The Framers Forum

Hi, I've been doing a lot of painted white frames for artists and at the moment I use a sponge to try and get a even smooth finish, I have been thinking about getting a spray gun setup to get a better finish, any recommendations or set up would be helpful.We recently had to repair a few frames for a local gallery that had some large Jan Nelson paintings in and the finish was so smooth.

It's not so much the gear as having a place to do it. It's messy and you need a fair bit of space.
Overspray goes everywhere.

Getting things dead smooth is a lot of hard work. Best to celebrate the natural textures IMHO.

I spray in a seperate 10x14 shed in the garden. There is no way it could happen otherwise. Originally I invested in an Apollo spay gun setup but cleaning the metal spray guns was a real pain. Eventually I found the Wagner system which is just the job. I use the fine finish guns which provide a pretty good finish although I second Prosperos comment about natural textures. I doubt you could get a perfectly smooth gesso finish for instance.

I sand with 120 grit, apply three coats, sometimes only two, and rub down aftwards with 800grit to de-nib the finish.

I generally only do simple painted finishes, and mainly white.

Thanks for your feedback, space for us isn't to much of a problem as we work from a old skittle ally which I have sub divided,
I have tried many types of white paint from wicks ripple to F&B and then Zinsser, I will be trying to add floetrol paint conditioner as it says it
smooths out the flow, just need to find a good white finish that's quick and simple.

I had an idea, which I never put into practice except with an airbrush....

I you use a gun with the reservoir slung beneath (there's a name for it but I can't think what it is...) rather than the
gravity-fed type with the reservoir above..... You can have a spare reservoir full of clean water to flush the gun out
when finished (important) Then instead of emptying and cleaning out the pot with the paint in, just cover the top with clingfilm
and you're good to go next time. You could have as many spare reservoirs as colours you use. Very quick and minimal paint wastage.

Well sounds like a good idea.

As for paint, have you tried Artists acrylic? It's very thick in the pot. You would need to dilute it to the consistency of condensed milk.
It's very tough when dry and dries quickly.

Add meths to the paint, does not leave a colour cast. Makes it flow better, also
Valspar trade is good paint with a high pigment load.

I'm not fully convinced that spraying is necessarily what getting a smooth finish is all about. To hide the grain of the wood takes enough thickness to be sanded down smooth and building up that thickness by spraying and waiting in between coats, for each coat to dry before spraying another coat can be a lengthy business. I wonder if sometimes if spraying has more to do with uniformity than the emphasis of smoothness.

Quite a lot of hand finishes are very smooth, but have not involved any spraying. Sometimes, that smoothness is created by the processes used after the paint has been applied. I don't have room to set up a spray shop, but I have given the idea some thought at various times and never been completely sure that I would the results would be as good as you might expect.

So I'm just wondering if forum members who decided to start spraying always found it to be as worthwhile as they were expecting. Any comments would be interesting to hear.

I spray 90% of the painted frames I sell. Time is the main factor. I find spraying a lot quicker.

Thanks Alan,

Do you mind me asking a few questions. I'm guessing that you know a lot of things that perhaps most of us either don't know, or can only guess at?

Are these frames mainly sprayed with water based paints, like acrylic and emulsion paints?

Are they finished as gloss, stain and matt and how do you go about this?

Is there much sanding down as part of the paint finishing process?

Do you also use other types of paint other than water based?

And what sizes of other framing businesses should be looking at doing something similar and why?

If you fancy doing this, perhaps you would like to show us some pictures as examples of what you are able to do by spraying them. It occurs to me that this might be not that dissimilar to hand finishing, but perhaps on a different scale and perhaps different objectives.

Are you spraying completed frames and therefore covering the corner joints as others would be doing on conventional hand finished frames and how do you think that you in house sprayed frames compare with other factory finished, or hand finished frames?

There are quite a few on this forum, who from time to times like to show their hand finished, perhaps workmanship on spray painted frames, deserves a bit more exposure and recognition as well.

Have a look at Alan's web site

The quality and range of frames he supplies are second to none. Alan is a competent and professional framer in every way

Peter.

Hi peter,

I see what you mean. Lovely quality and the prices are so reasonable for the customers.

Hi Alan,

Your frames are superb. I'm well impressed.

I'm hoping to setup a gesso spray booth soon too, but for gilding.
I was recently asked by a respected framer, if a frame I showed her was a spray finish. I was thrilled, as it wasn't.
I use a thick Johnstone's trade undercoat, sand and a couple of coats of usually Farrow and Ball, with a Daler One Stroke brush. The brush makes all the difference.
I'm looking forward to comparing a spray finish to a hand painted finish.

I won't be setting up for spraying any of my frames as I'm in a smaller shop than my last one, which was also too small, so space for a paint spraying area is not an option, but after hearing what you customer said, I think I will have to get one of these one stroke brushes and give it a try.

It might be just what I might find really helpful at the moment.

Out of interest has anyone tried this one?
https://www.screwfix.com/p/wagner-w590- ... lsrc=aw.ds

Thanks for the comments above. I must look at my pricing......

Hi Alan,

I think I should qualify what I said about your prices, just to be fair to yourself. One of your prices was for a 10" x 8" frame which looked every bit as good as a hand finished frame and I think that your website price was £27. I don't know if this included glass, backing and fitting, but I assumed that it probably did. My own price for a hand finished ready made frame of that quality would be more like £35.

It could be that your lower price has a lot to do with your existing level of business and perhaps you are already charging the optimal price for your existing level of success. Please don't take what I say about this as good advice, but get some other opinions before taking this as far a adjusting your prices. Being serious though, your frames are excellent quality for the money and you have much to be proud of.

Many of my "off the shelf" frames are made from materials left over from normal framing orders and are limited in size mostly as I like to use left over sizes of glass and backing board. I makes lots of full price oak frames, I have plenty of oak off cuts. As a result I also sell a lot of "off the shelf" oak frames, these are often good sellers. Not all of these are hand finished and the unfinished ones are often quite a bit cheaper. In fact I rely on pricing many of the smaller ones to sell, to avoid being overloaded with too many of them to store, or display.

Some bits of oak are not easy to match up, or have defects and these get made into "rustic oak frames", which often need a bit of some sort of hand finishing to make the lengths of moulding to look acceptable together as parts of the same frame. This does not always necessarily push the price up. A lot of these frames can be impulse buys and I realise that part of the attraction is going to be the right price.

I don't think that customers are very likely to walk 200 yards down the hill to the cash point and 200 yards back uphill, just for ready made frame in a shop window. It's got to be something that they can buy with money that's already in their pocket. There are times when you can hear couples talking while looking in my shop window, the wife often likes something, but the husband might say "or we could spend the same money on ice creams for the children" Impulse sales are like that and price is often make, or break.

Hi Alan

When you get a mo', what ratio of meth's to paint please?

Peter.

Just a splash. It’s just to break the surface tension. I also find I need to water down the paint 10-15% but that is a bit of trial and error.