Painting A Metal Garage Door? Things You Should Know First

So, you painted the front door. It was a steel hollow-core door, and it seemed to take the paint job just fine. Now you are looking at your metal garage door with the same gleam in your eye. Before you get really excited and begin to stock up on brushes or spray cans, there are a few things you should know first about painting metal garage doors, such as:

You Need a Very Special Kind of Paint

The paint you used on the front door may not stick to the garage door. There are all kinds of outdoor paint, each specifically formulated to accomplish two things; adhere to their surface and fully cover and protect the item being painted. If you are not sure an outdoor paint can manage the garage door, you should ask a garage door professional or someone who really knows their stuff when it comes to outdoor paint.

Use a Buffer Material for the Cracks

Most metal garage doors roll up and have cracks every foot to a foot-and-a-half to allow freedom of movement for the door as it rolls up and down. While you may think you can spray paint right over these cracks, it is definitely not recommended. As the paint dries, it will become a stiff sort of filling adhesive for these cracks. Then your door will not roll up or down unless or until you take a knife and slide it along the cracks to release the door's flexibility. That can leave an unattractive mess, right on up to peeling paint and large scratches where the knife slipped while you tried to cut the cracks between door panels free.

That said, find something you can use as a buffer material. Thin pieces of newspaper can work, but it is better to use something that will easily release after the paint is dry. Some DIY homeowners like small plastic bags with a little petroleum jelly thinly slathered on the outside of the bags. It is clean and releases easily.

Plan Ahead for Painting the Parts of the Door You Do Not See

All of these metal garage doors have at least an inch of metal on each side of the doors that you cannot and do not readily see. This metal should be painted at the same time as the rest of the door, but that requires removing the door or standing precariously on a ladder in the garage with the garage door in the "up" position. If this seemingly easy project suddenly became a little more difficult, you can always hire a garage door installation technician to remove the door for you, paint it, and then reinstall it.

Contact a company like http://www.aaagaragedoorinc.com/ for more information and assistance. 

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