Finishing Plywood for Shed Walls

[Midnight Man]

Many thanks for any advice and corrections to my understanding on this topic! Also, my apologies if this ought to be in "The Shed" forum, but I thought this might also be a useful topic for this area?

I have done some looking into this, and there seems to be a limited amount of stuff to find on finishing plywood - particularly, I want to use this plywood to line the walls of a workshop I'm fitting out. As such, I may not want to leave the plywood raw, or a raw colour, depending on the amount of light this will "suck" out of the space, and I might need to paint it white or near-white.

Personally, I'd prefer the look of it in it's natural state with a finish of varnish/shellac or similar for the aesthetics. I also realise that might make the space quite dark (though I have calculated it'll have about 2500 lumens of light per square metre installed), so I might need to paint the plywood white.

I'm planning on using the "Furniture Grade" ply from Trademaster in Sydney - this plywood is very smooth right out of the box, and doesn't tolerate any sanding, hence, my thinking is that it will need to be sealed first, and then optionally painted.

My plan, based on what I've been able to find to date, is to initially run a coat or two of shellac on the plywood, thus sealing the fibres. If that doesn't darken the room too much, I think I might leave it there.

In the future, as more light is needed (simply due to age), I would then have the option to run over that with a white or off-white latex based paint.

Is my plan and theory correct, or am I completely on the wrong track? Also would appreciate any other ideas I haven't considered!

[rod1949]

Prime/undercoat then sand to remove furiness then apply a White semi gloss. Or use a water based laquer.

[Chris Parks]

I painted mine a light grey which looks ok and is a bit different. I did give light yellow a serious thought as I have used that previously on floors and it did an excellent job of reflecting light.

[KBs PensNmore]

You haven't mentioned whether the Ply is Pine, Teak or whatever. Pine has a tendency to darken with sunlight on it, I have a Pine Dresser in the Kitchen which has gone a Brown sort of colour.
I'm going to line my shed with White or Light Grey sheet as used in Kitchens, it's half the price of Plywood of similar thickness, and allows me to put hooks, fittings etc, whereever I want to hang tools etc. plus I won't have to paint at all, I HATE painting, so saving money as it won't need redoing AT ALL.
HTH
Kryn

[Simplicity]

You haven't mentioned whether the Ply is Pine, Teak or whatever. Pine has a tendency to darken with sunlight on it, I have a Pine Dresser in the Kitchen which has gone a Brown sort of colour.
I'm going to line my shed with White or Light Grey sheet as used in Kitchens, it's half the price of Plywood of similar thickness, and allows me to put hooks, fittings etc, whereever I want to hang tools etc. plus I won't have to paint at all, I HATE painting, so saving money as it won't need redoing AT ALL.
HTH
Kryn

Hi Kryn.

What is (White or light Grey sheet as used in kitchens).

Cheers Matt.

[clear out]

If you want to lighten it but still see the grain try a lime wash finish.
We used Feast Watson on the interior and wardrobe doors upstairs.
Wiped it on and off and a clear coat of nitro cellulose when dry to keep it clean.
20 years now and looking good.
H.

[Cleokitty]

If you want to lighten it but still see the grain try a lime wash finish.
We used Feast Watson on the interior and wardrobe doors upstairs.
Wiped it on and off and a clear coat of nitro cellulose when dry to keep it clean.
20 years now and looking good.
H.

Wanting a uniform clear white transparent finish on our clear pine 140 x 21 floor boards we mixed our own.

1. Sand to eliminate any height difference in boards. (Not necessary in plywood wall. It won't be walked on.)

2. Mix 1 part paint: two parts water. (We used Dulux wall paint in Napkin White which we happened to have and used for a sample. We liked it so much we went ahead with the whole floor area

3. Apply with rag. Work quickly and wipe off a section at a time to avoid hard wet/dry lines.

4. Coat with clear satin water-based finish. We used Cabot's, sanding between coats. Damp mop. Apply last coat and let dry thoroughly.

Walls would not need this degree of finishing, probably a coat of the water/paint mix then a top coat of clear. I've put the full procedure here in case someone wants to use it on floors. It looks amazing and doesn't show dust, which suits a less than award-winning housekeeper very well.

