The Lemon Fool

It is that time of year again and I have just been buying my usual Cuprinol Ducksback fence paint. I do not know what others think but something awful has happened to it in the last year or two since I last bought any. I applied it by brush having given it a good stir and after the first coat it is very hit and miss and does not even cover the previous paint properly. It is as if it is too thin or something. It changes colour as well, as it dries but that is not really an issue. After a second coat it is a bit better and after the third it is fine. I have been applying paint in all sorts of situations inside and out for many years and feel I have got a good idea what it is about.

This is on previously painted wood so it should key with no problem and it is not soaking into the wood. Forums on the internet confirm what I have found. I would be pleased to hear from others and if you are thinking of buying Cuprinol, I would think again very carefully. It is from the same stable as Dulux and it is not what it was either. My painter and decorator complains about paint in general these days, health and safety measures apparently, but this paint is just hopeless.

Dood

General issue I have with wood treatments is that our green friends appear to have stopped manufacturers making truly oil based treatments. You have to be really careful becuase many products with oil in the name are still water based. Forumlations that used to be trusted have changed. I haven't yet found anything water based that's any use. I simply don't treat fences any more, it's a waste of my time. All the modern treatments seem to form a skin on top of the wood, they don't soak in.

It's far too expensive for fences, but the only decent wood treatments I know of these days is the Osmo Oil range. Others may know better than I.

BullDog wrote:It's far too expensive for fences, but the only decent wood treatments I know of these days is the Osmo Oil range. Others may know better than I.

Screwfix do No nonsense Decking oil that is still oil, rather than the branded water based rubbish in the green tin who's name I have managed to banish from my nightmares.

For fences I was unsing Barretine stuff from Toolstation (they also do other oil based stuff) but it was not cheap at £20 a tin, and I now see it is £35 per time which will n reality do both sides of 3 or 4 6x6ft panels. You only have to use that every 2 years and after a decade you may as well not bother and replace the panels.

Paul

DrFfybes wrote:

BullDog wrote:It's far too expensive for fences, but the only decent wood treatments I know of these days is the Osmo Oil range. Others may know better than I.

Screwfix do No nonsense Decking oil that is still oil, rather than the branded water based rubbish in the green tin who's name I have managed to banish from my nightmares.

For fences I was unsing Barretine stuff from Toolstation (they also do other oil based stuff) but it was not cheap at £20 a tin, and I now see it is £35 per time which will n reality do both sides of 3 or 4 6x6ft panels. You only have to use that every 2 years and after a decade you may as well not bother and replace the panels.

Paul

Funny you should say that. We had rear and side 6' panels renewed and the suppliers who make as well as install the panels told us to not bother trying to treat them. When you think of the time involved and the cost of a decent treatment, you understand why they said that. They've faded to a not unpleasant grey patina.

Dod101 wrote:My painter and decorator complains about paint in general these days, health and safety measures apparently, but this paint is just hopeless.

Dood

Topical for me because yesterday I re-opened a hardly used year old 5 litre can of B&Q white satinwood to paint my bathroom radiator. A single coat should have been sufficient to spruce up the slightly yellowed rad but, despite stirring it for ages and ages and loading up the brush, one coat made almost no difference to the appearance of the rad so I did a test application on a piece of card and discovered that it looked translucent as though there was insufficient pigment solids in it.
I've used B&Q paint a lot over the years and never had such a problem like this before even when the left over paint is years old.

BullDog wrote:General issue I have with wood treatments is that our green friends appear to have stopped manufacturers making truly oil based treatments. You have to be really careful becuase many products with oil in the name are still water based.

Sikkens AZ is still a proper oil and I use it indoors.

Outdoors I've gone to a water base, Bedec MSP.
Bedec also do a Barn Black which might be suitable for fences.

I've never painted a fence, indeed it's nigh on 42 years since we had a fence, and that was oak and I wouldn't have dreamt of painting it. Nowadays, hedges....

Cuprinol do a Garden Paint, no idea if it's any good.

V8

The eco numpties have done it again

Its now better/ cheaper not to treat/ paint fence panels


Just replace when required"……so much for the environment

I am glad it is not just me. I will use the paint I have bought but will never buy it again that is for sure.

Dod

mutantpoodle wrote:The eco numpties have done it again

Its now better/ cheaper not to treat/ paint fence panels


Just replace when required"……so much for the environment

I'm not sure what the problem is. Replacing renewable wood periodically is better for the environment than polluting the atmosphere with VoCs, Shirley?

I used ducksback on my shed a couple of times and found it to be rubbish (5 years protection - you're having a laugh). After experimenting with a few different products I've settled on Cuprinol Shades which is far better and long lasting. Much more expensive though so probably not suitable for a large areas of fencing.

88V8 wrote:Cuprinol do a Garden Paint, no idea if it's any good.

The Cuprinol Garden Shades paint is more of a decorative emulsion than a preservative, but with that proviso, it's still pretty good. I bought a 2.5 litre can the other day to re-do some trellis that I hadn't touched for ten or fifteen years, and it went on fine and covered well. Prices are all over the place - you can pay £34 at Wickes or £18 from Amazon.

You want two or three coats if you're starting from raw wood, but that's hardly a burden because it dries in an hour or so. It goes on light and gets darker as it dries.

Which reminds me. Somewhere or other, I have a couple of left-over cans of Cuprinol Five Star preservative treatment (clear) which we bought thirty years ago when we were restoring Bungee Towers, and these days it'll cost you the price of a small bungalow. (Minor exaggeration, possibly. ) It probably also contains chemicals that are now banned. Soaks straight in and bloody effective, though.

