Painting Tips No Weekend Warrior Should Be Without from the makers of HANDy Paint Products

A fresh coat of paint is one of the easiest and most cost-effective ways to completely transform and update a room. Inside or out, paint makes a house look new or furniture attractive once again.

For the typical weekend warrior, however, the task of painting can be daunting. But it does not have to be. The following is the first in a series of simple painting tips from HANDy Paint, the company that is revolutionizing the way people paint.

Thanks to HANDy Paint products, even first-time painters can achieve professional results quick and easily.

Plan!

Before you begin, thoughtfully plan your next painting project. Extra effort up front goes a long way. In fact, taking shortcuts at the beginning of a painting project actually creates more work later on.

To begin, make sure you have all the essential supplies: paint containers, trays, brushes, rollers, drop cloths and tape. The paint products you use can make a big difference in how easy your next paint project is.

HANDy Paint Pails have adjustable ergonomic handles so they are easy to hold and reduce fatigue in your arms and hands, or secure to your belt for hands free use. Magnetic brush holders prevent your paint brush from falling into the paint. What’s more, HANDy Paint Pails have a built in brush scraper that removes excess paint from your brush, which prevents drips and splatters.

Find HANDy Paint products and accessories at Lowe’s or anywhere paint is sold.

Use the equation

In addition to painting tools, make sure that you have enough paint. For the best results, let the paint do the work for you and do not ever hesitate going back for more.

Applying a thicker coat versus one that is stretched thin will save time and help you achieve professional-looking results on the first try. For this reason, the HANDy Paint Tray is designed to hold up to one gallon of paint, which is more than any tray on the market. More paint in your tray will save time and prevent messes associated with re-filling the paint tray.

There is an easy formula for determining how much paint you will need to purchase:

(wall height X wall width) X number of walls / 300 = gallons of paint

One gallon of paint covers about 350 square feet, so dividing by 300 will leave you the perfect amount of paint for touch ups!

Prepare the Room

After you’ve purchased your painting tools and supplies, prepare your room by removing all draperies, pictures, mirrors, area rugs, switch plates, wall plugs, receptacle cover plates and hardware including: hinges, latches and doorknobs. This includes all shelves, hooks, racks or anything else that you can avoid painting around. Take everything off that you can – removing items before you start painting will save a lot of time during both the painting and clean-up stages.

Move all furniture to the center of the room and cover the floor and all furniture with drop cloths. Plastic drop cloths are cheap and easy to clean up. However, a better option is the canvas drop cloth. Canvas drop cloths are durable, rip-and puncture-resistant, lay flat as you walk across them and you hardly ever need to worry about taping them to the ground. You can easily fold canvas around doors and hallways, as well as fold it up for re-use – which is virtually impossible with a plastic drop cloth. Additionally, canvas absorbs paint, versus creating a slippery hazard like when paint is splattered on plastic. One alternative to a canvas drop cloth is an old sheet.

Continue to prepare your painting surfaces by taping off all woodwork, wrap plastic around light fixtures and use masking tape or painters tape to cover any hardware you cannot remove.

Once walls are stripped, it is time to clean and prepare all your painting surfaces. Use a TSP solution – a tri-sodium phosphate, heavy duty, all-purpose cleaner. TSP works great on external as well as internal surfaces. If the original surface is glossy, you will want to enhance adhesion by lightly sanding the cleaned surface with fine-grit paper. Another option is to apply a deglosser, also known as “liquid sandpaper,” to create a stronger bond between your surface and the paint. Good news: HANDy Paint Pails and Trays can be used will all paints, stains and solvents so that every step of the paint job is that much easier.

After all your surfaces are clean, open a window or door to ensure good ventilation. Then you are ready to apply primer. This is an important and commonly skipped step that can make the difference between a professional and amateur-looking paint job.

