EPA'S New Lead Paint Ruling

Remodeling Just Got More Expensive

The EPA is now requiring that any contractor who is hired to do work in certain buildings built before 1978 is required to be trained, certified and registered in lead paint containment. This is called the Renovation, Repair and Painting Rule. This cost is added to overhead of doing business and passed on to the consumer.

Lead based paint was banned in 1978. The issue is primarily containment of chips of paint and dust for children 6 years old and under because of well documented health problems caused by lead.

Painting Your Own Home

If you are a homeowner performing renovation, repair, or painting work in your own home, EPA's RRP rule does not cover your project. EPA's lead program rules apply only to renovations performed for compensation; therefore, if you work on your own home, the rules do not apply.

If the surface to be painted is not disturbed by sanding, scraping, or other activities that may cause dust, the work is not considered renovation and EPA's lead program requirements do not apply.

However, you have the ultimate responsibility for the safety of your family or children in your care. If you are living in a pre-1978 home and planning to do painting or repairs, please read a copy of EPA's Renovate Right: Important Lead Hazard Information for Families, Child Care Providers, and Schools (PDF) lead hazard information pamphlet (20 pp, 3.3MB). You may also want to call the National Lead Information Center at 1-800-424-LEAD (5323) and ask for more information on how to work safely in a home with lead-based paint.

When You Hire A Contractor

Instead of listing all the possible ways an activity might be covered under this new ruling, I've included the official exclusions here.

What Housing or Activities Are Excluded and Not Subject to the Lead Paint Rule?

From the EPA Small Entity Compliance Guide for Lead Paint pamphlet

* Housing built in 1978 or later.

* Housing for elderly or disabled persons, unless children under 6 reside or are expected to reside there.

* Zero-bedroom dwellings (studio apartments, dormitories, etc.).

* Housing or components declared lead-free by a certified inspector or risk assessor.

* Minor repair and maintenance activities that disturb 6 square feet or less of paint per room inside, or 20 square feet or less on the exterior of a home or building.

Note: minor repair and maintenance activities do not include window replacement and projects involving demolition or prohibited practices.

* Is the project an emergency renovation? Emergency renovations are: 1. Activities that were not planned and if not immediately and/or property with significant damage. 2. Interim controls performed in response to an elevated blood lead level in a resident child.

If you are hiring a contractor and your project meets any one of these exclusions, the contractor is not required to have the lead paint certification. Your contractor, may, however, have you sign a waiver of liability to protect herself from potential legal action.

The EPA Small Entity Compliance Guide for Lead Paint pamphlet has also laid out these guidelines that must be written and signed if someone is going to hire a contractor who is not certified.

"Has the firm obtained a signed statement from the owner that:

1. The renovation will occur in the owner's residence

2. No child under age 6 resides there

3. No woman who is pregnant resides there

4. The housing is not a child-occupied facility; AND

5. Owner acknowledges that the renovation firm will not be required to use the work practices contained in the rule".

Fines for contractors not complying to the new regulations, when applicable, are stiff. They can be up to $100,000 per incident if caught.

For more information, please visit the EPA's website at www.epa.gov/lead

Little known product offers low maintenance and high style

Counter top resurfacing and much more - stone, rock and tile effects in “paint”

Sometimes you run across products that are actually helpful. The products I'm introducing you to are versatile, perform well, aren't difficult to install, look good and won't break the bank when compared to traditional fixes.

This is a decorative and/or protective coating for floors, walls or anything else, inside and outside, in any color. This family of products performs like stone and can go on like paint. Instead of putting in

• flag stone
• counter tops
  
• pavers
• tile floors
• plain epoxy or
  
• replacing concrete
  

consider having Better Painting install Roller Rock, Spread Rock, Spread Stone, VertiStone or Wall Rock. They are made with actual stone suspended in a paint-like resin. Daich Coatings has been making it’s products for fifteen years, with many original projects still performing well.

For example, new Corian counter tops start at around $34/sf plus installation and additions. Granite can go past $80/sf. For a small counter like mine, that's from $900 - $2,120 plus installation and any extras! Spread Stone will give me a low maintenance tough as rock reliability and the beauty of granite for about $700 installed.

