Spraying latex with HVLP

[Jamie Buxton]

My last attempt at spraying latex was a disaster, but it was twenty years ago. Since then I've acquired a better sprayer, and lot more experience spraying clear waterbornes. Recently I re-tried spraying latex. To my surprise it worked okay.

My current spray system is a 3-stage Accuspray turbine (they call it the 230 now) and a Fuji XPC gun with a gravity cup. I used Benjamin Moore Aura semigloss latex. I thinned it 20% with tap water. My targets were "shaker-style" doors; I wanted to see if the sprayed latex gets into the internal corners.
I sprayed two coats, then waited for the latex to cure enough to sand. Sanding fixes the grain raising caused by the water in the paint. Latex takes a while to get sandable. I had to wait four days before it wouldn't gum up the sandpaper. After sanding, I sprayed two more coats. I spray coats that are thick enough that the fluid flows out, but not so thick that there's any danger of drips. The end result is an acceptable finish quality for cabinets -- no brush tip marks, no drips, and no orange peel.

This said, pigmented waterborne lacquer is a better cabinet paint than latex. It cures much more quickly. It produces a harder film. And there's no worries about blocking. But latex offers the homeowner the experience of choosing from a million colors, and I know of no way to do that with pigmented lacquer.

[David G Elliott]

Couple of comments: 20 percent thinning with water sounds like way too much. I've had good luck with 10 percent thinning, but I feel I'm pushing it at that ratio. I'd try dialing back the the water and going with the biggest tip and needle available for your gun. If you want to avoid raising the grain, try priming with a shellac-based primer like Zinsser. You can go to your first finish coat almost immediately, and if by chance you do need to sand, the shellac-based primer can be sanded right away. If you have to smooth out your water-based finish coats, try scraping with a razor blade rather than sanding. Hold the blade almost perpendicular to the surface and pull toward you as you would with a cabinet scraper.

[John TenEyck]

GF offers a pigmented poly product that can be custom tinted to about any color you want. Or you could tint it yourself with Mixol or another UTC.

John

[Jamie Buxton]

GF offers a pigmented poly product that can be custom tinted to about any color you want. Or you could tint it yourself with Mixol or another UTC.

John

Of course pigmented waterborne can be tinted to any color. But if a homeowner pulls a color chip from a housepaint store, can you match that chip? The eye is so good at distinguishing colors -- millions of them -- that matching the color 100% is extremely difficult. In fact, it is beyond me. That's the advantage that the housepaint store offers.

[Jamie Buxton]

..Couple of comments: 20 percent thinning with water sounds like way too much.. ..

No, 20% thinning is not too much. It gets the latex to flow through my gun properly, and gets it to flow out properly on the cabinet. Less thinning, and the neither of those happens.

[Sam Murdoch]

For what it's worth, ML Campbell will match most any color from the Benjamin Moore color card file for their Aqualente waterborne white/opaque base product.They say they can tint to 1000+ colors - have mixed some nice ones for me that match perfectly to the same color in latex used elsewhere in the room.

Still, good to get some tips on spraying latex. Thanks for that.

[Curt Harms]

I've used a combination of distilled water & floetrol. I'm not sure how thinning affects durability of the surface so I spray a coat or two of a water based poly over the paint. Each coat is quick to apply and dries pretty quickly so it isn't a long drawn out process. Starting with a coat of 1# cut - Sealcoat cut 50-50 with DNA is a nice idea for a starter. A light sanding of the shellac coat can make for a really nice paint coat. I also had some acrylic enamel - don't recall the brand - that when sprayed over shellac produced a glass smooth finish. It was an exterior enamel and still looks good after being outdoors for several years.

[Jamie Buxton]

For what it's worth, ML Campbell will match most any color from the Benjamin Moore color card file for their Aqualente waterborne white/opaque base product.They say they can tint to 1000+ colors - have mixed some nice ones for me that match perfectly to the same color in latex used elsewhere in the room.

Still, good to get some tips on spraying latex. Thanks for that.

My experience with trying to get waterbornes custom-colored has not been good. I've tried Target's EM6500, tinted at a local paint store. I've tried custom-coloring done by General Finishes at the factory. In three out of three attempts, the mixed color did not match the color chip. The eye is really good at distinguishing colors. But I'll look into ML Campbell; latex isn't a great finish.

[John TenEyck]

Of course pigmented waterborne can be tinted to any color. But if a homeowner pulls a color chip from a housepaint store, can you match that chip? The eye is so good at distinguishing colors -- millions of them -- that matching the color 100% is extremely difficult. In fact, it is beyond me. That's the advantage that the housepaint store offers.

Of course not, but if it's for a stand alone project a close match is good enough. If you are trying to do an exact match, like for a new kitchen cabinet to fit into a row of existing ones, you really need to use the same products as used on the original. Maybe I misunderstood what you wanted to do.

John

[Jack Clark]

For thinning, instead of Floetrol+water, try this:

http://www.benjaminmoore.com/en-us/for-your-home/paint-products/benjamin-moore-paint-extender

[Sam Murdoch]

Of course not, but if it's for a stand alone project a close match is good enough. If you are trying to do an exact match, like for a new kitchen cabinet to fit into a row of existing ones, you really need to use the same products as used on the original. Maybe I misunderstood what you wanted to do.

John

In spite of what I wrote about ML Campbell color matching I would agree with John's comment above highlighted in red. You aren't just matching color but sheen and texture and that is nearly impossible mixing products.

[Curt Harms]

For thinning, instead of Floetrol+water, try this:

http://www.benjaminmoore.com/en-us/for-your-home/paint-products/benjamin-moore-paint-extender

Interesting, thanks! I'll look into that.