Who is the bigger fool?

[SoonerFan]

I did a project recently that I don’t want to do again. The project was to sand and repaint a tongue and groove pine porch ceiling (160 sqft / 15 sq meters). It needed to be repainted because originally the ceiling was covered with two coats of paint but NO PRIMER. Then over time the resins/tannins from the knots, etc. bled through and made the ceiling spotty. So to start I used my Rotex 125 and sanded the resin stains back to bare wood. Then I sanded the entire ceiling with a DTSC. Then I covered spots before coming back and priming the entire ceiling with shellac. I ended up with two coats of shellac and I sanded in between coats with my DTSC. I sanded again after the second coat of shellac and primed the entire ceiling with Sherwin Williams Extreme Bond primer. Then I sanded one final time. Then I added a two coats of Sherwin Williams Emerald exterior paint. So in total the spots were covered 6 times (spot treatment, two full coats of shellac, a coat of primer and two coats of paint) and the rest of the ceiling 5 times.

So who is the bigger fool? Me for doing this repair or the painter who either (a) did not care about how the ceiling would look over time or (b) somehow thought two coats of Sherwin Williams Super Paint was an good solution?

PS - before starting I suggested taking this ceiling out, reinstalling new tongue and groove and painting properly would be faster. Now I know it would have been faster.

 

[luvmytoolz]

I feel your pain. It's astounding how many "professionals" don't know to properly prime when needed.

I'd have to agree on replacing it. Priming and painting it before it goes up and then touching up spots would be infinitely easier.

I rebuilt our fence years ago with Cypress Pine pickets, and very thoroughly primed all edges and faces with a quality primer before painting, it's stood the test for many years now with no flaking or peeling at all, and the timbers held up exceptionally well as a result.

 

[Packard]

The painter got paid. And that’s all I have to say on that subject.

 

[Duckler]

I did a project recently that I don’t want to do again. The project was to sand and repaint a tongue and groove pine porch ceiling (160 sqft / 15 sq meters). It needed to be repainted because originally the ceiling was covered with two coats of paint but NO PRIMER. Then over time the resins/tannins from the knots, etc. bled through and made the ceiling spotty. So to start I used my Rotex 125 and sanded the resin stains back to bare wood. Then I sanded the entire ceiling with a DTSC. Then I covered spots before coming back and priming the entire ceiling with shellac. I ended up with two coats of shellac and I sanded in between coats with my DTSC. I sanded again after the second coat of shellac and primed the entire ceiling with Sherwin Williams Extreme Bond primer. Then I sanded one final time. Then I added a two coats of Sherwin Williams Emerald exterior paint. So in total the spots were covered 6 times (spot treatment, two full coats of shellac, a coat of primer and two coats of paint) and the rest of the ceiling 5 times.

So who is the bigger fool? Me for doing this repair or the painter who either (a) did not care about how the ceiling would look over time or (b) somehow thought two coats of Sherwin Williams Super Paint was an good solution?

PS - before starting I suggested taking this ceiling out, reinstalling new tongue and groove and painting properly would be faster. Now I know it would have been faster.

That is not a job I would want to do. I remember some old-timers saying "shellac sticks to everything, and everything sticks to shellac". Maybe you could have skipped the sanding? And just used shellac?
I am curious that way.

 

[SoonerFan]

I feel your pain. It's astounding how many "professionals" don't know to properly prime when needed.

I'd have to agree on replacing it. Priming and painting it before it goes up and then touching up spots would be infinitely easier.

I rebuilt our fence years ago with Cypress Pine pickets, and very thoroughly primed all edges and faces with a quality primer before painting, it's stood the test for many years now with no flaking or peeling at all, and the timbers held up exceptionally well as a result.

Whoever painted this would never be able to convince me they are professional. Knowing what I know now, I would have for sure replaced the ceiling.

 

[SoonerFan]

That is not a job I would want to do. I remember some old-timers saying "shellac sticks to everything, and everything sticks to shellac". Maybe you could have skipped the sanding? And just used shellac?
I am curious that way.

I think scuff sanding, a coat of shellac, and couple coats of paint would have worked. But I decided to make sure this was the last time this problem surfaced. The Rolex sanding was by far the biggest challenge. That thing is heavy when held above your head sanding.