You will experience the same kind of savings when you see these products can replace stamped concrete, tile floors and backslashes, and flagstone. Use it with concrete repair or patching to accent deteriorating steps or walk ways. It’s great for garage floors or around pools and over dull concrete patios.

The look and feel of stone can be put on your interior walls for a beautiful VertiStone faux treatment, or in the billards room to take whatever the boys dish out. It's a great addition to wine cellars where space is at a premium, but the look of stone is preferred.

Roller Rock, Spread Rock and Spread Stone have the look and feel of stone. Roller Rock and Spread Rock are highly textured and work great outdoors. Spread Stone can have a smoother finish and can be used indoor or out.

VertiStone looks more like paint and is made for walls. There are numerous faux effects availble with it. Wall Rock is a very durable paint that has been tested to withstand 2,500 scrub cycles. They can make your life easier and more beautiful.

These are extremely durable products. Most floor and horizontal uses require a sealer because the product is porus. Like stone. Sealing it keeps it from staining, collecting dirt and provides an attractive glossy look. Through years of use, the sealer may need to be reapplied to keep that "like new" look. How often depends on the type of sealer, the amount of use it gets and how many coats are applied. The product itself should not need to be replaced. As always, following the manufactures instructions are important to maintaining your beautiful finish.

Start imagining all the different ways you could use Daich Coatings to transform your home to a more comfortable place to live. And to imagine all the money you will be saving.
A new look for less money. That's worth investigating. You can start with a no obligation consultation by calling Tim Hoeffel with Better Painting at 719.641.5043.

Gourmet or fast food paint?

Not all house paint is created equal.

“Gourmet” paint can do more than a functional job, like gourmet food. Feed your home what it, and you, really deserve.

Most Paint Not "Good" At Everything

Just ask ConsumerSearch.com. “In its June 2007 issue, Consumer Reports published the best comparative review we found on interior paint. Editors tested over 60 different interior paints, concluding that no one paint does everything well.” My buddy and go-to paint guru guy Doug Wilson at PaintSource.net said the same thing. “Paint can be rated to be the best, but on what criteria?”. Out of the 60 paints rated by Consumer Reports, it only took 3, three votes, to be ranked the “best”.

A while ago I was wandering through the SpecialChem4Coatings web site looking for additives that I could put in paint to make it dry slower. I signed up to have a rep contact me for a particular additive with some long chemical name. A few days later he calls. Turns out to be an industrial account rep for BASF. Yeah, that really big chemical company that makes the stuff that makes all our stuff better.

Anyway, I find out I’m in way over my head because I got nowhere to put a rail car of corrosive chemicals. But this rep starts telling me stories of going to visit the guys in the paint lab. Turns out that they can experiment with small batches of paint that are really phenomenal. The kind of stuff that really will last a lifetime. ‘Course, it would cost a hundred smackers or more per gallon, but who sweats the small stuff, right?

I’m just saying that real performance is difficult to find. What can you expect from a film of paint no thicker than a plastic shopping bag (1 mil)? The guys at Master Painter’s Institute have been setting performance standards for the paint and coatings industry for a long time. They recently took exception to a recommendation by Consumer Reports.

4 of top 5 “quality” interior paints recommended by consumer reports in "Best for high-traffic areas" category and receiving "high scores for staining and scrubbing, and resisted gloss changes" failed MPI testing.

Here are Consumer Reports’ 2007 top five.

• "Behr $24 CR Best Buy"
• "Kilz $19 CR Best Buy"
• "Valspar $27"
• "True Value $23 CR Best Buy"
• "Dutch Boy $15 CR Best Buy"

The MPI article states: “Only 1 of the 5 passed qualification tests for performance contained in the test standards and protocol for MPI #138. MPI’s minimum number of scrub cycles for this standard is 3000, but 1 of the 5 Consumer Reports "Best for high-traffic areas" products actually failed by film breakthrough observed as early as 319 cycles. Some failed cleansability or burnish resistance, or scrubbability, etc. MPI approved products for high traffic areas are only marginally more expensive and can give results up to 9.14 times better”.

