How to remove already peeling off paint from drywall?

[rse43]

TL;DR I screwed up in my painting project and need to remove three coats of paint that are peeling off after finished painting. What is the most effective way to remove them from the walls?

I forgot to wipe the wall with sugar soap before putting one coat of dulux 1step prep primer and two coats of wash&wear. As a result the paint didn't stick at all and can be peeled off from the wall with hands. My plan is to remove the already peeling off paint and clean the wall properly before doing the job again but peeling the paint off with hands seemed to be very inefficient and might take me days to complete these two rooms. Any suggestion on what alternatives I could try? I was thinking about either sanding it down using a sander or apply paint stripper but I had no experience with either of these method. Thanks in advance for any advice.

Shuo

[Dave-1]

Afternoon @rse43 

Ugh... That paint looks straight out of my place lol I have flaky paint that peels off when you scratch it like that.

If it is as flaky as that I would suggest to use a 100mm Sharp Edge Paint Scraper There are also smaller bladed ones. If the paint comes off with this then great. If there are spots that are sticking those may need sanding to remove the edge of the paint line, I would be tempte dto remove as much as you can.

I am not 100% sure about your theory regarding not cleaning with sugar soap first is the reason why your paint is not sticking. I suspect you have painted over an oil based paint with a water based paint. Tho the Bunnings crew @EricL or @MitchellMc  iwll know the reason for sure. 

Removing the old paint with a scraper would be my first step tho.

I would also like to say a warm hello and welcome to the Bunnings community page, so many things to find out and try in here plus solutions to questions we all have  

Dave

[EricL]

Hello @rse43 

Allow me to welcome you as well to the Bunnings Workshop community. It's wonderful to have you join us, and thanks for sharing your question about removing paint from your dry wall.

It's great that you've received excellent advice from @Dave-1. Just to add to the suggestions made, I also recommend using Ryobi 300W Random Orbital Sander in combination with the 100mm Sharp Edge Paint Scraper. This should help with the paint stripping and make it go faster.

In regards to the surface of the drywall, was it already painted? If it was, I suggest doing a quick test to find out if it is oil or water-based. Once you have confirmed what you have, you'll be able to use the proper primer.

If you have any other questions we can help with, please let us know.

Eric

[rse43]

Thanks heaps @Dave-1 and @EricL  for the detailed advice and you're right about the pre-existing paint being oil based. I have scraped the the wall with methos on a rag and the pre-existing paint was quite shiny. It turned out that a thin layer of water based paint was applied before I took over the place and I incorrectly identified the pre-existing paint as water based because I could scraped off paint using methos before. Once the thin layer was wiped off with methos this time, the paint under is indeed oil based. 

I have tried using the paint scraper to remove the top layer but it's not easier than peeling it off using my hand. Most of the areas are quite sticky and using the scraper would leave a lot of spots that I need to sand down. Do you think it would be more efficient to apply (chemical) paint stripper in large area and then remove the paint, or it's better to stick to scraper and orbital sander as @EricL suggested?

Thanks again gents for jumping in and help.

Shuo

[Dave-1]

Good evening @rse43 

After using paint strripper on my front door and knowing how messy  and toxic (yeah fingers would burn even) (the old paint liquefies so you end up with new but old paint streaks everwhere if you are not carefull) I would use the orbital sander and just take yoru time, Spots to sand down are a lot easier then sanding the whole wall and there is a fine putty for small gouges you can use to bring it bck to smooth. Wax on Wax off... you will muscles in your arms after this

Dave

[rse43]

Thanks @Dave-1 , I've followed your advice and went with orbital sander. Very happy to report that it worked out really well and I was able to sand one whole wall down in less than a couple of hours. Six more to go and I'm already feeling my arms🙃

Shuo

[EricL]

Hi @rse43 

It's good to hear you stuck with the mechanical removal of the paint. Hang in there you'll eventually get all the paint off.

Eric