Refinishing Kitchen Cabinets
 

Refinishing Kitchen Cabinets

I am about to have my kitchen cabinets ‘sanded, primed, and painted’.

I am planning to use a ‘water-based’ Latex primer.
I want to use the best Primer, in order to hide as much of the oak grain as possible before painting. I plan to lightly sand the Primer before applying two coats of paint. Obviously, I will be sanding first, before applying the Primer

As there are many brands of Primer, and for different surfaces,I’d like the Forum to give me some recommendations.
one by a professional.

Just a FYI, I am having a professional do the actual work, I’m just providing , the materials. I need to purchase material in advance.

Thanks for your feedback, greatly appreciated !

BEHR primer, Home Depot.

https://www.homedepot.com/p/BEHR-1-G...3601/100205766

Alan

The pro didn't make a suggestion?

Most of the primers that I know of seal and cover/hide... but I do not have a real knowledge of how they effect grain in a hardwood.

Water-based in softwood can cause grain ''pop''... but I do not know about oak.

..... love the paint ..... hate the color!
 

Googled ' kitchen cabinet primer' and at $54.98/gal, Behr 1 Gal White Bonding Interior/Exterior at Home Depot is the most expensive, so go with that!

On the other hand, E M Heath's Hdwe in Centre Harbor usually has a shelf loaded with reject custom colors, where the customer was unhappy with the color and brought it back, that gets reduced from $50 or something down to just five bucks/gal for a Ben Moore brand gal of paint or primer.

So, go to Heath's in Centre Harbor and keep your fingers crossed for a $65-gal of Ben Moore STIX reduced down to five bucks. What the hell ...... it's primer so the color don't matter too much!

You know what they say ....... "this is absolutely, incredibly excellent quality paint ...... it's just the color that I hate! ....... :emb:

I don't know what the finish is on your cabinets. I painted some oak cabinets that had a shiny finish but I didn't do anything to prepare them. I used a color tinted bonding primer and a second coat with the actual color. That was 10 years ago and they still look fine.

I have same senario as you did, oak cabinets with a shiny finish.
That said, I did some research, and one of the best choices based on my research, is a Sherwin William product:
https://www.lowes.com/pd/HGTV-HOME-b...-QT/5014537523
It has bonding features to ensure that when paint is applied, wil not peel, and and has good hiding qualities.

You made a great point about 'tinting' the primer, this will help hiding flaws in wood-grain pop.

Thanks !

If they are shiny... there shouldn't be any grain pop.

A normal refinishing kit has deglosser - so you don't have to sand, a bonding primer, and a high gloss finish layer that has to be tinted to color. I think Rustoleum is the most noted.

I am surprised that the "pro" is having you purchase materials, and even more surprised that he isn't telling you what to buy. My brother is a professional painter (as was my dad), and we had him refinish our bathroom cabinets. I may be biased, but the cabinets came out looking like a factory finish. Prep work, product and an expert spray job are the key components to a great job. Make sure he removes all of the doors and drawers and sprays them at a shop having an ultra clean environment. It takes many coats to produce the desired finish.

I can ask my brother what product to use, but I highly recommend that you go with someone who can handle it for you.

I have a buddy of mine that refinishes bathroom tubs and tile. He did my cabinets 10 years ago and used oil base paint, spayed not brushed or rolled. They have held up pretty well.
I would think that the painter would want to use his own paint if he's going to stand behind his work.

Unfortunately, oil based paints are a thing of the past. I recently had my bathroom and spare bedrooms remodeled (2022-2023) and asked for oil based trim paint. My brother got the last two gallons at a store in Moultonboro. It is my understanding that going forward there will be latex paint only.

You can still buy oil based paint, just not at a home improvement store. Rustoleum spray paint is mostly oil based. I recently stained my house with oil based stain.
Laytex paint would never last on a bathtub. My buddy still uses oil based paint for all his bathtubs, tile, and kitchens. His tub repaints last well over 15 years and then he has people calling him back to do them again. I don't know if he uses the same paint on cabinets that he uses on tubs and tile.

Oil for a tub? I would have guess the epoxy that we have on the shelf.

We don't see as much oil interior as we used to, simply because most surfaces painted by the homeowners are sheetrock with some wood trim. The water-based has less of a ''smell'' (VOC) to it; and holds up well for those uses.

Obviously we have oil-based primers to seal the wood... and BIN Shellac is preferred by many.

And most decent painters can apply a high gloss acrylic latex paint over the oil or shellac primer getting the durability.

The factories tend to use the laquer as it sprays easier with fewer imperfections due to the flash dry time; so much easier to layer coats and not wait.

My wife painted our oak cabinets white 10 or 12 years ago. She went to a “Walls of Decor” store and asked the guy what she should do. Her recommended special primer that was for that specific use. Unfortunately, neither of us remember what it was. You might try going the same route at a specialty paint store.


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I don't know what he uses on tubs and tile but I do know he still uses oil based paint on kitchen cabinets.

I know about 5 years ago I refinished the top of a black kitchen Table. I went to Ace Hardware and they sold me a qt of oil based primer sealer, a qt of black satin latex paint, and a qt of satin finish latex polyurethane.
It's held up really well with 5 little grandkids beating on it. No chips in the paint but some surface scratches in the poly.
I'm sure I could give it a light sand and another coat of poly and it would look brand new again. The paint was Benjamin Moore. I did 2 coats of everything just because I had plenty of paint.

Oil creates that high gloss sheen and lays down very smooth.
It also is more durable a finish.

High gloss acrylic can be problematic sometimes as the humidity in the air can change the drying time... brush marks sometimes happen.

My kitchen cabinets aren't high gloss, they are a satin finish. I know it's an oil based paint because he gave me a jar of touch up paint and when it sits for a long period of time the oil and the paint separate. Every once and a while I will shake it up to mix it again.

While each of the latex and the oil come in all the sheens.
Just the higher the sheen, the harder it is to keep the latex from drying too quickly and leaving a terrible finish.

I've painted many of kitchens (new & old) through the years and have learned a lot of valuable leasons. When painting exsiting cabinetry one of the single most important steps is degreasing/cleaning the cabinetry well. I typically use TSP (Trisodium Phosphate), you should be able to get this at your local hardware store. You simply mix it with water and scrub down all the doors, drawer fronts, face frames and finish end panels. Try not to soak everything too much... I always go back over everything with a damp rag to try to pull as much of the TSP off the finished wood after. Once everything has been throughly cleaned I would scuff sand all surfaces with 320 grit sandpaper (sanding with the grain) and then vaccum and tack cloth all surfaces. Now you're ready for a high solids primmer (which will fill the grain to certain extent), it will not completley fill the oak grain, but it will do a decent job.

I would recommend a high quality cabinet paint & primer. I use exclusivly water-based primers and topcoats in either 1k or 2k with added catalyst. Some of the brands I would highly recommend would be ML Campbell, Acroma, Renner, Milesi, Icro, Sayerlack and Shermin Williams has a Kem Aqua which is pretty nice and they also have a Gallery series which I've heard good things about, however, have yet to try. These products will not only give you the best results, but also offer top proforming durability and cemical resistance.

Hope this helps. Best of luck on your project! Chris