Tuesday, June 29, 2010

New Project!

No, not knitting... I'm stripping the paint off some old metal chairs my brother gave me a couple years ago. They will be repainted a wonderful color & they will become part of my outdoor set once they're refurbished. We are using his power drill and some wire wheels. I started the chair Sunday night and Keegan has put a few hours in Monday & today. We're not making a lot of progress but I have to admit that it's more than a little addictive using the power drill to remove the FOUR layers of thick paint on these chairs. From the outside, down to metal, the layers are black, white, robin's egg blue, & teal blue. There is also some small degree of rust which I thought would be a LOT worse once I got going but it's not worse than surface discoloration so far.



I was pretty sure the rust was the cause of most of the bubbles and disfigured patterning, but it turns out it's the layers of misbegotten paint forming warped bumps. Once you get down to the metal there's no rust pockets and the design is very delineated. I think once we get this tedious paint removal done with, the chairs will turn out lovely. Above is the before picture of one. Below is the one Keegan is working on now.



That's Sunday evening when he started. Now most of the bottom is done and we're getting ready to move onto a new part of the chair. It's very slow going, but it's addictive work. I'm worried about Scot's drill overheating or breaking from the hours of constant use. I hope he's in a forgiving mood if it happens. :)



Here's the seat bottom as of tonight, at bedtime. I really want to work on it some more myself, but I only got a few minutes in before we had to do other stuff. I'm eager to go to a local hardware store & see if I can't find some more wire wheels too. Something to get into the little crevices and corners.

I'm getting excited about the color possibilities now too. I think I've settled on a yellowy-cream color for them, with details hand-painted in corals & greens but I'm not 100% sure. If you've got any ideas, be sure to share them with me. I personally love how they remind me of Dresden Plate quilts and a white and blue color scheme isn't entirely ruled-out either!




-Regan-

(By the way, the set I have is a bounce-chair and a rocker. Both appear to be in fantastic condition now that I've started removing the paint. This is a set that was made sometime between the 1930's - 1950's and it's in a very rare "Piecrust" pattern. That's an FYI in case you're interested in old stuff like I am.)

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