BJ

My personal guideline is firstly to try my best to only buy real oil based treatment. Secondly avoid anything that dries to a film on top of the wood. Without fail, sun and frost soon destroys it and the remnants look a mess. It's getting much more difficult.

Proper craftsman at work

https://invidious.flokinet.to/watch?v=690fp9Q-H48

I haven't painted our fence which was untreated and a few years old when we moved in 20 years ago. It looks nicely weathered and natural. A couple of years ago I checked the posts which had started to rot at ground level so reinforced them with concrete spurs. To be honest, I did three using a hired breaker to remove the subterranean area of post and ensure the new concrete foundations were good and it was so exhausting I got our local handyman to do the rest.

My neighbour paints his fence every two years. It looks a bit artificial after the treatment. Five of his panels blew over last winter because the posts gave way. They are now repaired and reinforced with spurs.

Admittedly just the experience of two similar fences installed by the same building contractor but I'd conclude it's not worth painting fence panels and they look better untreated.

regards

Howard

Painting the fence as we speak. It'll look good for a couple of years at least.

Ronseal one coat fence life. Liars!

Right. Best crack on!

Mike4 wrote:I'm not sure what the problem is. Replacing renewable wood periodically is better for the environment than polluting the atmosphere with VoCs, Shirley?

"Copper bottomed investment"? Bar Humbug. The Greek's had it right when it came to wood.

The ship wherein Theseus and the youth of Athens returned from Crete had thirty oars, and was preserved by the Athenians down even to the time of Demetrius Phalereus, for they took away the old planks as they decayed, putting in new and stronger timber in their places, in so much that this ship became a standing example among the philosophers, for the logical question of things that grow; one side holding that the ship remained the same, and the other contending that it was not the same.

— Plutarch

Urbandreamer wrote:

Mike4 wrote:I'm not sure what the problem is. Replacing renewable wood periodically is better for the environment than polluting the atmosphere with VoCs, Shirley?

"Copper bottomed investment"? Bar Humbug. The Greek's had it right when it came to wood.

The ship wherein Theseus and the youth of Athens returned from Crete had thirty oars, and was preserved by the Athenians down even to the time of Demetrius Phalereus, for they took away the old planks as they decayed, putting in new and stronger timber in their places, in so much that this ship became a standing example among the philosophers, for the logical question of things that grow; one side holding that the ship remained the same, and the other contending that it was not the same.

— Plutarch

An early example of Trigger's broom?

--kiloran

Howard wrote:I haven't painted our fence which was untreated and a few years old when we moved in 20 years ago. It looks nicely weathered and natural. A couple of years ago I checked the posts which had started to rot at ground level so reinforced them with concrete spurs. To be honest, I did three using a hired breaker to remove the subterranean area of post and ensure the new concrete foundations were good and it was so exhausting I got our local handyman to do the rest.

My neighbour paints his fence every two years. It looks a bit artificial after the treatment. Five of his panels blew over last winter because the posts gave way. They are now repaired and reinforced with spurs.

Admittedly just the experience of two similar fences installed by the same building contractor but I'd conclude it's not worth painting fence panels and they look better untreated.

regards

Howard

I would never treat fence panels. I had them in my previous house and they last for a few years and then had to be replaced. For my current boundaries, I inherited hedges which must be at least 10 feet high and when my neighbour decided he wanted a fence, my late wife said to him 'You do know that birds do not nest in fences, John?' She did not exactly approve.

Anyway my current painting job is not particularly big but seems to me to be important. It is a 6 foot wooden gate with timber straps on each side, facing my road. It infuriates me that paint manufacturers (so called) are unable to produce a product that can be applied and with two coats can be guaranteed to look good.

Dod

Dod101 wrote:

Howard wrote:I haven't painted our fence which was untreated and a few years old when we moved in 20 years ago. It looks nicely weathered and natural. A couple of years ago I checked the posts which had started to rot at ground level so reinforced them with concrete spurs. To be honest, I did three using a hired breaker to remove the subterranean area of post and ensure the new concrete foundations were good and it was so exhausting I got our local handyman to do the rest.

My neighbour paints his fence every two years. It looks a bit artificial after the treatment. Five of his panels blew over last winter because the posts gave way. They are now repaired and reinforced with spurs.

Admittedly just the experience of two similar fences installed by the same building contractor but I'd conclude it's not worth painting fence panels and they look better untreated.

regards

Howard

I would never treat fence panels. I had them in my previous house and they last for a few years and then had to be replaced. For my current boundaries, I inherited hedges which must be at least 10 feet high and when my neighbour decided he wanted a fence, my late wife said to him 'You do know that birds do not nest in fences, John?' She did not exactly approve.

Anyway my current painting job is not particularly big but seems to me to be important. It is a 6 foot wooden gate with timber straps on each side, facing my road. It infuriates me that paint manufacturers (so called) are unable to produce a product that can be applied and with two coats can be guaranteed to look good.

Dod

They can't because our green friends won't allow them to.

Dod101 wrote:I have just been buying my usual Cuprinol Ducksback fence paint. I do not know what others think but something awful has happened to it in the last year or two since I last bought any. I applied it by brush having given it a good stir and after the first coat it is very hit and miss and does not even cover the previous paint properly. It is as if it is too thin or something. It changes colour as well, as it dries but that is not really an issue.

Perhaps Ducksback is even thin enough now to spray instead of brush.
Ducksback - at least the Forest Oak shade I have used for ages - did always change colour markedly; starts out a garish light brown and after a few hours dries to a more gentlemanly dark brown.
I add 2% BAC50 (benzalkonium chloride) to the mix when staining rough wood to prevent green lichen forming. Although not caustic, it needs goggles though and not just safety glasses...