 

[PaulMarcel]

I think scuff sanding, a coat of shellac, and couple coats of paint would have worked. But I decided to make sure this was the last time this problem surfaced. The Rolex sanding was by far the biggest challenge. That thing is heavy when held above your head sanding.

That would have been a great project for a Planex off recon then sell after you're done

 

[Crazyraceguy]

That is not a job I would want to do. I remember some old-timers saying "shellac sticks to everything, and everything sticks to shellac". Maybe you could have skipped the sanding? And just used shellac?
I am curious that way.

I always heard that with wax. "Wax sticks to everything, but nothing sticks to wax"

As far as the main topic...I wouldn't touch a ceiling like that for anyone. Overhead work is just brutal.
Part of this may be the fault of the industry, to some degree. So many products out there are advertised as "paint and primer in one". That painter got paid and apparently got past any kind of warranty he may have provided. Job-done, for most people, very few seem to be concerned about repeat customers. Often referrals happen early on, so longevity is not that big of a deal.
I don't think I would volunteer for that one at all? Maybe as the first install.... pre-painted, touched up after, but it would be pricey. That is the usual tactic to hopefully make it go away.

 

[Dusty Bear]

I think if you’re reading this forum, your expectations of quality are a lot higher than the average person. I purchased my first Festool sander and dust extractor to fix a professional painting contractors screw up. I really struggle to use the word, professional and painting contractor in the same sentence. In my youth, I worked at a store that sold paints. I quickly learned what contractor grade paint was versus the good paint. None of the painting contractors would use contract grade paint on their own projects only their Customer projects. When we would try to educate them on proper preparation, which is where a huge amount of the work is, they showed very little interest to none at all. Now I know I’m throwing all painting contractors under the bus and that is not fair but the shoe fits most of the time. I have met two excellent painting professionals over the years but for what they charged they should have been substantially better. They told me they couldn’t be because they couldn’t hire good help. The most egregious painting jobs I encountered over the years were actually from homeowners that spent a Saturday morning seminar at a big box retailer on painting. A large amount of my Festool sanders I never wanted to buy but had too to get the job done properly. If only we could purchase a paint in North American that was as good as Festool tools are.

Fun story, congratulations on a job well done.

 

[Packard]

The ceiling paint in my bedroom is peeling. It has since I moved in. Once a year I scrape off the loose paint. I vowed not to paint over it until the remaining paint was scraped off.

There was a product recommended for that application. I did not try it because if it did not work, getting it off sounded intimidating. But here it is:

 

[SoonerFan]

As far as the main topic...I wouldn't touch a ceiling like that for anyone. Overhead work is just brutal.

@Crazyraceguy, it was truly brutal work with the Rotex sanding being the worst by far. Using shellac upside down is now joy either.

 

[SoonerFan]

The ceiling paint in my bedroom is peeling. It has since I moved in. Once a year I scrape off the loose paint. I vowed not to paint over it until the remaining paint was scraped off.

There was a product recommended for that application. I did not try it because if it did not work, getting it off sounded intimidating. But here it is:

@Packard The shellac I used was Zinsser BIN. I had never used it before. A couple sources I just said it was the best at blocking resins. Hope they are right.

 

[SoonerFan]

I think if you’re reading this forum, your expectations of quality are a lot higher than the average person. I purchased my first Festool sander and dust extractor to fix a professional painting contractors screw up. I really struggle to use the word, professional and painting contractor in the same sentence. In my youth, I worked at a store that sold paints. I quickly learned what contractor grade paint was versus the good paint. None of the painting contractors would use contract grade paint on their own projects only their Customer projects. When we would try to educate them on proper preparation, which is where a huge amount of the work is, they showed very little interest to none at all. Now I know I’m throwing all painting contractors under the bus and that is not fair but the shoe fits most of the time. I have met two excellent painting professionals over the years but for what they charged they should have been substantially better. They told me they couldn’t be because they couldn’t hire good help. The most egregious painting jobs I encountered over the years were actually from homeowners that spent a Saturday morning seminar at a big box retailer on painting. A large amount of my Festool sanders I never wanted to buy but had too to get the job done properly. If only we could purchase a paint in North American that was as good as Festool tools are.

Fun story, congratulations on a job well done.

@Dusty Bear I agree the expectations here on FOG are higher. People around here care about craftsmanship and doing good work. That’s why I like it here better than Reddit, etc. The moderators since I have been here have all been excellent and all deserve our thanks for keeping this place civil, fun, constructive, helpful, etc.

