Painting my cabinet, need info...

[Warborg]

Well, I am trying to decide what to do as for as my Showcase...  Right now it's in 2 separate colors, and obviously I want it one color...  It's veneered (sp?) currently (I know, duh), but I was wondering if it's possible to primer/paint on top of the veneer?  Will the primer actually stick to it, is there any prep work that I should do prior to painting on this type of surface, if it will even work at all?

And help would be appreciated...

[rampy]

hmm... I was faced with the same dilemna originally with a faux wood grain laminate on my Taito cabinet.

My laminate was in rough shape as you can see here... actually it wasn't bad except for the missing chips.

Originally I was going to fill in the depressions left by the missing laminate with putty... rough up the laminate a little with sandpaper, clean, and killz/primer, and then paint.  I believe it would "stick" fine giving a proper priming.  I also think it would have been easier to scrape than painting on to wood.

What I ended up doing because the laminate was old, and the glue somewhat dried out, adn there was a starting point (the broken off pieces)... I went nutz with a putty knife and a hammer to work off the laminate...

That ended up working pretty good (took about 2 hours)  BUT  there may have been some contact cement residue left on the particle board   (it's hard to tell as the cabinet has been converted so many times it could be a multitude of things) that gave a slight dimpled texture to the wood (not perfectly smooth) and seemed to have a sheen (kinda looked like/coulda been a clear coat that was only partially sanded down prior to lamination way back in the day)  I took forever to sand it down... even with a hand sander... and I didn't really get all of it off...

There's a point to this rambling BTW... you might be better off with a heat gun to soften the glue, and possibly a wood safe solvent/stripper to remove any film/finish etc that may be under there IF you decide to remove the laminate.

So... with that background of my experience with removing laminate in mind... I'd say if you wanted to do it right, get the right tools (heat gun/contact cement remover putty knife/etc) and remove the existing laminate... ideally re-laminate in the one color of your choice, but you can paint if you do a good job with surface preparation.

That's just my opinion... you can probably get away with priming/painting and having it look decent, I just don't know how much of a longterm/ideal solution that'll be... know what I mean?

good luck,

rampy

[neuromancer]

Well, I am trying to decide what to do as for as my Showcase...  Right now it's in 2 separate colors, and obviously I want it one color...  It's veneered (sp?)

Veneer? Like real thin wood? You can paint that.

If it has a finish like panneling, you need to either lightly sand it or use a commercial "deglosser"

If you mean plastic laminate, paint will work "OK", but it won't ever stick well.

When in doubt, find a hidden bit and try it out first.

Bob

[Mike]

I painted right over the gray laminate on my cabinet. I primed it with kilz and painted it a satin red. It took alot of coats but it looks good. I filled small chips with putty and I put on 3 coats of primer sanding between each coat. I used a 4" roller to paint it. Like I said it turned out good.

[Warborg]

I painted right over the gray laminate on my cabinet. I primed it with kilz and painted it a satin red. It took alot of coats but it looks good. I filled small chips with putty and I put on 3 coats of primer sanding between each coat. I used a 4" roller to paint it. Like I said it turned out good.

Do you have any pics of how it turned out?  I'd love to see it...

I had a suggestion to maybe try using Krylon paint on it, as it's something that you can use on automotive interiors (like a vinyl dashpad) and it will actually stick where other paints won't...

[ashardin]

I had a pair of really nice sounding MTX speakers given to me that had that horrible 80's veneer on it.  After giving up plans to take that damn stuff off, I simply sanded it with a 60 grit with my automatic sander, puttied any imperfections (it had a couple of nicks), then sanded it with 120 grit, 250 grit and a finish sanding of 400 grit.

I then primed, painted, and polyeuthaned as if it was normal wood.  They turned out very nice.  So I did the same thin on my Taito cabinet that had that yellow and green "sticker" on the sides.  Turned out just as nice.

I'm sure there is a good reason not to do this, but my finished products turned out great.  So that is what I base my experiences from.  Take your time, and I'm sure your results will be just as good.

[liche]

My friend who has his own arcade business (owns and rents out over 2,000 machines) said the best way to paint a cabinet is the following:

1.  Use something like 60 grit sandpaper to just "roughen" up the existing side-art (decal).  

2.  Then using one of those yellow foam rollers, use a good oil paint and apply one or two coats.

3.  The finished paint job looks very well done and if roughened up enough, the paint job will take on a nice textured look.

4.  One of the things not to do is to sand the decal art completely.  You only want to roughen up the decals enough to hold paint.

Later

[Nannuu]

Just a note for painting.  If you want a glassy look to the paint you can lay the cabinet parallel to the floor and roll on the paint.  Once you get a nice uniform thick coat, use an old Windex spray bottle (or similar) to lightly spray mineral spirits over the top of the wet paint.  It takes longer to dry, but it removes the bumpy texture.  Obviously only use this if you are interested in a smooth shiny finish.