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Painting & Decorating

Paint spills, fixing a bad paint job

Anonymous user 15/03/2024 - 2.34 PM

Hi, I hope you can help. A decorator I recently used to paint my sitting room spilt 2p-sized spots of oil-based paint in several places on my carpet. They were completely dry by the time I saw them and are not coming off with water, soap or diluted white spirit. Is the carpet ruined or is there a product that would work? He also painted over the metal pipes on the radiator and got paint on the metal door handles, light switches and metal hooks on the wall. Is there a product that will remove it? White spirit isn't working. I can't use a blade easily as the surfaces are curved and difficult to get at. Also, the paint on the woodwork on the door and windowsill is thick and has drips in it (dried) and fingerprints where he obviously touched it while it was still wet. Should I sand these parts down and repaint. Do I have to sand down and repaint the whole door/windowsill or can I just do the part where the drips/fingerprints are? What grade of sandpaper should I use? Finally, he didn't prep any of the woodwork before painting (!) and there are holes and dents in the doors and door frame that have simply been painted over instead of filled and fixed. Can I just fill the holes and paint over the filler? I'm a complete novice at painting - though learning fast what >not<to do after seeing this guy's work - so detailed advice would be much appreciated. Thank you.

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2 Answers

Anonymous user

Hello trr1, sadly the likely hood is that your carpet will now be ruined as the paint has dried i am afraid, there are some low grade acids but in all honesty you will most likely just discolour or damage the carpet further. As for the oil based paint on the door handles and fixings there is a good product from Zinser i would recommend and can easily be obtained from most building suppliers or possibly hardware shops, you should try and scrap as much off with a blade and sand paper if possible. For the windowcills and door, you will need to sand down the effected area using grade 60 sand paper (yellow) and grade 90 (green) on the worst parts if necessary then apply a fresh coat to the entire surface. for the filling if they are not to deep you can use 'one-fill' which you need to apply with no excess, meaning you do not need to sand it down and you might get away with just touching up after but you may need to paint the whole surface also. hope this helps very sorry to deliver bad news thanks Tony Next Level inc

Answered21 May 2017

Anonymous user

Hi trr1, What a nightmare! However there are one or two tips I think you could use.. Firstly though, the carpet. You say the spills are oil-based and dry, in which case your only option is to try cutting them out. There's really no product which can remove them without ruining the carpet as well. Sorry about that :( For other areas, Tony's suggestion of Zinser "Stripfast" is a good one - alternatively Nitromors which is sold by all good DIY stores. None of these products is cheap, but they do the job properly! Basically they will "blister" the paint and turn it into mush which you can simply wipe off with a disposable rag. Pay real attention to the directions for use, since these are highly acidic/alkaline products which *will* also tarnish or burn the metal underneath if they're left on too long. For painted holes and dents, you should sand with 60/90-grade as Tony suggests, to get a decent burring that will allow filler to bind properly with the paint surface. Or even sand right back to the wood. Then fill with Polycell's Advanced Polyfilla, using a flexible decorator's knife. Leave to cure for 24 hours, sand down and repaint. I do hope your painter/decorator wasn't hired through this otherwise excellent website! Regards, Rob Adam

Answered29 May 2017