Chips in gloss

Intel1982

Hi, I had my woodwork painted from a varnished pine to white about 9 months ago but lots of it is starting to chip away! Can anyone suggest the best products to fix this? The chips are all in my hall which is a high traffic area, the rest of the woodwork is holding up better. Thanks 

stuart45

Was it glossed straight over the varnish?

Silvertabby

Was this DIY or did you pay someone to do this?

Intel1982

We paid someone to do this, I think he must've glossed straight over the varnish on the skirtings? He did the staircase and primed it with zinsser but that's also chipping in places 

ThisIsWeird

How much cleaning or preparing of the varnished surfaces did they do first, do you know - 'rubbing down'?

Satin or gloss? And what paint was used?

These will be impact/contact damage - the chips didn't just jump off - but it does look as tho' the new paint isn't very tough, or not well adhered.

I have found Zinsser AllCoat to be tough and durable, and is self-priming, tho' the applied surface should obviously be clean. If the paint used was a lesser product, then perhaps that's the way to go? For the individual chips, just touch up using a small artist's brush - build up layers, and go up to, but not over, the chip edges. For the skirting board, I guess it would benefit from a significant rub-down, using say 120-180 grit, to flatten the numerous edges and clean up the larger area (just concentrate on the flat vertical surface, which is the part that gets knocked), and lightly take this around the top curve to clean the surface, and then apply 2-3 coats of the Zinsser.

It's a tough call whether the P&D did an unacceptable job - it's clearly an area that gets some 'abuse', but it's nigh-on impossible to judge from this side of the screen whether that was excessive.

My gut - from the size and cleaness of the chips - is that the paint was too easy to detach - not very well adhered - and not particularly durable. But, in many homes, this just wouldn't be an issue. Yours is, I presume, a normal - but 'family' - home? In which case, a good P&D would have factored this in.

Intel1982

Yes it's a normal family home with two adults and two young boys so it's never going to be pristine 😂 I just checked my messages and he said he was doing the stair case two coats of zinsser then finishing it off with eggshell? I'm assuming he's just whacked the gloss straight on the skirtings though, as I've just noticed the chipping is the same in the living room below the radiator where no one is near 😥

Should I purchase a tin of zinsser, eggshell and white gloss then to touch up the staircase and skirting boards and then just try to fill it in with a small brush? 

Thanks for your help. 

Silvertabby

Intel1982 said:

We paid someone to do this, I think he must've glossed straight over the varnish on the skirtings? He did the staircase and primed it with zinsser but that's also chipping in places 

Well, he made a pretty poor job of it.  Zinsser is good, but it wasn't designed to go straight on to varnished wood without any prior preparation.

stuart45

All you can do without a lot of work is to touch in the chips. It's better to remove things like the door furniture when painting.

ThisIsWeird

If there's paint flaking off where there's been next-to-no contact, then I fear you have longer-term problems. Ie, you will always be relying on the presumably-poor adhesion of the Zinsser to the varnish.

By 'two coats of Zinsser', I presume he meant BIN or one of their other sealer/primer products, which I understand are good products in themselves, but may be treated by some as a 'get-out' for not carrying out proper cleaning and preparation first. The surfaces do first need to be clean, free from grease and anything else that could compromise adhesion.

Good chance that these chips are coming off complete with their double-coat of Zinsser primer - ie it's 'more likely', imv, that the surface was not clean enough so the Zinsser didn't adhere, than it is that the Satinwood didn't adhere to the Zinsser - that second option almost certainly did happen ok. So, anything you add on top will possibly always be compromised by that (presumably) poor preparation.

That's obviously guesswork, and I am not a P&D.

Others will hopefully advise on whether you should re-engage this P&D to sort out what could have been a poor job, but if they are not responsive, then that's not going to be enjoyable.

What to do? Don't know. I think I'd want to know whether the P&D was culpable, and - if so - at least expect my 'labour' money back. How to do this? You could perhaps close-up video the surrounding chipped areas being gently thumped with something akin to whatever caused them to chip in the first place, and if it's pretty obvious that paint flakes are coming away far too easily, then that's pretty solid evidence, I'd have thought. Or, video gently picking away at the paint edge with your nails - you should have to 'grind' the paint off as particles, and not flakes. It should all be well-adhered.

Or else you get another P&D out to advise - but that would be the opinion of another 'pro', but not an independent surveyor.

Close-ups of the skirting below the rad? V'clip of you picking or chipping at it?!

'Eggshell' is usually pretty durable stuff - any idea what make? Did it 'smell' - is it 'oil' or water-based? It's also a non-gloss finish, so are you sure they used Egg and Gloss on different parts of your paintwork?

Postik

In the past I have stripped the paint right back to the bare wood and started again.  It's extreme and time consuming, but my woodwork had layers and layers of paint, some of it not done very well.  It gives you a nicer finish and you aren't relying on the adhesion of older layers.

In this instance though, I might be inclined to just touch up the chips until I was ready to redo the whole lot.

What I have done for this kind of thing is use a wood filler or fine surface filler to fill the chips.  Straight after filling I use a wet sponge to carefully clean up around the area so that it's completely smooth without having to sand.

With small chips and in areas of low traffic I have gotten away with just leaving it like this and sometimes the filler just blends in.  With bigger chips and/or high traffic you'll probably need to paint over the filler to protect it.  I would do two or three very light coats of paint and feather the edges to blend it in to the surrounding paint.

The issue is whilst this might fix the existing chips it won't stop more from coming.

stuart45

Postik said:

In the past I have stripped the paint right back to the bare wood and started again.  It's extreme and time consuming, but my woodwork had layers and layers of paint, some of it not done very well.  It gives you a nicer finish and you aren't relying on the adhesion of older layers.

In this instance though, I might be inclined to just touch up the chips until I was ready to redo the whole lot.

What I have done for this kind of thing is use a wood filler or fine surface filler to fill the chips.  Straight after filling I use a wet sponge to carefully clean up around the area so that it's completely smooth without having to sand.

With small chips and in areas of low traffic I have gotten away with just leaving it like this and sometimes the filler just blends in.  With bigger chips and/or high traffic you'll probably need to paint over the filler to protect it.  I would do two or three very light coats of paint and feather the edges to blend it in to the surrounding paint.

The issue is whilst thigs might fix the existing chips it won't stop more from coming.

It's a good way to prep a job, and does produce a good job. However, when paying a pro to do the work for you, the majority of people won't pay to go to those lengths.
A friend of mine told me that when he was an apprentice, at college they were given a few battered up old doors. After a burn off, filling, sanding, priming, undercoat and gloss, including sanding in between coats, the doors looked like a sheet of glass.
He added that he had never been able to price for work like that again, and only came close when working on his own property.