Doug's Sounding Board

We needed to get the kitchen painted this weekend so the contractor could start installing the cabinets. Nicole was sick so that left it up to me. Saturday I got the ceiling in the kitchen and dining area, and the ceiling in the living room primered. The Wagner Power Roller helped a lot since I didn’t have to keep bending down to add more paint to the roller, just slide the switch for a few second and keep on going.

Sunday Nicole remembered that King’s Paint is closed and they have the Benjamin Moore paint we had picked out. I looked on-line and found a number of other paint stores and one after the other they were all closed on Sunday. Finally we found one in San Jose. We got our paint and came home and Nicole went back to bed. I started to set up and asked if we had a tool to do corners with. Nicole said “No,” but that I could go get one. So off I went again (to OSH) but they were out and it was a mob around the paint area, probably because dedicated paint stores are closed on Sundays. I found an edging tool and decided to give that a whirl.

I like the edging tool, a simple square brush with wheels so you don’t slop onto the other part and it’s simple. Apparently I have a long way to go to master it though. After about 15 minutes Nicole came to check on my progress and told me that I was putting the paint on too thick and it was going to show a seam. I tried to smooth it out but that part was too far gone. I started using less paint and going back to smooth out seams but that still seems to have resulted in a noticable difference.

Finally I finished edging in the kitchen and dining area and got out the power roller to make quick work of the rest. I learned then that the power roller wasn’t really meant for lot’s of repeated uses using different paints. Each time you use it you have to clean it out which means running water through it. You can’t get all the water out so unless you use it for occasional painting you are going to have water come out when you first turn it on to get the paint going. The manual cleaning instructions assume you’re going to store it so they leave out any tips that might help you deal with that. So I start rolling and waiting and water starts coming out and making a puddle and then watery paint starts coming out and adding to the puddle. So I start rolling it on the wall in a place that will be covered when everything is in place. If you’re at our house before the refrigerator goes in or happen to be here if everything is being torn out you’ll see very drippy paint. If only I had thought to use red…

So the rolling going fairly well for a mintue or two before I realize that in the current light that while the paint is wet, you can’t distinguish the paint from the primer except for the wetness and you can’t always see that. I did the best I could but there are sime thin spots and a few missed spots we’ll have to hit later. The areas that are done well are those that the contractor needed to work in so mission accomplished there.

On to the living room. I break out the edging tool and am being extra vigilant about drips and using too much. I think it’s better, but it’s still too much. I was using Dutch Boy Professional for this part because we liked the color. It was quite a bit thicker than the Benjamin Moore though so I should have been extra extra careful. It was all going well and I was close to done when I edged into an open corner. I was edging on the bottom edge and it ran to a wall at a right angle to it with nothing above it. When I got there the paint piled up and overflowed the edger and went into my hair and lips. I never said I was good at staying in the lines. By the time I got to the bottom of the paint tray I noticed a skin had formed at the bottom but that’s ok since I was done.

On to the roller part once again… I’ll give this tip for the Wagner Power Roller, if you are on a scaffold it’s good to drape the hose over your shoulder and loop it (loosely) so it stays there. That way you don’t have to lift the tube filled with paint and try to control it. You sacrifice some range but it’s worth it. Anyway, I learned from my last clean-up to start-up transition that I needed to get as much water out as possible, so this time I think just a cup was still in there. I rolled it on the waterproof paper floor covering until I got paint flow and then climbed up the scaffolding. Rolling was going great, but paint flow seemed to slow down. I was at the end of the gallon and that’s what hallens then so I put in a new gallon and started up again. It was around 11pm, I was getting tired and the painting seemed to be taking a long time.

Finally I finished at 12:30am and went to clean up the equipment. I noticed the water flow through the hose was less that it should be. That’s why it seemed to be taking longer, because it was! I read in the troubleshooting part of the manual that slow/no flow meant something was clogging the line and that requires sending it in to Wagner. Then I remembered the skin that formed which I was doing the edging. One of those must have formed by the time I got close to the end of the gallon and been sucked up. Great, now there’s a latex skin clot in the paint thing (sorry dad!) so I have to take it apart and try to get it out. If that doesn’t work then I’ll send it in, and if that doesn’t work then my dad gets a new power roller tube. Oh yeah, and a lid because the dogs decided to eat the other one in protest of being left at home.

Looking at the living room ceiling today I can see many spots where the paint just isn’t thick enough because I didn’t realize that I wasn’t getting enough paint on the roller. It was wet, I moved on. I guess we’ll try again later this week, but now other things jump to the front of the line. At least I got a good shoulder workout.