I love plantation shutters. I just think they are so beautiful and also practical, but they are pretty expensive to buy.
This is why, a couple of years ago, while we had moved out of our house to have it renovated, I was on the lookout for some second hand ones on gumtree or ebay. Well I found some. Here they are. These,
and these.
Special aren't they? Yes, I know what you are thinking; they are green. Dark green. They were from the same house but they don't match. Not that that really matters as I didn't want them dark green, but anyway.
The seller said, oh, you just need to spray paint them, you'll be fine. So off I went with them under my arm.
Two years later my husband is doing it, hooray!
Here are his top tips for successful spray painting:
Important: Safety First! Wear a proper facemask suitable for spray painting & make sure it seals well to your face without any gaps.
- Sand the surface with 120 grit paper.
- Hang the item using temporary screws and string so that contact points are minimised.
- Blow off dust with an airgun & wipe down all surfaces with microfiber wipe.
- Get some water based undercoat & mix it up, pour some into a spare tin or sealable container. Add 10% water & mix.
- Fill
the airgun with the diluted paint. Set the air pressure to around
40psi. Adjust the settings by test spraying onto the side of an old
cardboard box. Set the quantity of paint by adjusting the knob at the
back of the gun. Set the ‘fan’ of the spray pattern by adjusting the
knob near the nozzle. Its good to have a nice wide fan to make the
coverage more even.
- Start
spraying! Try to do the tricky areas first. Shutters have A LOT of
little nooks & crannies & it took a few goes to work out what
areas to do first… You should keep the gun moving as you spray to ensure
you get a good coverage without any runs. It’s a balance between having
a rough finish where the paint drops have not flowed together with each
other and having too much paint which runs. Its not easy, but practise
& learning as you go will get you there.
- Allow
to dry for 2 hours or more. Empty the paint back into the container
& clean the gun with plenty of water. You need to strip the gun down
every time otherwise you will find that all the pigment settles into
the nozzle and blocks it. Even if you think you know better &
think ‘I know I’ll wrap the nozzle in a some moist rag to stop it drying
out’. No, it won’t solve the settling in the nozzle problem…
- Repeat with the top coat. Use a water based paint suitable for timber.
Top tips
You
need to have plenty of reflecting light to see how the paint is going
down as you are spraying. Use work lamps on either side of the work
piece. You will need to position yourself so that you can see the light
reflecting off the paint, its harder with white paint as its not so easy
to see the reflection.
Cover
anything in the garage /workshop with dropsheets. A few minutes spent
doing this will save your prize possessions getting covered in spots of
paint!
This is the aircompressor and below is the spray gun. The gun is gravity feed. Gravity feed guns need lower air pressure to achieve vacuum. Spraying with lower air pressure has the advantages of less overspray, less waste and greater control for the painter.
The gun is being held in a vice to keep the cup upright. The gun is not by any special maker. It is just a cheap one.
So here is the first one almost finished. I just love it so! They are going to look amazing when installed too. Can't wait.