Painting Homes in Kenya, Painting Houses in Kenya

Painting Homes in Kenya, Painting Houses in Kenya

Painting Homes in Kenya, Painting Houses in Kenya; with the surge in home renovations in Kenya during the COVID 19 pandemic period as more people work from home, there is a need to know how a successful painting exercise can be undertaken. There is need for adequate planning for painting, which should be started well in advance to take care of occasions like rains, exams, weddings etc. Preparation work like masonry work, crack filling, water proofing etc. should be preferably done before commencing the actual painting work. This is also necessary to increase the life span of the final paint product. This final product should be perfected by proper colour scheming and selection of brushes or roller. It is also important to choose the correct paint which is durable.

Cement plastered surfaces with new Portland cement concrete and renderings are strongly alkaline, and for this reason solvent based paints when applied to them, are subject to saponification and bleaching. In addition, there is a risk of damage by efflorescence. Solvent based paints should not be used on such surfaces, until several months for drying of the material have passed, but earlier decoration may be carried out with cement paints or silicate paints.

Surface Preparation

It is most important that any substrate, whether it has been painted previously or not, should be in a fit condition to receive paint. To be ready for painting, a surface should be clean, dry and sound, and it should, as far as possible, also have reached a stable state.

1. Manual hand cleaning: To remove rust, scale or old coatings with the use of sandpaper, wire brushes, scrapers etc for spot cleaning during normal maintenance.
2. Surface washing: To remove salt deposits and grime with lukewarm water containing 1 to 2% detergent. After that the surface is to be dried, lightly wire brushed and sand papered. This is useful where only the finishing coat of paint shows signs of deterioration and the primary coat of paint is sufficiently in good condition
3. Temporary coatings: When painting can not immediately follow surface preparation, the temporary coatings will be applied with the use of linseed oil applied uniformly and thinly or prefabrication primers.

Painting or Coating of Plastered Surfaces

Painting on plastered surfaces should be started only after ensuring that the surface is ready for paint application and there would not be any defect likely to be occurred after drying of the final finish. The painting operations generally include the primer coat, under coat and finishing coat to get the final finish as desired.

• First Primer Coat: It is applied to provide adhesion between the paint film and the surface. It makes the surface smooth and less absorbent and increases the spreading capacity of the paint.
• Application of Putty: This is done to fill the minor cracks and surface imperfections. Drying time for putty is normally 5-6 hrs.
• Second Primer Coat: This is applied to sandwich putty between two primer coats, since painting directly on putty leads to a patchy appearance.
• Final Coat: Generally two coats must be applied to get the desired finish and colour. Each coat must be completely dry before the next one is applied. Drying times for different paints vary due to their composition.

Jongonga Contractors have undertaken several painting projects over the years and the following links testify to that:-