primer for cedar siding repainting

On Aug 21, 9:59 pm, MinnJim <[email protected]> wrote:
> Hi,
> I am repainting a 70+ year old cedar siding house. I have done a good
> job of scraping and cleaning up the loose paint and peeling areas. I
> don't know if the present paint job is oil base or latex. My question
> is how do I tell which one it is and what should be used for a primer
> on the bare spots. As you put primer on it will cover some of the
> existing paint along with the bare area. My understanding is that
> putting oil base over latex is a 'nono', so should I use latex primer
> and forget about determining what the existing paint is. My feeling is
> that oil base primer is best if I can use it!!!
> MinnJim

I will be repainting with a latex paint

On Aug 21, 10:02 pm, MinnJim <[email protected]> wrote:

> I will be repainting with a latex paint

Why? For 100% compatibility, use oil. Never wonder if that flake,
bubble or moldy spot is caused by a lack of adhesion. If you use oil
and it does that, you would know it was bad prep. If it was latex on
top of the old oil paint, I think you would always wonder...

Some of those old resins are nothign but hard plastic after 10 - 20
years of exposure.

A 70 year old house probably has 7 -10 coats of oil based paint on it
now if it has been maintained, and you may not get much traction for
your latex.

For me it has been 50/50. I buy the best latex I can get and use that
when the owners don't want oil, and I am hitting about 80% with no
problems. I always test a window trim or something like that though,
and give it a couple of weeks or a month before I start. (They
usually want test colors anyway on the house).

Good luck!

Robert