Well, I'll do my best to condense this but. . . who am I kidding? It's going to be long and windy, it's who I am at this point. I hired someone to paint my house this spring, he did a great job but my screened in patio looked pretty bad as the screens were worn, the wood trim (these screens are stapled around the perimeter and then framed with thin strips of wood.) The lattice (the thin strips of wood) were cracked/broken in places, the screen had popped out in places, the screen was also pretty sun faded and with the rest of the house freshly painted the screened in patio looked all that much more tired and need of attention.
I tore the old screens off, the wood trim and got down to the frame (the patio is framed with 4x4 posts.) I've been in this house for almost 20 years, I've replaced the screens once (15+) years ago but I've never touched the posts. I noticed sloppy caulking from the previous owner was worn out so I scrapped that out and replaced all of that. Next, I painted the posts, they needed some small repairs in places (a bit of wood putty) and I needed all new trim and new privacy screen. This was kind of a hassle because there's a TON of trim around each screen. I had to put two coats of paint on the trim and it took forever. I stapled the screens in place, carefully matching the direction of each staple for some reason and then I predrilled the trim so that all the holes lined up, why, I have no idea either. Lastly, I went back and painted the nail heads. I used roofing nails, they have big shiny heads and they stood out. I used these b/c I talked it over with my painter (he's also a handy man) and he suggested I use roofing nails for a number of reasons. Oh and I want to mention something before I forget. There are nine screen panels and trim around each panel. 15+ years ago, I did all of this over a long weekend. This time, I believe it took me 4 weekends to get the nine panels done. . . I'm like old and stuff or something now.
Next was the old screen door. I put this door in 20 years ago, I've never touched it since b/c it was a BEAR to find a nice wooden door, but it was even harder to find a place that would cut it down to the exact size I needed. The screen door I put in was stained a pecan color, but it had badly sun faded, the clear coat cracked and wore off and the stain was worn down to where it looked grey in most places plus the screen had torn in a couple of places.
This is the
after on the screen door, and this is the
installed screen door. Ooof. This is what I did to this door. I sanded down to bare wood, both sides with an RO sander except for the corners and the wooden grills (the wooden grills are part of the door, they are not removable) and those were fun to sand on both sides. Of course, I removed the screen first. The screen was held in by trim and spline (it's like a long, rubber shoelace if you will) and I then carefully removed that delicate, thin wooden trim molding. After I was finished sanding, we picked a stain (the deck will eventually get this stain color - so I wanted to color match the door to tie it all together,) I stained, sanded, stained, sanded (both sides of course) and then I picked a matte finish polyurethane coating which, again, was coat, sand, coat, sand. Then I put the new screen in, the new spline, newly refinished trim molding and brads which I lined up to the same holes as before. Done. Another 4 weeks, I think. Oh, last thing was I bought all new black hardware (door handle and hinges) and then hung the door.
This was all supposed to take me a weekend by the way. Turned into a 2.5-month mega project, which, is what an old co-worker would call "pulling the thread." Oh, and I also put a nice, new, wooden handle and thermostat on my old Weber gas grill. I may stain and poly that handle before it's all said and done, we'll see.