Scraping paint off a house.

[Campus Loop(y)]

I was helping a friend today scrpe paint off his house in preparation for painting. It is long overdue and damn, hard as hell to get off, more than other houses I have helped on. He is going to the store to find something to aid us.

Suggestions? What works well for you on old wood and a more than 15 year paint job? Heat guns, a solvent or thinner of some sort? Thanks for suggestions.

 

[BigWill]

pressure washer

 

[EEE]

when i was living in new orleans, this is what all the painters used
the link
wear a respirator and eye protection.

 

[Campus Loop(y)]

Pressure washer = I volunteer to do it all, I love those things.

The other: I have something to do that day, call me for the fine touch up details.

Thanks guys. I'll pass it on.

 

[Fletch_F_Fletch]

I've used a pressure washer before. Works like a motherfacker. Be sure to use AT LEAST 2700psi.

 

[accuratehorn]

Depends on how thorough you want to be, and how well you want to protect the wood underneath.
Pressure washer gets most loose paint.
You can use the electric sander to get a lot of it, but it can easily gouge the wood, leaving swirl marks or worse.
Fine restoration painters use heat guns or propane torches to get every bit of the paint off-if the house is a national treasure, this extremely time consuming method works.
Then there are the highly toxic chemical strippers, if you want to poison the yard, yourself, your pets, the nearest stream, and Town Lake.

 

[HilltopHorn]

Pressure washers work pretty well, until you get to the paint that is stable. If you try to use a pressure washer to get that stubborn stuff of, you can get the wood too wet and it will raise the grain, which will do two things: delay you in painting until the wood dries, and secondly call for a lot of unnecessary sanding. My tool of choice here is a random orbit sander, with the sandpaper that staves off clogging. The random will do a better job of not gouging like a stationary orbital.