Primer serves three main functions:

1. Blocks stains from bleeding through
2. Provides a solid base so that you only have to apply one “topcoat,” or only one coat of the desired, final color
3. Improves adhesion and extends the life of your topcoat

To get the most out of your primer, tint the primer toward your final color by mixing in a small amount of your topcoat. Tinting primer makes it even more effective at hiding the original surface color. One word of caution: be sure your primer and topcoat solutions match. Both primer and topcoat need to be either latex-based or oil-based, never mix coatings with dissimilar solutions.

Finally, fill any gaps between walls, ceilings, crown moldings and other interior trim with caulk after surfaces have been primed. Remember, the key to good, professional –looking results is to start with a properly prepared surface, which is clean, solid and dry without cracks or imperfections.

Paint away!

You have planned accordingly and have purchased all your painting supplies and an adequate amount of paint. You have prepared your painting surfaces and are finally ready to pick up the paint brush. Because even the best painters have occasional drips, splatters and spills, it is important to follow the painting order outlined below.

1. Ceilings
   Paint a two-inch wide strip on the ceiling where it meets the wall with a paintbrush. Then use a roller with an extension pole to fill in the ceiling. Start in a corner and work your way across the short side of the ceiling to maintain a wet edge.
   
   When “cutting in” while painting a ceiling, the paint eventually separates the brush and inevitably drips down your arm, no matter how much excess paint you were able to remove with your brush scraper. To stop the flow, fold a small, absorbent cloth and tape it around the metal collar of the brush
2. Walls
   Using the same technique as with the ceiling, paint a two-inch wide strip along the ceiling, floor and woodwork with a paintbrush. Then break out the roller again and fill in the wall. Come as close to the edge of the wall as possible with your roller to create a clean, uniform appearance.
   
   To roll closer edges without creating a mess, slip your hand inside a plastic bag, grab the paint soaked roller sleeve and slide it a little off the roller handle cage so that it extends about one inch past the roller knob end. The extended roller allows you to roll very close to the edge, hiding brush stroke messes

3. Woodwork
   After the ceiling and walls, paint all trim around doors, windows, ceilings and floors

4. Floor
   Start in a corner diagonally opposite from the exit. Again, use your brush to paint a two-inch wide strip all along the floor where it meets the wall or the trim. Using a roller with an extension pole or a wide brush, start in the corner and work your way across the short side of the room to maintain a wet edge.

Over-nighters

Often, no matter how prepared you are, paint jobs are too large to complete in one day. In these situations, if you want to avoid cleaning or replacing paint rollers and brushes every day, put away rollers and brushes when they are still wet. Slip your hand inside a plastic bag, grab the paint-soaked roller or brush, slip the roller off the cage and turn the bag inside out with the wet roller or brush still in it. Wrap the plastic bag with a twist tie and store overnight in the refrigerator. Brushes and rollers will stay fresh in the refrigerator for several days.

Cover all open paint containers with plastic overnight. HANDy Paint makes HANDy disposable plastic paint covers that easily grip edges of paint trays and pails to create an airtight seal over your paint. These covers make it easy to stop and start a project when your schedule allows.

Clean up

Painting can be a very messy job. Thankfully, there are several tips do-it-yourselfers can follow to make clean-up faster and easier. One neat trick is to put petroleum jelly or cream on your hands and face prior to painting. The petroleum layer prevents paint from sticking to your skin so that paint washes off easily in the shower.

The type of painting products you use can also make clean up a lot easier. HANDy Paint Pails and Trays come with disposable liners. When you are done painting, all you have to do is throw the liner away and your paint container is good as new. Look for liners that are thick and durable so that you do not have to worry about paint or stain leaking through the liner onto your container. Also, look for liners that snap into place in order to prevent spills caused by the liner shifting in your tray. HANDy Paint makes an entire line of affordable painting products that come with thick, durable disposable liners that snap into place.

It is important to remember that clean up procedures depend largely on the type of paint that you use. Latex paint cleans up easily with water. You want to clean all your drips and spills before they dry with a damp paper towel. Brushes and rollers can be easily cleaned with soap and water. If you wait until latex paint is dry, water will not work to clean up drips and slips. You will need specially formulated products to clean up dried paint. After cleaning, flush spraying equipment with mineral spirits to prevent rusting.

