Painting Melamine Question - Answered W/ *PIC*

[Dan Barber]

I woke up Saturday morning with an idea for a small entertainment center to house the DVD and receiver that we got a couple of weekends back. The milk crate was just not cutting it!

I wanted to make this during the weekend as we are hoping to move to another house as soon as ours sells, long projects are just not in my best interest now.

<p ALIGN = CENTER>http://mywebpages.comcast.net/danbarber/EC/DSC00022.JPG </P>


Problem was I wanted the EC to be black to match the speaker stands I built last weekend. Melamine seemed to be the logical choice, but I had no access to black melamine as any suppliers of that are closed on the weekends.

So I posted a question about painting melamine on Saturday morning. After receiving some positive responses - some suggesting a special melamine paint - I decided I would go ahead with the plan to paint some white melamine black.

We have a coffee table and end tables I built a couple of years back that have black painted frames and a cherry inset top. I thought matching them would also be nice. The end result is shown here.

The carcass is made from melamine with a couple of accent strips and a door frame made of cherry. The glass was a piece of smoked tempered glass I had been hanging on to for the last 20 years or so - I hate to throw such things out.

Tempered peg board with some strategically placed slots for speaker wires and such completes the back. I ended up sanding the melamine with 120 grit and then painting with Painters Touch water base enamel from Rustoleum.

The cherry was finished with Sealcoat from Zinsser. BTW, thanks to others recommendations I picked up some seal coat about a month ago - this is a really great product - goes on easily, dries fast and can be readily built to any level of finish you desire.

In all, this project took about 6 hours Saturday, and 7 - 8 hors on Sunday. Total cost was less than $70 not including the miscellaneous pieces of cheery and the glass I had left from earlier projects.

<p ALIGN = CENTER>http://mywebpages.comcast.net/danbarber/EC/DSC00024.JPG </P>

Not my finest work, but it gets the job done and didn't tie up the shop for an extended time. I still need to do something with the speaker wires, I just ran out of time. Thanks for looking. Thanks to all who answered on the painting question as well.

Cheers,

Dan

[Jim Becker]

Looks great! So...what paint did you actually use for this project to turn white to black?? ;)

[Bart Leetch]

"Painters Touch water base enamel from Rustoleum."

[Mark Hulette]

Dan-

That looks really nice! It also opens up a lot of possibilities for bathroom storage that I didn't necessarily want to do in white. Guess the choice is only limited to the range of colors made by Rustoleum.

BTW- What joinery did you use? John Lucas has used the locking miter router joint before with good success.

Thanks for showing a good weekend's work!

[Dan Barber]

Hi Mark,

I used a 1/4" deep dado cut in to the sides for the top and bottom to fit into and then some melamine screws were used as insurance. I put the included plastic caps over the screws.

Just a word about the paint - I don't at this point have any idea about longevity of this paint on the melamine surface. So your results could be less than optimum over time.

I was a bit less concerned than usual as I see this a short lived cabinet in this application.

Cheers,

Dan

[Phil Phelps]

Originally posted by Dan Barber
Hi Mark,

Just a word about the paint - I don't at this point have any idea about longevity of this paint on the melamine surface. So your results could be less than optimum over time.

I was a bit less concerned than usual as I see this a short lived cabinet in this application.

Cheers,

Dan
I doubt it is a wearable surface with water base enamel. You said it is probably temporary. You could have used Bin pigmented shellac for the primer that would stick pretty well. I've used epoxy primer before, but at $50 dollars a quart, plus thinner, I would back off. For an outstanding wearing surface, could use laminate over the Melamine. Should be ok if you don't drag something accross it. Looks darn good, though.