On Sat, 06 Nov 2004 22:19:55 GMT, "Leon"
wrote:

Oil-based is a great product, but is considered much less convenient by
most painters, professional and otherwise. The solvents for cleaning are
a
challenge, compared to cleanup with soap and water.

I have to disagree with you here. My partner and I pant probably 3 houses a
year on average. We much prefer oil based paints for clean up. Thinner
will clean a brush 5 times faster than soap and water will clean latex pased
paints. We use both and much prefer oil based at clean up time. We do all
woodwork with oil based and all walls with latex.

I painted houses full time for a few years, mainly Victorians,
back in the days when "NL" was still proudly known as
National Lead Industries :-) Like you, we usually used oil
on the outside, latex on the inside. Cleanup *was* quicker
after oil but some of our customers didn't appreciate the
smell. Since we used expensive brushes we had to clean
well. . But nowadays most do-it-yourselfers are either
going to throw away the brushes and rollers when they are done,
or toss them out when they go to use them again a year or
two later and find out that they're stiff because they weren't
cleaned enough the last time around: they're usually cheap gear
anyway. Couple that with the fact that oil paint is a pain to deal
with on clothes, floors, and other things it's spilled on unless
you deal with it right away, it's not surprising that box stores
are phasing out oil paint.