These results, according to MPI, “do not indicate that the products tested are not good paint products, but it does indicate that the performance and durability standards needed for commercial projects are somewhat more stringent. Until accepted performance test methods are adopted by any consumer product testing, perhaps professional specifiers of commercial products should avoid DIY paint recommendations for commercial and institutional projects.”

This just brings home the point that there are wide variations in quality from manufacturer to manufacturer. Here are some ideas on how to know you are getting what you are paying for.

Fast Food Paint

Most of us end up hoping the “top rated” paints are “good enough” at doing what we need them to do so we can overlook their weak side.

A general rule of thumb in buying paint is similar to going out for dinner. Our choices fall to many providers in three different categories; fast food, nice sit – down and gourmet, with variations, specialties and overlaps. Food quality, like paint quality, is all about the ingredients. The biggest difference between nice sit-down and gourmet is usually the presentation and the ambiance, with less difference in ingredient quality. But for those who know the difference, it’s worth it.

The same is true for paint (and painters too, I might add). But many settle for fast food thinking it’s the best value. My definition of value is better products + better application = real value. You get better looking longer lasting results. Gourmet paints hold their color longer, are more wear resistant and go on more easily. You get more enjoyment from the hard work it took to get your room painted.

There are four basic ingredients to paint, all with quality variations. Depending on the recipe you get either white wash or a gourmet product.

1. A vehicle, which is usually water or mineral spirits

2. Filler or solids, which is often talc and titanium dioxide

3. Binder or glue such as acrylic and

4. Pigment or colorant

Paint, as with most other things, is made to hit a balance between price and performance. The higher the price the better the performance. Take the binder. Acrylic comes in two basic grades; vinyl and straight acrylic. Any paint claiming to be 100% acrylic can use either of these and be accurate, but vinyl acrylic is a lower grade and comes off more easily. If you add urethane to regular acrylic you get a super sticky highly adhesive paint with maximum durability. Add high amounts of titanium dioxide, which provides coverage power, and you get a gourmet paint. How do you tell the difference? Read the label. The ingredients are listed on the back.

Not very part of your house gets the same kind of wear or experiences the same conditions (like the kitchen or bath vs. the dining room or a room with a lot of direct sun light). So the paint companies now make their paints perform differently to accommodate different conditions to keep things affordable. Now there are specialty paints for cabinets, bathrooms and ceilings. Not to mention the decorative paints and oil or water base paints. Each has their purpose. You will make your choice depending on what your purpose is.

Recommended minimum characteristics of interior paint provided by the Rhom and Haas Paint Quality Institute (www.paintquality.com) are:

1. Goes on smoothly and evenly, without showing brush or roller marks.

2. Minimal spattering during application.

3. More hiding power, so it will require less touch-up and, possibly, fewer coats.

4. Surfaces have less tendency to stick to each other, so windows, doors and other freshly painted surfaces won't bond to one another.

Follow this checklist of things paint is supposed to do well and see how it matches up with the things highlighted on the paint you are thinking of buying.

Paint Characteristics	Paint 1	Paint 2
1. Better resistance to dirt and stains, which facilitates cleaning and maintenance.
2. Spreads Easily and Works Well
3. Covers Well (High Hiding)
4. Retains Sheen
5. Low Spatter
6. Touches Up Easily
7. Resists Fading
8. Durable (Cleaned easily)
9. Resists scrubbing
10. Good Adhesion
11. Extra Additives (Anti-mold or mildewicide, etc.)
12. Environmentally Friendly (Low/No VOC)
13. Price

4.

How to paint cabinets

Question: Hi Tim, A couple of questions about repainting an old cabinet. I have one here that I'm trying to convert to a liquor cabinet. This cabinet appears to be originally redwood, but not sure after years and years of probably numerous restainings(I just started on this project). I would like to repair a little and repaint this old cabinet. Question is, how to prepare this surface for repainting? Should I sand first with course SP, then with Fine? and should I prime this cabinet before painting. the Color I believe I'm going with is a Burgundy, or some other darker color. and what paint manufacturer would you recommend? Lastly, how would I resolve deep gouges in the cabinet? Wood Putty? or is the better caulk available for this? Thanks

Answer: Hi Paul,
Thanks for stopping in.

