Posted by Charles Budd on Monday, August 15, 2016,
Until the scaffolding was up on this semi-detached house in Stratford upon Avon, it was difficult to see the state of the faux Tudor timber beams at the top of the house. Once I got up onto the scaffolding, and poked my finger into the timber, I got rather a shock. It was not only rotten, but just thin planking.
Taking a closer look at the paint, you can see it was in very poor shape. Nearly all the paint would have to come off.
It was time to get my professional Finnish and German sanding equ...
Posted by Charles Budd on Saturday, July 23, 2016,
This piece of guttering was only just hanging on.
Imagine if it had dropped on someone's head.
Here’s the ‘executive summary' of the detailed process below.
- Clean off all flaky gubbins*. (*Technical term.)
- Glue the pieces of cast iron together using Repair Care resins.
- Paint your guttering.
- Stand back with a cup of tea and gaze in awe at your repair.
If you really want to know the ins and outs, brew yourself your favourite beverage, sneak a couple of ginger nuts out of the biscuit tin...
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Posted by Charles Budd on Monday, August 24, 2015,
I won't drone on for too long about how much I love my sanding equipment. I'm sure you've better things to do. I've got two Mirka sanders for broad areas - the Ceros and Deros, and I've got two Festool sanders - the RO90 for exterior timber work, and my RTS400, mainly for interior woodwork, and for finishing off exterior woodwork.
These sanders make a MASSIVE difference to my decorating. Sorry for the caps, but I can't emphasise how useful they are. Not only can I sand much quicker with these...
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Posted by Charles Budd on Tuesday, July 28, 2015,
I love decorating in Stratford upon Avon. It's an old town, with plenty of old buildings, and that's what I love the most. Don't get me wrong, I love the simplicity of decorating relatively newer buildings, as usually the plaster is flat, the woodwork is simpler, and they are often faster to do, but I do love the challenges and details of being part of the renovation process of old buildings. And although Stratford upon Avon is a relatively small town, it provides enough work for at least a h...
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Posted by Charles Budd on Saturday, November 15, 2014,
Several ideas have been spinning around my head due to a
particular job this year. A job of
patience, intricacy, detail, more patience, thought, analysis, change of
technique, more patience, evolution of technique....
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Patience and Detail - needed with cast iron lattice windows.Those of you who know me know I'm a pretty patient chap.
Earlier in my working life I was a care worker for adults with learning
difficulties and challenging behaviour - that needed oodles of patience, and
empathy too. I...
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Posted by Charles Budd on Thursday, December 12, 2013,
I'm repainting a lovely bespoke kitchen at the moment, and all the cabinet hinges had paint on them. I cleaned off a few, but it was taking quite a long time, and I had dozens!
Putting the little grey cells into action, I put all the hinges and screws from the cabinet doors into a large freezer bag, gave them 5 squirts of
Multi Task Multi-Purpose Cleaner, moved them about in the bag a bit, sealed and left for a few hours. I was told by
Andy from Eco Solutions in Somerset (who make Multi Task)...
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Posted by Charles Budd on Thursday, November 7, 2013,
I just thought I'd share a
few photos of a recent job. Sorry about the quality of the photos!
Some
months ago I was approached to refresh a neutral and tired-looking sitting
room. I was too busy at the time, but gave a quote which was accepted and the
work booked in for autumn half-term while the house was empty.
The
specification was to repair some deep holes in plaster caused by redundant
light fittings, general preparation work, repaint ceiling, 3 walls, woodwork
and fireplace, and pape...
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Posted by Charles Budd on Tuesday, October 15, 2013,
As an experiment, I've made this entire post into a Pinterest graphic.
http://www.pinterest.com/pin/155796468333066160/ Continue reading ...
Posted by Charles Budd on Sunday, July 7, 2013,
I'm currently painting the exterior of a customer's house. Most of the brick is unpainted, except a couple of square metres where there was a lean-to in the past. I asked my customer whether he'd like me to strip the paint off, to even it all up. He said it was a good idea.
There were several layers of gloss paint on the brick - and I knew to sand it all off would take a long time, as well as quite a lot of Abranet (the mesh sanding 'paper' I use which enables most of the dust produced by san...
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Posted by Charles Budd on Monday, June 18, 2012,
I like to blame as much as I
can on Andy Crichton, yes, him off the Traditional Painter website.
It's his fault that I've spent lots of time
practicing how to use Toupret skim fillers to get a finish smoother than an
baby's bottom on walls and ceilings.
It's his fault that I've had to spend delicious
hours experimenting with Little Greene paints to get the most beautiful
eggshell finish to woodwork (they're much better than that other 'heritage'
brand that most people rave about).
And es...
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