How to paint over calcimine
Ugh! Peeling ceiling Paint!
Do you own an older home with peeling ceiling issues? Calcimine is a common problem;
here’s how to deal with it.
Have you ever been painting a ceiling and as you make your way across the room you notice the fresh paint peeling off the ceiling as it dries?
Or do you have a ceiling with paint that peels all the time?
There are a few causes of this and we’ll explain through this post so follow along as we cover causes of peeling paint, common areas that paint peel and how to deal with calcimine coated ceilings specifically.
1- What makes paint peel?
2- Where ceilings do commonly peel
The most common room for ceiling paint to peel is the bathroom. The excess moisture from taking showers along with contaminants from soap, cleaners and beauty products can be a cause. Calcimine coated ceilings have a tendency to peel when painted over with incompatible coatings such as latex or acrylic ceiling paint.
3- What is calcimine paint?
Calcimine paint was used in the past up until about the 1940’s and still found in some houses into the 60’s. Calcimine paint was an easy and cheap coating to give interior surfaces a clean look. Calcimine was made from easy to acquire products like calcium carbonate mixed with water (sometimes pigments and glue) to make an easy to use and fast-drying coating for walls and ceilings. These were the days of heating with coal and wood stoves, so walls and ceilings stained with soot quickly and calcimine was a quick and inexpensive cover-up during spring cleaning. source: read more here
4- What is the problem with calcimine?
Calcimine ceiling repair and painting: How to paint over calcimine.
5- Preparing the room
6- Scraping the loose paint
Whether you have paint peeling off the ceiling while painting, paint peeling from ceiling or paint cracking you’ll need to scrape ALL the loose paint from the ceiling. Sometimes a small cracked or peeling area will scrape off exposing a larger area than it looked like. Scrape the loose paint until you get to an area where the ceiling paint is tightly bonded. Wiping or cleaning any excess chalkiness will greatly help.
7- Spot priming
After all the areas of failed paint are scraped it’s time to spot prime. Remember that calcimine is loosened by water or moisture. You will want to apply a moisture-resistant primer. In this case, you should use an oil-based primer so you do not reactivate the calcimine and keep paint from peeling.
8- Patching
After the primer has dried it’s time to patch all the defects. Use your patching compound of choice and apply the number of coats needed to make smooth after sanding. Patching compounds are water-based so be sure to patch only where the oil-based primer was applied so as to not have issues with the moisture from the patching compounds over calcimine. Allow to dry and sand smooth.
9- Spot prime again
Yes, another coat of oil primer should be applied over the patches. This ensures uniformity of the finish coat by sealing the porous filler.
10- Ceiling paint
Product Used
We hope this information helps when it comes to your peeling ceiling. Calcimine painted ceilings can be problematic but now you know why they peel, what calcimine paint is, and how to remedy the peeling. There are no shortcuts for scraping, spot priming, patching and painting with the correct products when it come to calcimine ceiling painting but, when done right, will have your ceilings looking great for years to come.
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