As far as professional painting contractors, I only know of two. One painted the inside of our house several years ago. Real pros they were. Prep work before painting was terrific. Craftsmanship was excellent. They were clean, on time, polite and good communicators. And we paid good money for the work but it was worth it. Unfortunately they retired. The other is Mauro from This Old House. I am now re-painting part of the exterior to my house just because I want it done right which means, fix the wood rot, sand, prime, caulk, and the two coats good paint. It will take me longer but when it’s done it will be done right.

 

[SoonerFan]

That would have been a great project for a Planex off recon then sell after you're done

Another option along with full replacement that would have been easier than my approach. I won’t do this again and if asked I will push harder for another approach or walk away.

 

[Packard]

@Packard The shellac I used was Zinsser BIN. I had never used it before. A couple sources I just said it was the best at blocking resins. Hope they are right.

BIN is simply a pigmented shellac, and is an excellent primer. It can be tinted, if the final coat is color.

Not only is it a resin sealer, it will also seal odors. So if your cat sprayed the lower couple of feet of the walls, then a coat or two will seal the odor. If it peed through the carpet, paint the subfloor before laying replacement carpet.

If they peed on the hardwood, then sand and seal with clear Seal Coat, then add a clear topcoat.

Shellac was the original “miracle” primer/sealer.

 

[Dusty Bear]

@Dusty Bear I agree the expectations here on FOG are higher. People around here care about craftsmanship and doing good work. That’s why I like it here better than Reddit, etc. The moderators since I have been here have all been excellent and all deserve our thanks for keeping this place civil, fun, constructive, helpful, etc.

As far as professional painting contractors, I only know of two. One painted the inside of our house several years ago. Real pros they were. Prep work before painting was terrific. Craftsmanship was excellent. They were clean, on time, polite and good communicators. And we paid good money for the work but it was worth it. Unfortunately they retired. The other is Mauro from This Old House. I am now re-painting part of the exterior to my house just because I want it done right which means, fix the wood rot, sand, prime, caulk, and the two coats good paint. It will take me longer but when it’s done it will be done right.

SoonerFan, I’m glad you had a good experience with a painter contractor they do exist. The quality problem isn’t just limited to painting contractors. The big box retailers have done damage to professionals by convincing home owners they can do it themselves. Now I’m all for people doing things themselves and in fact, the trend is increasing with millennials purchasing their first homes. The YouTube generation is discovering not everyone on it knows what they are talking about. So much of master craftsmanship has been lost to age I’m hopeful that Youtube can becomes a depositor for some of that knowledge. To give an example, I’ve never seen a video on how a master trim carpenter would nail trim. Once the pneumatic nailers took over, drilling and hand pounding skills was lost. It became more nails is better when you don’t have to pre-drill and counter sink a nail head. Restore an old house pre great depression and you can discover the how they did it, but you still can not understand the why. This is true in all trades. Thankfully there is starting to be young people who want to work with their hands and learn how to do things correct and this is hopeful.

I agree the moderators keep this one of the few places you can go to learn helpful accurate informations, hopefully with Festool’s new marketing direction we’ll see more professional engagement content and less info-tainment.

 

[mino]

.. The big box retailers have done damage to professionals by convincing home owners they can do it themselves. ..

I think you have this backwards.

TLDR:
- the quality of an "average" contractor is plain atrocious these days, any trades "honor" that existed in past is long gone
- the economy in the West /US, Europe is worse/ is going down the drain for the middle class for decades, this makes contracting-out plain unaffordable especially for the younger people
These two combined force people into the DIY space. Both the low end of it and the above-professional end of it /represented in the FOG crowd/.

---
Finding someone doing the job properly requires you /the customer/ to know how to do the job so you can watch over them and ensure they do not skip steps etc. If you are rich, you can have the good guys selected, but the middle class cannot afford to pay up a premium "general contractor" to take care of that. Premium meaning 2x to 3x of what a direct bid lands /talking of Central Europe now, but presume this is universal, good work is not cheap/. *)

This results in people who are capable to not see the benefit in paying good dough for work that is *worse* than what they can do even without the skills. Meaning. If I have the time, I would rather do it myself at material costs and mess it up BUT be able to fix it up than pay someone to mess it up for me ..

