How To Keep Paint From Bleeding Under Tape On Textured Walls

How to Prevent Painter's Tape From Bleeding

Unless you're a legendary painter who tin can do directly lines with just a paintbrush, you need masking tape to make crisp lines betwixt different-colored walls or to make stripes on the wall.

2 simple techniques help you create crisp lines.

You need the right tape, and you need to use information technology properly, but these steps aren't enough -- y'all too demand a technique to preclude seepage, especially on a textured wall. Two like shooting fish in a barrel procedures ensure clean, straight lines that all beholders tin can consider legendary.

Employ the Right Tape Correctly

Non all types of masking tape are suitable for detail painting, so brand sure y'all read the label earlier making your purchase. Painter's tape is blue or green; tan masking tape has a potent adhesive that can pull the pigment off from underneath information technology. Some varieties -- which are normally green -- contain a polymer that is activated by latex pigment. Because such tape varieties tin can actually prevent bleeding, they are the best selection -- especially for textured surfaces. Clean all dust and crud off the surface earlier applying this tape, and avoid stretching it as you lot lay it. Score the edge with a putty knife.

Pigment With Two Colors

Painter's tape makes a direct line, merely if y'all want a perfect line with no hint of bleeding, you need to perform one of two procedures. The commencement is the easier of the two, only you'll need the paint colors on both sides of the line. After laying the record, pigment over the border that forms the edge between the 2 colors with the color that'due south underneath the tape, and let that paint dry out. Information technology seals the border, and when you pigment over it with the the second colour, none of that colour can seep. When y'all carefully remove the record subsequently the paint dries, no seepage will be evident.

Apply a Bead of Caulk

Some painters prefer to use caulk to reinforce the edge of the masking tape, and information technology's your best pick if y'all don't have both paint colors. After pressing downwards the edge of the tape with a putty knife, spread a thin bead of paintable caulk forth the edge and wipe it flat with your finger, forcing what remains into the small-scale gap underneath the tape. Pigment immediately and remove the record before the caulk has a chance to dry -- if yous look too long, the tape may pull off your fresh paint.

If you're a perfectionist -- and legendary painters usually are -- you may want an alternative to a putty knife, which has a large, coarsely honed blade. You tin brand your own tool from a short slice of iii/iv- by three/4-inch close-grained hardwood, such equally maple or alder. Cutting the stop at a 15- to 30-degree bending with a chop saw to form a sharp edge, and employ this to press down the border of the tape and tool the caulk. The edge is almost as precipitous equally a pocketknife, and the wood has enough flexibility to follow textures closely without damaging the wall.