painted red bricks......AAAARRGH

Kaldorn

My house has a red brick front on it and the previous owners decided it would look great to paint these red bricks purple..i know i know absolutely crazy..anyway i spent 3 weeks sanding it by hand and although i got most of it off it still looks purple and i cant get it back to normal,i have also tried a drill with a wire bit but that just removed half the brick,I have decided I will have to paint the bricks as close to the original colour as i can get or is there something else i can look into? the bricks arent all red and are intersperesed with the odd dark brown/black brick so it is tricky...any ideas..oh by the way some of the house on the road have painted there bricks too but i think they still look bad,not half as bad as purple but bad anyway.

10-10-20

I reckon if you were to use a short-hair roller and if you prevent the roller from being overloaded with paint, you may be able to paint just the brick and leave behind the grouting (which may still be purple...) and get a better effect...

Kaldorn

hi,the grouting is actually painted black.I am not going to go near the grouting i think ill try your idea with a mixture or orangy/red paint and some dark brown for the darker bricks.

bushy...

You can get acid brick cleaner, might be worth getting a small bottle and trying it. Or you could blast it , it'd be quicker but you need to use proper media for it.

Stoner

I had this problem 3 years ago, I ended up getting a crowd called Nolan Cleaning i think they were somewhere between 400-600 euro, did a good job, but the acid stays around for ages and kills plants, but you'd need to treat the bricks afterwards

http://www.nolansmpc.ie/

6th

Christ I'm just move! Seriously you should get professional advice on this. If its purple paint then I'm guessing its not regular masonary paint ... could be oil based.

6th

Nolans are very good, I had dealings with them years ago when I was involved in the painting industry.

teflon

I found this on the net. Hope its useful.......
http://www.pavingexpert.com/cgi-bin/ib3/ikonboard.cgi?;act=ST;f=6;t=4883

John Mason

my house was painted Orange !!!!

i have spent the last 4 weeks trying to get it off. the drill bit is fecking useless

i got nitamores (sp?) and a strong wire brush. slap the nitamores on leave it for 20 mins or so and start using the brush.

it was an absolute nightmare but it worked

best of luck

Wertz

Painted brick? Sandblasting is the obvious solution but costly and you need all sorts of permits and that. Chemical stripping is also expensive, time consuming and dangerous for the amateur.

Burn off the excess film with a gas blowtorch whilst stripping with a shave hook, then move to wirebrush/sandpaper. You're never going to get it all off but it should come back up to an acceptable level. An acid wash to finish will help renew the brick too..
OP: you've got it back so far and now you're just gonna repaint? :rolleyes: Should have just painted it from the word go...

ircoha

I would externally insulate the house and kill 2 birds with the one stone