How to strip water based semi gloss paint off of existing oil based paint on door frames?

[JamesMarshdale]

Hey there,

The situation is this: my partner and I have begun painting our apartment walls which includes the door frames. The door frames are made of metal with what I am sure is some kind of oil based cream coloured paint. I attempted to paint over them with Taubmans Water-based Enamel Semi-Gloss paint, however not only did I not think to sand the door frames before I put on the first coat I was under the impression that as the door frames had already been painted I would not need to use any sort of primer. You can see that the result is less than impressive. The technique I used was quite poor (I was lead to believe that the first coat could be rough as it was just to cover and the second coat would neaten it out.)

This is an example of how the paint has set in one section. I can't really get any other better photos unfortunately.

We have 6 door frames that look like this that we need to strip back and start again. I've used Acetone to strip the paint which gets mixed results (some places strip better than others) and I have also borrowed an electric sander as manual sanding appeared to take too long with slow results. The electric sander works, however it appears to be removing the original coat of paint and is showing the metal underneath.

I suppose my question is this: Is it worth the time to strip the paint right down to metal and start again? Or is it best to keep going with the acetone (or any other effective means of removing the paint) to strip the paint back to the original cream colour and work from there?

Any assistance will be greatly appreciated.

[JamesMarshdale]

Hi there Eric,

Reporting back in about the door painting dilemma, I have a Wagner Spray Gun and I have a can of Dulux Precision White Primer. When it comes to diluting the primer, the instructions in the spray gun say to water down the primer by 10% however the instructions on the primer can say do not dilute. I've put a two coats of primer on already with mixed results (mostly good, just a few spots that seemed iffy which I can fix by sanding) however I need to give another coat to certain areas that got slightly missed. Before I start with the next coat, which set of instructions should I follow? Do I do what Wagner recommends and dilute the primer with water or do I do what the primer can says and don't dilute?

Thank you!

[MitchellMc]

Hi @JamesMarshdale,

According to the product's datasheet, a small amount of water (no more than 100mls per 1 Litre) may be added. So, if you are having issues with the paint flowing through the sprayer, it can be diluted. However, I'd start with 50ml per litre.

Mitchell