Refinishing Cabinets
This can be an enjoyable project you will take pride in for years. It can also be rather time consuming and the prep work a little daunting. But if you are ready, we will dive in!

Finish level
The first thing you will need to determine is how fine a finish you want. The better/smoother the finish, the more work it takes. Here is a list of supplies you should have on hand.

Supplies
1. Sand paper (I like Norton 3x) in various grits including 80, 120, and 220 or the equivalent sanding sponges. You may also want a nylon sanding pad for between coat sanding.
2. Some clean rags.
3. Denatured alcohol.
4. Flowtrol or Penatrol.
5. Oil based stain blocking primer like Cover Stain or BIN from Zinsser.
6. Paint. Oil or latex. Special "cabinet paint" is available. It's formulated to give a harder finish (similar to oil) than typical latex paint.
7. Shop vac with brush attachment.
8. Wood filler.

Prep work
As you know, sanding for a smooth finish is important. Since you do not need to sand down to the bear wood, starting with 120 grit normally works. The procedure I use when doing work like this is: sand, sweep, wipe. Sand is obvious, sweep up the dust with the shop vac and wipe off the remaining dust with a damp cloth if you are done sanding. Then wipe your piece off with denatured alcohol on a cloth to remove any surface oils from your hands.

The primer needs to be put on with the same care as the top coat. You can use the Penetrol (at about 1/2 the label recommendation) to thin the oil base primer. The main thing Penetrol does is makes the brush marks level out better so they are less visible. It also gives you a longer "open" time to work with the paint. The piece does not need to be a solid white for the primer to work. You only need a second coat if there is bleed through. If you're using a darker color, have it tinted gray.

Paint Selection
The first thing to decide is what seen you would like. Traditionally, satin, semi-gloss and gloss are used. Semi-gloss is the most popular. The higher the sheen the easier to clean is the phrase often heard.

The type of paint is an important choice. Paint is divided into two main branches - latex (water base) and oil/alkyd. Oils are harder so most people think they are better. But most people do not know they yellow over time and never stop getting harder, which leads to cracking.

Water base is divided into several camps. The "consumer" grade (like depot store brands), commercial grade and specialty, and are in ascending quality. The best advise I've heard is to buy the best product you can afford. Examples of specialty paint is Cabinet Coat from Coronado Paints. It's one of the best cabinet paints available. Sherwin Williams, Benjamin Moore and others also have special cabinet paint.

Painting
When you decide on sheen, color and paint, it's time to start with the top coat. If you're using latex paint, use Flowtrol for the same reasons as Penetrol. I like starting with the edges. That way you don't mess up the front of the door trying to get a little roll over. So do three edges, then work your way out from the middle if it's a door. If it's a self, start at the back and work your way out. Use a high quality brush from Wooster, Purdy or Corona.

There is more, of course. But this should get you started.

Hope that helps,
Tim Hoeffel
Better Painting

Smoke Damage Restoratation

Subject: Smoke Damage

Question: Hi Tim:

My house suffered severe smoke damage. I was told that I need to have someone to clean the walls before the walls are re-painted. I got an estimate from a company that does the fire restoration type of works. However the cleaning cost is very expensive. The people in the hardware store tell me that I just need to apply a layer of oil based primer. It will cover the smoke stain and the smell. What is your opinion? Is the cleaning necessarily?

Thanks!

Answer: Hi Kenneth,
Thanks for stopping in.

Fire damage restoration
The cleaning is necessary. You have to think what you are putting the paint on. The smoke and soot don't make a good surface for any paint to adhere to. There is a good chance the paint will come off later if it is put on the soot. You will be better off in the long run if you can get it off . Try a solution of TSP and amonia in warm water to cut through the grime. Follow the directions for the TSP. There are plenty of products you can buy to remove the grime. This is an inexpensive way to get the majority of the smoke off.

