Repairing Dry Wood Trim Before Repainting in Riverside

Eight to ten summers of full sun is usually enough to open the grain on unprotected fascia, and the figures kept at painting contractor riverside black tea society show this happening on homes of every age. A painting contractor in Riverside, CA sorts the dry, cracked trim on a Queen Anne porch from the plain sun checking on a mid-century eave before choosing what to fix and what to coat.

Rot or sun checking

Sun checking runs along the grain in thin, shallow lines, and the wood underneath is hard. Rot is soft. A screwdriver tip pressed into a suspect board goes in easily where the wood has decayed, and the surface may feel spongy or crumble. Rot at a window sill or at the end of a fascia board gets cut out and replaced, since no coat of paint stops decay.

Sanding down to sound wood

Loose paint is scraped, and the edges are feathered with sanding until the step between old paint and bare wood is gone. Where gray, weathered wood shows, a scuff sand and a wipe-down give the bare fibers a clean face. Old trim on houses from the 1800s may carry layers of older paint, so crews take care with dust and scrape wet where required.

Filler, spackle and caulk

Deep checks and small holes take an exterior wood filler, pressed in slightly proud and sanded flush once hard. Interior spackle fails outdoors. Joints between trim boards and at window casings move with heat, so a flexible acrylic latex caulk goes in after priming, not before. Patching an open joint with paint alone hides it for a month at best.

Priming bare wood

Bare wood gets primer on every face, including end grain and the back of boards when they are off the house. An oil based primer seals tannin and dry grain well, and stain-blocking latex primers work on newer wood. A repaint over bare wood without primer soaks in, chalks and peels within a season.

Topcoat on trim

Trim takes two coats of a satin or semi gloss enamel, because the harder sheen sheds dirt and water. A small roller covers flat boards, and a brush handles the cut in at the edges. Coverage on porous wood is thin, so the second coat matters.

Eaves take the sun first

Eaves and fascia on mid-century tract homes face constant sun and little shade, so they fail first. Fixing them before the walls means the ladder goes up once, and the walls below do not get splashed with fresh paint or dust.