Oil-based or alkyd paint requires mineral spirits or paint thinner to clean up. Use paper towels dampened with mineral spirits or paint thinner on walls and baseboards, and rinse brushes and rollers with mineral spirits or paint thinner to remove excess paint. Pour the cleaning material into a bucket and rinse brushes and rollers well. When done, let the cleaning material sit so that solids settle out of the cleaner, then strain the original liquid back into the container for re-use on your next paint job. Keep mineral spirits and paint thinner away from children, pets or open flames. Dispose of all dry containers safely in the trash.

Painting Techniques

• Using a brush
  • Hold your brush near the base of the handle
  • Dip half the bristles into the paint and use the built in paint scraper on your paint container to remove excess paint
  • Use enough pressure to bend the bristles only slightly – do not bear hard on the brush
• Using a roller
  • Slowly roll the roller into the paint tray, then roll it back and forth until the roller is completely and evenly coated with paint
  • Roll on the tray’s ridges to remove excess paint. NOTE: use a paint tray with deep ridges like the HANDy Paint Tray to ensure superior roller coverage and prevent waste and drips
  • For smooth surfaces, cover two-foot squares at a time using the “W pattern,” roll back and forth in the “W pattern” to spread the paint evenly
  • Roll as close to the edge as possible to cover up unsightly brush strokes. To roll closer edges without creating a mess, slip your hand inside a plastic bag, grab the paint soaked roller sleeve and slide it a little off the roller handle cage so that it extends about one inch past the roller knob end. The extended roller allows you to roll very close to the edge, hiding brush stroke messes
  • Use an extension pole for hard to reach areas like ceilings and floors
    • Extension poles come in a variety of sizes, but most DIYers should invest one that extends from about 18 to 30 or 36 inches. This size offers plenty of reach for painting rooms with ceilings that are 9 feet or lower
    • Look for poles that have a soft, non-stick rubber grip and a rigid metal core. Plastic handles are too flexible
    • Check that the telescoping shaft locks securely in place and doesn’t collapse when pressure is applied
    • Thread the hole in the paint roller handle into the extension pole to attach the two. Of course, this means that you need to check to make sure that your paint roller handle has a threaded hole in the end – most do. Also, make sure that the threaded end of your extension pole is metal
• Covering nooks and crannies
  • When tackling tricky, uneven surfaces such as shutters, a fence or a carved antique, ditch your brush and roller; instead, pull out an old oven mitt or wool sock
  • Place a plastic bag or a rubber glove over your hand and then slip on the mitt or the sock
  • Dip your hand into the paint and smoosh the paint onto the tricky, uneven surface
  • When finished, simply throw away the mitt or sock for easy clean-up

Quick Painting Tricks

• Drill small holes in your paint stick to reduce resistance and make stirring easier
• When painting steps, stir sand into your paint to provide better traction and help prevent slips and falls in wet weather
• To keep insects from landing on a fresh paint job, stir in citronella oil into each gallon of paint – it has no affect on the paint and will repel bugs
• To stop white paint from yellowing over time, add five or six drop of black paint to every quart of white paint. You will never notice the difference!
• Because no two cans of paint are exactly the same color, when one can is half-empty, fill it up with another new can. Repeat this process as you go along and you will even out any color variations.
• When you’re done painting, draw a line on the label to show how much paint is left in the can. Then write down the brand, color, price and dealer information. Tape this information to the back of a electrical switch plate cover so that the information is always on hand for the next time you need to touch-up a paint job.
• To reduce the smell of fresh paint, add a few drops of vanilla extract
• Make sure your paint goes on smoothly by first straining it through a square window screen into a separate painting pail or bucket like the HANDy Paint Tray. Use a rigid screen, larger than the mouth of the tray and dented in the middle to sieve the paint as it drains through