Suggestions on refinishing veneered furniture

[workingwood]

I was able to pick up some pottery barn style, desk, dresser with mirror, chair and night table for my daughters bedroom for free. She has picked out the paint she wants them to be since they are in need of some repair. I wondered though they are an engineered glossy veneer that is about 1/32" thick. I wondered with how smooth it is if it would be best to take some 220 sandpaper and sand it to rough up the surface and then paint it with latex paint/primer combination or if just priming it first would be the better way to go? What would you do. My thoughts are to sand it down a bit so that the paint will have a surface to adhere to more, however I don't want to do more work than necessary, especially since it has some cut in details that would be a pain to sand. Any suggestions would be great.

 

[mshel]

That's how I would approach it. Especially on the slick surfaces.


Mike

 

[Mark Gottesman]

If you check a store that caters to professional painters, I've used Sherwin Williams, they offer a specially designed primer that will stick to items like Formica and other engineeered surfaces. You will still need to sand, but the primer seems to stick better than something like Kilz on that sort of surface. I had to do a bunch of gallery display pedestals and it held up well for the 7 years I was there. I have not used the combo primer/paint materials. Maybe I'm old school, but I'm leery of their claims for coverage, adhesion and opacity. YMMV.

 

[Canuck]

If you check a store that caters to professional painters, I've used Sherwin Williams, they offer a specially designed primer that will stick to items like Formica and other engineeered surfaces. You will still need to sand, but the primer seems to stick better than something like Kilz on that sort of surface. I had to do a bunch of gallery display pedestals and it held up well for the 7 years I was there. I have not used the combo primer/paint materials. Maybe I'm old school, but I'm leery of their claims for coverage, adhesion and opacity. YMMV.

+1 on the Sherwin Williams oil based primer.

I refinished formica bathroom cabinets and face frames using the oil based SW primer and their ProClassic enamel. It wasn't odorless by any stretch but the finish came out nice and hard and smooth. Used a brush and both the primer and enamel levelled out really nice. (Used the the same finish on the poplar raised panel doors and the finish still looks like new.)

Wayne

 

[workingwood]

Thank you all for your advice. Since I already have the pain primer combo that my wife took my daughter to lowes to get I am going to give that a shot. Of course I will go with sanding the surface down with a series of sandpaper starting at 150 and stopping at 220 and then try this stuff. I figure I will try it on a small surface first so that way if i have to I can strip it off. Worst case scenerio I have to end up re-laminating a surface which might not be a bad thing. Thanks for the advice I will post some before and after pictures when I am done. I am though really leary of the blue and pink paint that was chosen ha ha ha.

 

[workingwood]

Ok so I wanted to update this. First the paint+primer is not what it is hyped up to be. 3 coats of paint is what it took to cover this little night stand. The picture of the drawer is what the colors used to look like and the pink and oh yeah it is pink nightstand is the finished product.

View image in gallery

View image in gallery



Thank you all for the advice and yes sanding was the key to this. Thankfully I have a detail sander that worked out great for me.​