Cleaning paintbrushes

While cleaning my paintbrush today I got to thinking how kany people still do it? I know some folks say its not worth thier time and just throw them away. I use a wire brush and rock, cement block, what ever is handy and scrub the devil out of it. Put it back in the container it came in for storage. Anybody else do this?

Absolutely! I do not buy cheap brushes.

Glenn F.

Good brushes are time savers and make for a better looking job. I always clean them. I like to do it. It's a way to relax at the end of a days work.

I use better quality brushes so yes I clean them and take care of them

I have one of those swirley things that spins a paint brush in a container of whatever solvent you use, after that I usually soak in diesel and store in a
plastic news paper bag. Ellis

Wife has me clean even her el-cheapo paint brushes. She paints some stuff that has me questioning why, so that's when she'll grab a "slightly used" paint brush. *lol*

Most of the time, this "cleaning" involves everything EXCEPT cleaner! A hammer, some concrete and usually a wire brush in a drill are my tools of choice. Yes, they're that bad! :lol:

I clean brushes also.

How many clean rollers? I do.

I clean them, use them for years. I don't buy the most expensive, but somewhere in the middle.

I will take a shortcut sometimes though, if I know I'll be back to painting the same paint in a few days, I'll wrap the brush/roller in a plastic bag and put them in the refrigerator.

I clean good brushes and then place them in a container of water about 2/3 the way up on the bristles and leave them. It keeps any residue from drying out over time.

Rollers are to cheap to waste the time cleaning them to keep. If I am going to use the roller on the same color the next day. I just pull the roller from the handle about an inch and drop it into a pan of water and dry it the next day before use.

It depends on the paint. If the paint was latex and not used all day then it's worth the trouble to clean. If it's oil the cost of the solvents and your time isn't worth it. If the brush was used all day with latex it would probably require solvents to clean making it not worth it.

diesel to clean a paint brush that will be used in the house? How will the residue affect the paint. Verry little oil base paint out there.

I clean both brushes and rollers to use again.

One thing I do that helps keep brushes cleaner... is that just prior to using them, I wet them (with water for latex or mineral spirits for oil based paints) - then squeeze them fairly dry with an old rag.

Discovered this accidentally when I had to clean a brush I'd left wrapped in the fridge for a few days and the paint had hardened some... had to clean it before use, so the whole brush was damp when I began painting again. I noticed that the paint did not "wick-up" toward the head, quite so badly, with the bristles all being damp when I started.

So now I always dampen them prior to use. Seems to help a lot.

I always clean my brushes because I buy Purdy brand and they are expensive. A good quality tool makes any job easier.

Here's a trick I learned a painter friend of mine for cleaning oil based paints. To minimize the amount of solvent used, reuse it. He would keep used lacquer thinner and paint thinner cans to put the used solvent in. The solids from the paint sink to the bottom of the can and leave fairly clean solvent on top. He would do his first cleaning with the used solvent and do a final clean with virgin solvent.

OTJ

I'll echo what SweetFeet and Oregon Jack said,it works. While working for Sears in 1965,I was amazed how the window sign painter was able to do such nice work without stincels or masking tape.(anyone else remember the days before vinyl printing when windows were painted to advertise weekly ads?) He gave me instructions and allowed me to try it with his brushes. I bought a full set of "Sears Best"and still using them. Ever few years I soak them in brush cleaner after cleaning with water or solvent.

I have painted houses interior/exterior 20 years. Here is my routine; pre-wet brushes help cleaning a lot. Get a brush comb, an 8 or so wire teeth, and work it in bristles then comb out to tip. Doing this under hotwater about a dozen times. Switch to a paintbrush only wire brush, doing same deal under the water stream. Shake out excess water, dry, and store back in the folder. I have just retired my daily brush after 15yrs 40+ hours a week!

Roller covers; buy cheap ones and use once. I can buy a $5+ roller and clean, clean, clean, still never get fully clean. Besides rollers loose their paint absorbancy after about 40min which means you have to redip more often. I pay .50-1.00 per roller, use about 6 per couple rooms. Save a good 2hrs in cleaning.

Lucid; It would take me 20 minutes or less to clean six roller covers which had been used with water based paint. Depending on what your time is worth, that still might not justify the effort if that represents savings of only $3 to $6. Anyway, here's what I do: When I finish for the day or finish with a color of paint, I drop the roller cover, still on the roller, into a five gallon bucket containing enough water to cover it. When it's time to clean up I fully turn on a garden hose with a pistol grip nozzle. I hold the roller cover vertically inside the bucket so it's just above the waterline, and start spraying the edge of it at the top with the strongest stream of water I can get from the nozzle. On a good roller this will make the cover spin so fast that it will hum. This throws off the water and paint which mostly stay inside the bucket. As the water level in the bucket rises, I raise the roller while continuing to spray---always keeping the stream from the nozzle directed at a point below the rim of the bucket. (This actually works even better in a utility tub, but I don't always have access to one, but I always have a five gallon bucket.) I can spin much of the paint out before I have to dump the water out of the bucket. After dumping the bucket the first time I usually alternate saturating the roller cover with spinning it out, still keeping it inside the bucket. Within another minute the roller cover is clean enough that I can spin it with the stream of water outside the bucket and it's only throwing off clean water, not water with paint in it. I often hold it on the far side of the five gallon bucket for this final rinse so that I don't get completely soaked. I won't pretend that I'm ever able to stay completely dry---but dry enough. Using this method I've managed to reuse some of my better quality roller covers for dozens of jobs. I realize that I can't make a case for doing this just for the savings. I continue to do it because it pleases me to take care of my equipment whether it's cost effective or not, and because it's fun.

Stan

The trick is to oil the heel of the brush so no pint can dry and lose hairs.