Average Guy Product Reviews

The original paint job on our house sucked. It was done in 1997 when the house was built and the builders must have used the cheapest paint they could get their hands on. For the last couple of years I've been slowly watching the paint peel and chip from the fascia boards and the underside of the eaves. The rest of our house is stucco, so the paint was still intact there, just faded. Plus they painted most of the homes in this area a butt-ugly coral/peach color... probably because everyone thinks pastels are "southwest" colors. Whatever... I'm painting it good old "brown".

At any rate, we needed to paint the house very soon, so I had a few bids on getting the house painted by painting contractors. They ranged from $2,500 to $3,500 to do the entire house, including the cost of paint and supplies. I knew that painting a house wasn't rocket science, just a monumental pain in the ass... so I decided to figure out the costs of doing it myself.

All tolled, paint, supplies and equipment would be in the $1000 ballpark. Not too bad I suppose, plus I'd get to keep the equipment for future projects. So, I committed to painting the house myself and began getting together everything I needed:

• Graco Magnum X5 Paint Sprayer
• 12 gallons of wall paint (Sherwin Williams "Super Paint" Satin Exterior - "Tavern Taupe" SW7508)
• 5 gallons of trim paint (Sherwin Williams "Super Paint" Satin Exterior - "Tiki Hut" SW7509)
• 5 gallons of primer (Glidden Grabber in gray) for wood on fascia and eaves
• Large canvas Dropcloth
• Paint brushes
• Paint scraper
• 1-1/2" wide painters tape (the blue kind)
• Roll of masking paper for the windows
• Paint straining screens for 5 gallon buckets
• A few empty 5 gallon buckets for straining paint and cleaning sprayer

So, that's all the crap I had to buy. Most of it is self explanatory, but this post is mostly about the Graco Magnum X5 Paint Sprayer. I looked at a bunch of other sprayers before I bought this one. The ones you see a lot are the Wagner sprayers like the Paint Crew. I hear these suck, both from reading reviews and from friends and family that have used them.

Another popular brand is Graco. These are more expensive, but you can tell right away that the construction is better... mostly metal parts as opposed to plastic. Some of the Graco sprayers were pretty pricy, $500 to $1200 I think. That was much more than I waned to spend for this project. So, I decided on the bottom-of-the-line Graco sprayer, the Magnum X5, which was only about $300. Some of the more expensive ones, like the X7, have wheels and a frame for carrying the 5 gallon buckets. Had I known how much I was moving the buckets and sprayer around, I might have sprung for one.

It comes with a DVD and quick start card which was laminated to keep it from getting soggy. The DVD was short and informative, I recommend you watch it first because it shows how to clean, prime, and store the sprayer correctly so you don't get dried paint clogging anything. I used the 25' hose that comes with the sprayer, but I probably should have upgraded to a 50' hose to keep from lugging around the sprayer and paint bucket so much. I did opt to purchase a swivel for the spray handle... about $25. This definitely helped the hose from getting tangled up too much.

I also just used the standard spray tip that comes with the sprayer. It worked fine pushing out all the paint and primer, which was pretty thick. I didn't have to thin any paint down, and the sprayer didn't clog once. If it did clog, the spray nozzle has a lever that you rotate to easily clear out any dried paint globs. I'll probably use this same sprayer to paint my kitchen cabinets someday, so I'll pick up a finer spray nozzle for that project.

Clean up and storage was pretty easy. I watched the DVD and used the quick guide card since I couldn't remember all the steps. After a few times, it was a piece of cake. It probably takes half an hour to clean out the sprayer. I used an old toothbrush to clean out the spray nozzle, intake filter, and the small filter in the sprayer handle. The extra 5 gallon buckets I bought came in handy for waste water and clean soapy water. I also picked up some Graco Pump Armor liquid. I have no idea what's in it, but it's supposed to keep your sprayer from clogging during storage. I figured it was worth a few bucks to keep the sprayer in working condition.

Overall, the project took me three full days to power wash, scrape old paint, prime the eaves, and paint the whole house. Plus another day or so to do touch-ups with a brush... hey, I'm no pro. There was definitely some over-spray.

As far as the Graco Magnum X5 Paint Sprayer goes, it worked really well. No problems at all, even in the Arizona heat. I'd give it a 1 out of 10 on the suck-o-meter.

Oh yeah, something else to remember if you're ambitious enough to try this yourself, buy some Advil... you'll thank me later.