need a hose and an air transformer which is a filter regulator for the air supply.

If you have the finances its always better to get top quality gear so invest in better quality equipment. Depending on the area you live in there should be specialist suppliers who supply the spray painting trade (yellow pages). Or you can contact some of the paint companies who have associations with equipment companies.

PPG sells a top quality spray gun (Sata) which they recommend for their quality car paints, Get a full sized gun,it can spray small areas and large but a touch up gun only sprays small jobs. Do some homework there should be lots of info if you do a search in the forum here.

[JontyG]

Have you ever sprayed enamel before?

If not you may be unaware that it is difficult to spray (if you mix or spray it badly it will result in a terrible finish) So you will need to practice if unexperienced before doing anything that matters.

Unless you have a suitable area to paint it you can cause yourself and the neighbours a lot of drama.

Enamel dried very slowly so when you create overspray it will float around and deposit itself on everything within a wide area. So if you spray outside and the wind is blowing the next doors' dog, washing on the line the house, the car and anything else will get coated with overspray which will stick like glue. If its not removed while the paint is still wet the surface may have to be sanded down and repainted. A contractor painting a building in Wollongong had to pay for the respraying of over a dozen cars when he painted a building and all the cars in the street got overspray on them.

Besides that you will be covered in paint which will be sticky, don't wear a mask and protective clothes you will have apint in your hair all over your skin and be blowing paint out of your nose for a few days. Being slow to dry the paint is subject to contamination, so you will get dirt in it easily unless you are in suitable conditions such as a spray booth.

Don't let me put you off, I have sprayed successfully many things with this paint in the backyard. You need to pick a fine calm morning, water down around the area you are spraying in to lay any dust. You can then spray the paint and you should then place them somewhere which is enclosed (garage-shed) till they are dry -12 hours - depending on paint)

An HVLP gun for enamel (gravity feed - pot on top) will spray the paint no problem, (ask for one to spray enamel) depending on how much use you think the gun and compressor will be put to and your budget will depend on how much you spend. Just going to do the things you mentioned then nothing much after then go for a cheap compressor and gun from Bunnings. A cheap compressor is usually a direct drive (less than $200 a good one (belt drive $400-800) You will also need a hose and an air transformer which is a filter regulator for the air supply.

If you have the finances its always better to get top quality gear so invest in better quality equipment. Depending on the area you live in there should be specialist suppliers who supply the spray painting trade (yellow pages). Or you can contact some of the paint companies who have associations with equipment companies.

PPG sells a top quality spray gun (Sata) which they recommend for their quality car paints, Get a full sized gun,it can spray small areas and large but a touch up gun only sprays small jobs. Do some homework there should be lots of info if you do a search in the forum here.

Thanks for the tips, much appreciated

I haven't sprayed enamel before - haven't sparayed anything before, other than rattlecans...

I am planning to set up a spare room as a painting booth, so the overspary will be confined to this room.

It seems that many people use the Wagner HPLV guns, which look like an inexpensive option - I may look into one of these. The gun will primarily be for the jobs listed in my original post, not sure that I will use the spray gun much after that.

I have been presented with another option for the kitchen and bathroom cabinet doors, by a friend in the panel beating trade - I may be able to have them sparayed in a 2 pack. I would imagine that the doors would need to be stripped right back before going through this process though (they currently have some sort of varnish). Any opinions on this?

Thanks,
Jonty

[pawnhead]

Very interesting tips there durwood.
I'm considering spraying my own kitchen doors soon. I've already got a compressor, but it may be wiser to just profile the MDF doors myself, fill and sand them properly, then send them to someone else to apply 2pac.
I wonder how much it would cost?

[durwood]

Jonty,
Take you friend in the panel beating trade up on the spraying.

Yes you will need to get rid of any varnish type material before you can put 2 pack over the top.

Here are a few options.

* One strip all the original finish off and start again in 2 pack on clean bare timber.

*Use a sealer to block off the old finish and then do it in 2 pack. The auto trade has special sealers to do this. Saves lots of work stripping buy you then have a surface with two different types of paint and it may not wear as well especially if there is lots of old paint thickness. The sealer is a barrier coat and adhesion is less than a proper process so chipping of the new paint might happen easier.

* You could also have your PB mate ( or whoever is going to do it - painter maybe) spray the enamel for you. he could also give you a better finish over the old one by adding a hardener to the enamel which converts it into a 2 pack finish. You won't have to do the stripping just rub back to a nice base and the enamel won't attack the old finish like 2 pack will ( weaker solvent) but you will get a coating neally as strong as 2 pack urethane.

Prawnhead,

Have you checked out the guy on ebay who supplies MDF doors finished in 2 pack. My daughter needed new kitchen cupboard doors and his prices were so good I could see it was not worth the effort for me to make the doors in MDF and spray them for the cost he was charging. He sells samples to check him out and the cost of the sample is deducted from cost of doors if you go ahead and order.

I have just tried to look him up but don't see him on there at the moment but if you are interested I will check with my daughter. He's in western Sydney somewhere.

[JontyG]

Thanks durwood, I'll definitely look into those options.

I'm also interested in finding out about the details for the MDF doors - I'll be adding several new cupboards during the kitchen reno.

Cheers,
Jonty

[pawnhead]

Thanks for that durwood. Mine's a bit further down the pipeline though. A lot of other priorities with this old dump.
It's never ending.