You can see the finished product of the rot repair and the window installation. What I see is a little bit of painting that needs to be done. The unfortunate part is that all three colors need to be painted and I have pretty much used all of the gray. That means a trip to Sherwin Williams to get some more paint. This would be the first time I have had to buy that color since we have painted our house about ten years ago (Wow, I cant believe it has been that long).
I can no longer call myself a paint insider since it has been over twenty years since I have worked in the industry. At one time, I used to know all of the movers and shakers in the industry. I might have even known too much about it. This is not a nation wide endorsement, but I prefer Sherwin Williams because I knew the head chemist and I knew that they had a Pacific Northwest test facility.
There were also some local companies making paint. But, like I said I knew all the movers and shakers which means I knew the strengths and weaknesses. Clearly locals were going to have some sort of local testing, but we have specific performance needs in the Pacific Northwest. The same would be true in the desert southwest or the Midwest or anywhere else for that matter.
That is a long way of saying that I believe in paint that has local test facilities, not all brands do. What these test facilities do is generate long term data with formulations. We are concerned with bleaching and mildew resistance. Generally speaking, price is an indicator of quality. Quality is defined by longevity, ease of application and coverage ability. I will talk about that a little bit.
Longevity to me is first will the paint stay on the substrate once it is down. Some of the problems I have seen are thing like alligatoring where the paint flakes off over time. There is also chalking, where the surface becomes chalky causing adherence problems and is more of an oil based problem. Yellowing or fading has to do with the composition of the paint.
What I mean by ease of application is more about prep than actually painting. A line like Super Paint from Sherwin Williams is a primer and paint combined. This eliminates the requirements to prime first (at least on bare wood). But, also can it paint on oil based gloss or does that have to be sanded or removed. I really don’t advise this but I watched the painter paint over moss and mildew and it still looks good today (from a distance).
Coverage ability is not just how much square footage a gallon will go but also how many coats do you need. When painting our house, we did most of it in Super Paint because it is cheaper than the line up Resilience. But, that step up would allow complete one coat coverage. When they sprayed the house in dark blue, they didn’t bother with covering the trim because one roller coat of white was perfectly fine. You pay for that because Resilience is 50% more expensive than Super Paint.
I know, this kind of sounds like a Sherwin Williams commercial. I have confidence that there are some other brands out there that perform just as well, this is what I am familiar and comfortable with. I would highly advise buying your paint from a paint store and not a box store. While the prices might be similar at each, the products are not. You are just going to get a better product at a paint store for similar money. And this stuff is not cheap. One gallon of Super Paint at list price is $85.
Since I painted my house with Super Paint and the work was new, I simply painted. No other prep was involved. That was a major labor saver.
End Your Programming Routine: I got the painting done in about four hours, all three colors and I even painted over some of the ten year old sections to make sure the color stayed even. I have painted a lot of houses over the years. I really wouldn’t want it as a career, but there can definitely be some zen in it. Unlike most building materials, paint is one thing that has improved over the years. And, it always feels good to check something off the list.
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