All,
Just a quick question on removing paint from a cedar deck. I moved into an existing home last year, and to my horror they previous owner had painted the very large cedar deck (decking material is cedar, structure/railing is pressure treated) with “floor paint”. Now, about 15% of the surface has already peeled, and I expect I can get more off with a pressure washer, being careful not to set the pressure too high of course.
My intent was to rent a floor sander (NOT the drum type, but the new fangled ones that are like big random orbital sanders) and go over the whole deck and then stain it.
Does this sound like a reasonable approach, any other suggestions? Thankfully the railing was not painted.
Thanks in advance.
Replies
If you are going to sand it anyway, don't pressure wash it. You will undoubtedly scar the deck with the power washer, no matter how good or careful you are.
I devised a technique to power wash decks without gouging and scaring them up. It works well but is not perfect by any means and usually leaves some marks even on my best of best days (my best days, unfortunately, are now behind me).
Grunge on. http://grungefm.com
All,
thanks for the advice. The decking is screwed in so I think I am okay there, but will do a visual beforehand.
It also makes sense just to sand and forego the pressure washing.
Thanks a ton as always!
Amanna,
Just finished a job like this. Deck was about 750 s/f on 2 levels. The sander to rent is the oscillating model (NOT the drum sander). Have a belt and palm sander handy to get into the tight spots. We sanded through a coat of Cabots solid coat stain (chestnut brown) and a coat of deck paint (grey) and primed (Cabots Deck Primer) in about 11 man hours (we're not fast we're "half fast"). This included about 2 man hours of using a hacksaw blade to clean dog hair and various other debris out from between the deck boards. We then used a back pack blower to remove all the dust, etc. (DON'T pressure wash, it'll raise the grain). Finish coat of Cabots went on in about 90 minutes. Deck looks GREAT. Customers happy as all get out since they didn't have to do a tear-off replace.
Good Luck,
Don
Edited 4/17/2006 10:12 pm ET by DJH
I spent yesterday sanding a deck using a rented random orbital sander with a very aggressive grit. It had a square base plate ~12" x 16", the sanding paper was a peel & stick adhesive. Decking material was PT with a painted surface. Most of the paint came up except where the decking had curled or paint had filled a void in the wood. I couldn't get to the edges along the house or beneath the railings. I still have to pressure wash the balisters & hard to reach spots to remove some mold & mildew.
All-in-all it came out good. A solid stain might cover the remaining paint, might not. A good deck paint would be best after I prime it with an oil-based exterior primer.
The sander I rented had a vac bag attached, this was priceless when dealing with the dust it picked up.
Good luck, -Norm
Make sure all the nails (or were the boards screwed on?) are set--maybe the big orbitals can handle nails, but I sanded a deck with a hand-held belt sander while crawling around on my knees and when it hit a nail, the belt was toast!
Funny, I'm at the same place you are. The machine I saw is a U Sand, a 4 head random orbit sander with dust pickup.
I'd really like to prep my deck by sanding and then go with the finish instead of having the 3 day wait after pressure washing which always seems to get complicated by rain.
this machine http://www.u-sand.com/
Edited 4/17/2006 11:48 pm ET by cynwyd