Painting Sash Windows - Without Painting Them Stuck!

Ok, so we all have the capability or at least some sort of rudimentary basic knowledge of painting and decorating and almost all of us at some point will have attempted DIY decorating at some point in their lives I am sure.



Sash window painting can become a living nightmare!

Painting walls with emulsion paint has got to be one of the easiest decorating jobs going, cover up the carpets and using a roller or large brush (roller recommended!) you basically just slap on the paint. My personal advice would be to repair all cracks with powder based filler first and then wash down the walls with sugar soap but in reality most people skip this and go straight in with the paint achieving pretty impressive results very quickly and cheaply.


So lets imagine you have tackled the walls, that was the easy bit now you start to look at the windows that by now have begun to look very tired compared to the freshly painted walls surrounding them....Great you might say, another job to do!

So here goes with my attempt to help you decorate your wooden windows. Casement style windows or sliding sash windows can in fact be very hard to decorate and if not done properly will either stick closed or worse look like you 4 year old poured a bucket of paint over them!
Take it from me I did my whole house and it was only after several windows that I got to grips with how to paint them to a reasonable standard and i am no novice to the paint brush.

Lets start with the basics, if possible I would recommend removing the opening part of the window completely whether it is on hinges or hung on sash cords the best thing to do is get the window out of the frame. This may sound making the job take longer but I assure you it really is the best way as you can allow the fresh paint on your windows to dry thoroughly before you re fit them.
This method will prevent the windows from sticking closed and trust me if this happens you will have to free the windows up again, damaging all the paint work and effectively you will need to start over from scratch....not a good thing to happen...learn from my past dumb errors and you wont go wrong.

Once you have removed the windows simply board up the opening over night with thick ply board and remove it as your work progresses.

Masking tape, as we all know the Pro' decorators would skillfully run masking tape round all the glass surfaces preventing paint from over running onto the glass. I hate this job and seem never to be able to run the masking tape in a straight line, maybe it is just me I don't know?
So, i came up with what I think has got to be one of the most simplest and cheapest ways of masking of glass surfaces!

Go to your kitchen or local store, grab a standard wax candle hold the candle against the glass surface with just enough pressure and rub it on the glass. it will leave a trace behind of wax, don't push too hard as you may end up breaking the glass!
This thin layer of wax effectively will act as a mask so if you do run over onto the glass so what? at the end of the job just take a window scrapper and very easily remove the wax along with any paint. Trust me this works so well when I painted my sash windows I didn't even bother cutting in, I just painted right over the glass/wax.
Once the paint drys out I just run the glass scrapper over the window and abracadabra the paint is gone!

Another top tip for painting sash windows is vasaline, smother the sash cords in the stuff!
If you get paint on the sash cords once again, after you have finished and the paint is dry you just gey a dry cloth and remove the vaseline from the sash cords, along with the paint. Super clean sash cords, super clean glass and really nocely painted sash windows!

The above all assumes that you are up to date on basic casement and sash window repairs / maintenance. Sash window repair is an entirely different subject and that should be my next blog so come back soon! For now though until I write my sash window repair post I found the following websites online that have loads of great tips and advice, also check out www.youtube.com as there is an unbelievable amount of videos showing you everything from how to repair sash cords to replacing sills!

Its been great having you, please check back again soon for my next post

Jason

Oh yes, sorry here is that sash window repair link: http://www.sashwindowrepairs-london.co.uk