Repairing Holes in Wooden Houses as You Prep to Paint

How to Repair Holes in Wood Houses before Painting and Sand

It would be nice if your wooden home needed no more than occasional home maintenance and repair. Only caulk and scrape some, toss down some painting drop cloths, and roll on some layers of durable house paint.

It is never that easy. For a wide variety of reasons, you usually have to fill the wooden facings of the house.

My roughly twenty-five year old home had to have a lot more be done. The galvanized metal near the roof gutters was badly done and enabled the water to repeatedly dampen the wood behind the eve. As the years passed, the wood became rotten and the protective coat of paint flaked.

This repair I wanted to do on my own. It did not seem like standard compounds to fill wood would last.

My next door neighbor repaired his wooden home frequently in an endless battle those darn flying termites. These jobs stood the test of time. He knew something I did not.

Fill in Wood Holes with Bondo then Use Power Sanders to Sand

He said an experienced handyman suggested to him to use Bondo to patch any imperfections in the home’s surface. To get a better understanding see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bondo_(putty)

I knew how Bondo worked on cars. This auto filler was heavy and durable. This auto filler could be sanded. When he mentioned using Bondo, It was obvious that it would do the job.

Using Bondo, the approach is to make repairs in layer after layer with a lot applied first and then thinner layers at the end. Bondo allows you to form shapes with molds, combining molding boards and regular kitchen wax paper. When sanding and finishing prior to painting all you need to do is to use one of the discounted power tools to make the Bondo blend smoothly with the wood.

Homeowners with a wood deck, you could also apply this auto patcher to fill in gouges in the planks of wood decks of various types. It comes in handy, when you are waterproofing redwood decks.

You should note that Bondo has a distinctive light reddish color and that will be what you see, when using a non-hiding water sealant on your wood deck. If you want to preserve your wood deck repaired with Bondo, you will get the best results with a dark stain.

Also it is not necessary to go to a car parts place to acquire Bondo. You can get Bondo at Lowes or Home Depot. By the way, my painting prep job still looks great after several years.