Yes. That is how I got into electrical wiring when 16 .. I got shocked after an electrician "repaired" sockets in our apartment in such a wonderful way there was 230V AC at the grounding pins on some wall sockets. No. Not joking. Or into gas appliances after our water heater got "repaired" in such a way there was obvious flame leaking sideways from the burner. The gasket was mis-aligned. Again. No joking matter. Since then I install/repair gas appliances myself and have a technician come to check for leaks/issues. I am fine with him taking it apart and back together in front of me, but would never let it be done on trust. Call me paranoid all you want.

Then. A huge, huge, argument for DYI is clean-up costs.
It is no good I saved a workday or two by not doing the work .. if the consequence is my SO spending a week in clean-up after the contractor instead. Dust and stains everywhere. If that SO is working and not at home with kids - common today - the "savings" math suddenly stops computing. It becomes economically viable even for a relatively high-earner.

Lastly. I earn my living by my brain. Doing manual work - even not simple work - is relaxation for someone with an office job. This changes a calculus greatly from the past when most people worked manual jobs of one type or other and were physically tired to pull "another shift" at home. I am dead on Friday still. But psychically only, my body plain screaming for physical activity .. I know this is hard to imagine for trades folks but is a big reason high-stress job people like doctors, IT people, lawyers, etc. are into DYI. It is a stress relief opportunity.

---
*) This is how I got into woodworking. I came to realize than to have quality furniture and other stuff made I HAD TO learn how to make it well to even be able to contract it out properly. But then, once you know how it needs to be made .. there is very little reason to not to do it yourself .. as you quickly learn that those who *can* do it properly are really, like really expensive and hard to book to begin. Yes, I got into a "hobby" by economic necessity - it was plain unaffordable to get quality custom stuff made to order and I do not need to be a rocket scientist to "adjust" IKEA furniture once I got the tracksaw-router-sander basics sorted out. And do not get me started on painters. A friend had an apartment painted "professionally". They are now saving up for a complete renovation as a result as *all* the pain will have to be scraped and all walls re-plastered /brick walls/ as wrong, non-breathing, paint was used on the walls. Yes, they were lied to by the uneducated contractor that the paint is "breathing" based on him reading it on the can and not understanding that "breathing" and "breathing" are not the same between paints. Now they got mould all over the place on the outer walls as the paint closed those up..

 

[jeffinsgf]

This thread scares me to death. We bought our house in 2018. It was built in 1990. It's a 3 bedroom 2 bath ranch of about 3,000 sq ft. Vaulted ceiling in the family room and 9'ish ceilings everywhere else. Oak trim throughout with crown molding in a couple rooms. It needs paint. Not desperately, but it needs paint. We've had two quotes from "professional" painters and both were around $15,000. I keep looking at the rooms thinking I could do it myself, but I know I'm not the world's best painter. No matter how carefully I mask and drop cloth, I wind up making at least one significant mess. My physical ability to stand up to long days in weird positions faded into memory a few years ago, along with my confidence in working on a ladder or scaffold. Tackling one room at a time and doing it on evenings and weekends sounds good, but I'm usually completely wiped out at the end of the day and I don't want this to be an 18 month project.

My fears are that I will keep looking for someone to do the job for less, and they'll do a crappy job. OR I'll give in and spend $15,000 and they'll still do a crappy job.

 

[luvmytoolz]

@jeffinsgf I faced the same conundrum when I needed to have the whole house and sheds rewired, and the concrete roof tiles replaced with a colourbond roof. These were pretty much the only jobs I wasn't going to tackle myself, and I went through just about every review I could find for numerous tradies/companies before settling on one company for the electrical and another for the roof.

And I couldn't have chosen better, the electrician came in at what I calculated to be a very cost for the time and labour required, and the roofer was a little more expensive than many of the others, but after having dealt with trying to track down leaks for ages I wasn't prepared to take the risk with going with a slightly less than stellar reviewed tradie.

Word of mouth is almost always the best way I've found for weeding out the better contractors, and ultimately go with your gut.

 

[P_K]

PS - before starting I suggested taking this ceiling out, reinstalling new tongue and groove and painting properly would be faster. Now I know it would have been faster.

If you'd removed the existing T&G, you'd be exposing the myriad of other issues that inevitably lie beneath. Stripping and painting may not have been the most difficult path.