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Paint Sprayer vs. Roller: Which one is the Best to use?

Paint Sprayers

One of the best attributes about paint sprayers is the fact that they leave the smoothest of surfaces. This attribute makes sprayers an excellent choice when it comes to finishing furniture and cabinets. While you can use sprayers to paint trim, ceilings, and walls, it’s highly prudent to cover adjacent areas that you don’t intend to paint to prevent the sprayer from getting on them. Because paint has to be thinned for spraying, runs and drips can occur heavily if you don’t apply heavy coats.

Why You Should Use A Paint Sprayer:

Countless advantages exist as to why you should use airless sprayers compare to conventional painting methods such as brushes or rollers. Granted, not all situations call for sprayers. However, if you need to lay down countless gallons over vast surfaces, paint sprayers are indeed the best choice.

Here are some of the reasons you should use the best paint sprayers:

Large Coverage Area and Time Efficiency

Speed is one of the most popular advantages of using a paint sprayer. They boast the ability to spray plenty of paint within a short period thus allowing users to cover vast surfaces in a limited amount of time. Painting huge walls is a perfect area of the application when it comes to using paint sprayer. You should be aware of vast paint volumes are pumped through the gun. That can have two major side effects, one being roughly 15% of the volume can get lost in the atmosphere. Secondly, your painting surface can suffer from overspray.

Even Coating Application

Paint sprayers are ideal for making sure you achieve a uniform and perfect coating. With rollers and brushes, you could end up with some lines or marks on your final job. Paint sprayers blast out your paint into small droplets that cover the whole surface evenly. That’s specifically useful if the surface is textured or uneven as every square is covered with proper application evenly.

The machines are portable. They’re powered by either electric or gas engines. With that, you’re able to transport and move around a particular job effortlessly.

The best model for any type of project:

The Graco X5 Airless Paint Sprayer is an entry level airless sprayer that produces results consistent with a higher end sprayer. It is a great value for the price and comes from a respected name. It has a durable SG2 Metal Spray Gun with an in-handle filter that blocks debris, preventing tip clogs. The paint gun is extremely lightweight and easy to use whether your project is located indoors or out. A lightweight, portable stand design makes it easy to move around the project. The Power Flush Adapter connects to a garden hose which makes clean up fast and easy. Also you can find more sprayers from Nestkoo. They reviewed a lot of top quality sprayers from the market.

Tips and Concerns

Overspraying is one of the major areas of concern when it comes to using paint sprayers. The best attribute about them is the fact that they’re adjustable meaning you can control the area much effortlessly compared to other machines. Because the sprayer covers vast areas in every stroke, it’s highly possible for everything that’s not covered to get painted. Therefore, always mask each area that you don’t want to be painted. You should also cover up all furniture before starting paint spraying.

Rollers

Paint rollers are effective at painting big flat areas such as ceilings and walls. Because rollers leave a textured surface, they aren’t the best if you desire a smooth finish, such as on cabinets, trim and woodwork. If you have no choice but to use a roller on smooth surfaces, you must back-brush the paint immediately with a paintbrush to obtain a smoother texture. Fortunately, shorter nap rollers usually leave smoother surfaces compared to the longer nap one.

Advantages Of Using Paint Rollers

Rollers are highly effective at maintaining a constant painting density and contrast. Because of this reason, they are popularly used for painting floors and walls. Rollers are widely utilized for professional and industrial works. While that might be the case, it’s highly important to select the appropriate roller fabric because plenty of variations exist. For instance, for the rough surfaces, you should settle for the long pile, semi pile for the medium rough surfaces and foam for the plain surface.

Paint rollers offer extremely thinner layer as well as a totally smoother surface after drying. The paints that utilize rollers tend to be more absorbed compared to the sprayer. You can also find thrill rollers of smaller lengths, which you can use for finishing touches and short width painting.

In summary, here are some of the advantages of using rollers over paint sprayers:

  • Inexpensive/disposable
  • Extremely easy to use
  • No brush strokes
  • Covers more surface

Excellent painting rollers bring with them grips that are highly comfortable to hold. Additionally, you must ensure that your roller brings with it a heavy frame that doesn’t bend under any form of pressure. Another highly important feature you should be on the lookout for has to do with a non-slip protector.

Conclusion

There you go. The above are some of the reasons that are pro and against using paint sprayers and rollers. For best results, choose which one to use wisely.

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Derek Dewitt

Wednesday 11th of July 2018

My wife and I want to repaint our house this summer, so thanks for sharing this. I like your point about how paint prayers can cover large areas in a short amount of time. We'll try using this for the larger walls so we don't spend as much time outside.

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