Hello, I seem to be in a bit of a mess. I live in a tiny studio in NYC
and recently discovered that my door frames inside the apartment are
metal. I decided I wanted to have the exposed metal and did
appropriate research on lead paint removal - the building was built in
1927, so lead paint was definitely in there. There are probably about
15 layers of paint on the frames. After 12 hours of working, I still
don't have all the paint off one door frame and am ready to quit.
Since the paint layers are in various layers of removal, the paint on
these frames is in uneven layers. Is there anything I can do to just
cover this mess up? My feeling is no, but if anyone out there has any
insight, I would appreciate your input!!

Thanks,
rc

"home_novice" writes:
Since the paint layers are in various layers of removal, the paint on
these frames is in uneven layers. Is there anything I can do to just
cover this mess up? My feeling is no, but if anyone out there has any
insight, I would appreciate your input!!

Are you asking whether you can cover it up from an aesthetic
point of view (i.e., make it not look bad) or from a safety
point of view (i.e., make the lead paint not dangerous)?

Aesthetic: I suppose you could put a skim coat of plaster on
the areas you've partially stripped to smooth them over, then
sand and paint the plaster after it dries. However, I imagine
that given the stresses placed on door frames all the time,
the plaster will start to crack rather quickly. In short, I
suspect you're probably out of luck.

Safety: There are encapsulating paints you can use to cover up
lead paint instead of stripping it. However, encapsulation is
not a safe deleading technique on "gnawable surfaces", and
door frames fall into that category, so you probably can't use
encapsulant. I don't know of any other applicable techniques
for covering up lead paint on exposed surfaces rather than
stripping it.

I guess the executive summary is that as far as I can tell
you're out of luck. Perhaps someone else will have better
ideas.

What's your motive of removing the lead paint? If you were worry about
lead poisoning then by by doing an unprofessional job of paint removal
you may have just done the worst possible scenario by scattering paint
chip that has high level of lead contain around your house.

FC

home_novice wrote:
Hello, I seem to be in a bit of a mess. I live in a tiny studio in NYC
and recently discovered that my door frames inside the apartment are
metal. I decided I wanted to have the exposed metal and did
appropriate research on lead paint removal - the building was built in
1927, so lead paint was definitely in there. There are probably about
15 layers of paint on the frames. After 12 hours of working, I still
don't have all the paint off one door frame and am ready to quit.
Since the paint layers are in various layers of removal, the paint on
these frames is in uneven layers. Is there anything I can do to just
cover this mess up? My feeling is no, but if anyone out there has any
insight, I would appreciate your input!!

Thanks,
rc