[Beardy]

The area will be substantially brighter if you paint it a light colour compared to leaving it in a natural finish.
Compare a freshly Gyprocked room to when it is painted, it makes a huge difference

[tonzeyd]

I've painted one of my walls an off white in my shed, Initially i loved the look, as it brightened up the shed, looked clean. However this also has been its downfall as over time (its only been 2 years) its starting to look dirty and you can see every mark that I've splattered/smeared on the wall accidentally. If id do it again i'd probably opt for a more gray color eg casper gray dulux paint which we used for inside our house.

[DaveVman]

My old shed has been lined with some kind of hardboard/masonite. I have since lined most of it with whatever I could get my hands on. Some is recycled melamine, one bit of recycled plywood and the rest is 12mm plywood I had intended for something else. Some is cream, some is white and some is light blue. It depends what leftovers I had around. I didn't do it all at once.
I would recommend against the natural wood look. Unless your shed is huge and you need to create a warmer feel in your work space. A light colored paint will make a big difference. It will look and feel cleaner and lighter.
The melamine obviously requires no finishing but I expect it might eventually get moisture in there after a few years. It was already old and I wasn't fussy with it. Which also meant it was free. The risk of it eventually needing replacing isn't important to me because I hope to have moved in a few years. If it ever got bad I could just pull it down and replace it anyway.

One part wall at the back of the shed needed some repairs and relining so plywood was used there also.

I can understand an aversion to having everything white. So you can use an off white or light colour.
I only sanded the bit of recycled plywood. The other sheets were good enough for a workshop (B side of BC ply).

I did one undercoat/sealer and one or two coats of whatever leftover interior paint I had. I did the minimum number of coats. Not just to save paint but because painting isn't that exciting. After a few days to properly harden the paint blocks out the wood and it's only to line a shed so .....

If you're interested I'll create a little video and come back and stick a link in this thread.

[Midnight Man]

Many thanks for all the feedback and great suggestions everyone!

It seems my suspicion was right, in that I'm going to be better off painting the walls some kind of light colour - in my heart as someone who really enjoys wood, it "hurts" to paint what would otherwise look quite nice (the ply I'm planning on using is qute nicely finished, it's like an A side, if such a thing existed).

This is going to be a 6m x 6m space, so it seems I have some painting to do!

Any harm in using ceiling white as a wall paint? I have like 15 litres of the stuff unopened in a can...

[Beardy]

Many thanks for all the feedback and great suggestions everyone!

It seems my suspicion was right, in that I'm going to be better off painting the walls some kind of light colour - in my heart as someone who really enjoys wood, it "hurts" to paint what would otherwise look quite nice (the ply I'm planning on using is qute nicely finished, it's like an A side, if such a thing existed).

This is going to be a 6m x 6m space, so it seems I have some painting to do!

Any harm in using ceiling white as a wall paint? I have like 15 litres of the stuff unopened in a can...

Ceiling white is a flat finish that fingerprints up really easy.
The best product to use is Dulux Weathershield or equivalent style of product . It is self priming, covers much better and has a more durable surface that you can clean down
The other downfall apart from the finish with your ceiling white is that you will need a primer first so you still need to buy that which will cost nearly as much as the exterior weathershield type product and will require more effort to get your end result

[shanesmith80]

If your talking about Trademaster’s ‘Okume’ ply then that’s what I lined my shed with. I thought about finishing it but decided I just couldn’t be bothered. I don’t find it darkens the shed at all, but I have put in what I think is substantial lighting.
And it’s getting to the stage that most of the walls are getting covered with tool cabinets, French cleats or random things hung from wall that I can’t see the ply anyway.
the way I figure as long as you don’t mind looking at it it’s fine whatever you do.

[Chris Parks]

Many thanks for all the feedback and great suggestions everyone!

It seems my suspicion was right, in that I'm going to be better off painting the walls some kind of light colour - in my heart as someone who really enjoys wood, it "hurts" to paint what would otherwise look quite nice (the ply I'm planning on using is qute nicely finished, it's like an A side, if such a thing existed).

This is going to be a 6m x 6m space, so it seems I have some painting to do!

Any harm in using ceiling white as a wall paint? I have like 15 litres of the stuff unopened in a can...

Get it tinted and start painting.

[KBs PensNmore]

Hi Kryn.

What is (White or light Grey sheet as used in kitchens).

Cheers Matt.

Hi Matt,
I couldn't think of the name when I wrote that, it's Melamine finish on either MDF or Chipboard. I'll be using the White Melamine Chipboard, only because it's what I can get locally.
Kryn