You will still need to prime the walls with Kilz or BIN from Zinsser. The shellac base seals in the stain and smell. Regular oil base won't work.

Hope that helps.

Tim Hoeffel
Better Painting
Colorado Springs, CO

Hiring A Painter

Question: Our house needs to be painted/stained. We have several areas that extend from the main structure like the garage, family room. As such, the painters would have to climb on these roofs in order to reach the sides of the main structure. This concerns me since we have a cedar roof and i would imagine there would be significant damage from ladders etc. How do professional painters go about painting a house like this? what should I look for in a painter?

Thank you

Answer: Hi Mike,
Thanks for stopping in.

Hiring a painter
I have painted a number of homes built like yours. They can pose a challenge depending on the pitch of the roof and they roofing material. Cedar shakes can be slippery, which makes them especially difficult to work on. A professional painter will be able to handle this with a minimum amount of damage. Often a sheet of OSB is laid on the roof for protection and even footing of ladders. There are harness systems that are available as well. But there is no substitute for being careful.

When you pick a painter, ask people you trust. Friends and neighbors are always good. You can also call local paint stores. They have a short list of people they recommend. Check out the BBB or Chamber of Commerce. If a name or two comes up more than once give them a call. You can also check www.angieslist.com. There are also a number of companies that screen contractors and refer business to them, like www.servicemagic.com.

If they show up for the estimate your on the right track. Even better if they show up on time. For your situation you may want to have the painter(s) sign a waiver of liability from accidental injury. This should be covered in their insurances, but if it concerns you it should be brought up.

Look for the obvious things you normally would. First impressions are important. Does he seem trustworthy or a little flaky? He should have most of the following things: confident and professional demeanor, a business card, certificate of insurance or other business licence, fan deck of colors, references to call, pictures of past work, action plan of how to work with your situation, recommended products and why he's using them, estimated life span of the paint or a garrantee of some kind, a written estimate detailing products, procedures, time involved, all costs and final estimate.

Also, be aware of the difference between hiring a pro painter and a guy who paints. You may save a few buck with the latter but may end up regretting it later.

Hope that helps,

Tim Hoeffel
Better Painting,

Choosing An Accent Color

Choosing An Accent Color

Question: Hello- I have been researching to find out which wall to paint an accent wall in my bedroom. The color I chose is a latte color and my furniture is a dark french roast color. I thought the latte and one Mocha accent wall would look good plus it would accent the furniture. Question is which wall?? The room layout is four walls in a square. No weird angles. As you enter the room the wall to the left has two windows. The bed centers this wall with a window on each side. On the far wall is one window on left and to the right a door that goes out to a deck. A dresser sits in-between the two. On the far caddy corner is the entrance to the bath. The wall on right of entry is plain except for closet on the far left. The entry walls is plain except for the entry door that sits on the right side of the wall. My thoughts are to do the darker color on the wall with bed. Is that correct?? Also I want to make the room look bigger then it is. Any suggestions??

Answer: Hi Tara,
You are in the fortunate position of not being able to be "wrong". This is completely a preference issue. It's your room, do what you want. But here are some things to keep in mind while making your choices.

Bright and light colors make a room look larger. Darker colors make a room look smaller. A dark wall will make it appear closer than it is. Colors on the same wall as windows appear darker because the light coming in is so much brighter than the light in the room. Walls with a lot of light on them appear lighter. You may have to make some compromises to get a better balance of colors.

What I have noticed is that on walls with window light shining on them from the adjoining wall has a very nice mottling effect from the window. The color is bright and light next to the window and gradually gets darker the farther away you go. This is a great place to put a complex paint color with several underlying hues. The underlying hues come through next to the window and the dominant color takes over somewhere down the wall. Add colored curtains and it could either add to or ruin what you are trying to achieve.

If you like the dark color of the furniture but want that open feeling a lighter wall color gives, you may want to use the dark color in other accents. Things like picture frames, vases, lamps or throw pillows make nice accent colors.

Good Luck,

Tim Hoeffel
Better Painting
Colorado Springs, CO