Kitchen Cabinets paint or repaint

Repaint Kitchen Cabinets, Refinish Kitchen Cabinets, Reface Kitchen Cupboards

There are many ways to rejuvenate your kitchen cabinets. Some ways are very inexpensive and some will cost more depending on the tools you have, but even the most expensive (buying the necessary tools) will cost a fraction of the cost of new cabinets and you have the benefit of some new tools for other projects.

Custom Search

Minwax Tung Oil Finish

Rockler 100% Pure Tung Oil

Furniture Cleaner

0000 Steel Wool

"Green" Pure Turpentine

Prepare Your Kitchen Cabinets

Custom Cabinet Door Program

It makes life and a kitchen cabinet painting job a lot easier to make all preparations first. Some sawhorses are a must. You can make them real easy. Use Saw Horse Brackets, a pair for each sawhorse. Each sawhorse will require four 2 x 4 legs, cut to a length comfortable for you, and a 2 x 4 cross piece, about two and a half or three feet long. Looking at the brackets as a robot terrier, each leg is inserted up through the bottom of the jowl and the cross piece goes between the ears. There is a swivel point on the forehead, so the sawhorse can be folded and hung on the garage wall.

There are holes to nail or screw the brackets to the 2 x 4s. I always used screws so a leg could be replaced as necessary. Two eight foot 2 x 4s set between two sawhorses will give ample work area to set up several kitchen cabinet doors at a time. Get the cheapest 2 x 4s that you can, they may be irregular, but they don't need to be pretty.

Plans to build Portable saw horses are pretty reasonably priced and the sawhorses are easy to store too.

Mark the doors

Mark the kitchen cabinet doors in some manner, use a bit of masking tape with a number or something to identify which door goes to which opening. It can be a major hair tearing jigsaw puzzle trying to match doors to openings and screwholes if they aren't identified. A more positive method is to use die number stamps which make an impression in the top or bottom of the door. They're there forever so you don't need to worry about the stripping and finishing process removing tape or marker numbers.

Hinges

Remove the kitchen cabinet doors including the Hinges from the cupboard fronts and lay them on your sawhorse work table and remove the rest of the hardware. While you have the cabinet hardware off, it's a good idea to clean it well with 0000 steel wool.

If you're a wife, the preparation is definitely a benefit and will save time, but you'll probably have to clean up the final mess in either case.

Clean the Surfaces of Your Kitchen Cabinets

Before you scowl at me too hard, I know you keep your kitchen cabinets clean, but hygienically clean isn't always enough for redoing kitchen cabinets. No matter how well your kitchen is ventilated or how healthy your diet and cooking are, there is always a small amount of residue on the surface of your kitchen cabinets. If you like bacon and eggs for breakfast, a fried hamburger for lunch and a fried or broiled steak for dinner, then there is a bunch of residue. One little pin head of grease will cause a clear finish or paint to make a little crater with ridges and no matter how you coax the crater won't fill until the grease is gone.

Prelude Furniture Cleaner and Orange Oil are two of the best cleaners for removing the unseen greasy residue that can be harmful to a kitchen cabinet painting job. Besides doing a good job of cleaning, the Orange Oil gives a pleasant scent of a freshly peeled orange. It's always a good idea to try new chemicals in a small area first.

Repaint Kitchen Cupboards

If the old finish, either paint or clear finish is sound and attached firmly to the surface, use it as a base for painting, it will save hours of work building it up to the point where it is now and will generally give a smooth base surface.

One tried and true method for painting kitchen cabinets, after a thorough cleaning, use a liquid deglosser. That should remove all traces of grease, but to be extra sure of a good, smooth surface, under coat with Kilz spray, or KILZ brush on. KILZ will cover crayon, lipstick, ball point pen or almost anything else that regular paint will stick its tongue out at and totally avoid. After applying the KILZ, following label instructions, you're ready to apply the final coat.

Metal Kitchen Cabinets

The above methods work equally well on metal kitchen cabinets. In fact, you will save yourself a huge amount of frustration it you don't strip the old finish off of metal kitchen cabinets, but use several coats of Kilz primer, sanding between coats, on chips and scratches, until they are feathered and smooth with the surrounding area. Just use the primer where it's necessary, not over the whole area.

Other Kitchen Cabinet Finishes

Other methods of redoing your kitchen cabinets will be covered on separate pages.