Haymes Paint knows walls โ€” but do you know your primer? Your dream room depends on it.

Do you need a primer, and which Haymes prepcoat

A primer is doing one job, and it helps to know which

Most people treat primer as a single product you either bother with or skip, and that's where the confusion starts, because a prepcoat is really three different jobs sold under one word. Work out which job your surface needs and the choice makes itself.

There are three of them and they solve different problems. A sealer handles a surface that drinks paint in. Where a surface is too slick for paint to hold onto, you want a bonding coat instead. The third job is blocking, which stops something already in the wall from bleeding up through your new topcoat.

Sealing a porous surface

New gyprock, bare plaster, patched filler and raw MDF all suck paint in, and the give-away is that your first coat dries flat and patchy with dull spots wherever the filler is. That's not a bad tin of paint, that's the wall drinking the binder out of it before it can level.

A sealer soaks in and evens the porosity out so the topcoat sits on the surface instead of disappearing into it. This is the one people skip most often and it's the one that costs the most in wasted paint, because you'll put three coats on a wall trying to get an even sheen that a sealer would have fixed in one. Haymes Ultraseal is the prepcoat for this.

Gripping a surface paint won't hold onto

Gloss and semi gloss enamel, varnished timber, laminate, melamine and tile are all too slick for a waterbased topcoat to key into, so the paint goes on looking fine and then peels off in sheets the first time something knocks it or a fingernail catches an edge.

A bonding prepcoat sticks to the slick surface and gives the topcoat something to hold. Sanding helps and it isn't a substitute, because sanding a laminate bench just gives you a scratched slick surface. Haymes Ultralock is the one to ask for here, and it's also the sensible pick on old varnished trims where you're dealing with grip and bleed at the same time.

Blocking a stain before it comes through

Water marks from a roof leak, tannin bleeding out of a knot in timber, smoke, and kids' texta all share a habit. They dissolve into the topcoat and come back through it, sometimes weeks later, and every extra coat you put on top just gets stained in turn.

A stain blocker seals the stain in so it can't migrate. Haymes Ultrahold is the one for that, and I've written it up on its own in Haymes Ultrahold, the stain blocker and when you need one. The important part is that you can't fix a bleeding stain by painting over it harder, so if a mark has come back once it will come back again until something blocks it.

When you can genuinely skip it

Repainting a sound, previously painted interior wall in a similar colour, with a low sheen going over a low sheen, generally doesn't need a prepcoat. Give it a wash and let it dry properly, and you're right to go.

Going a lot lighter over a dark colour isn't really a primer question either, it's a coverage question, and a tinted prepcoat can help there by getting you closer to the finish colour before the topcoat goes on. We tint prepcoats to order from the Haymes range in the shop, same as the paint.

Shop related products

Did you know the Haymes prepcoats themselves are in store only, because paint and flammable goods can't be posted. We carry Ultraseal, Ultralock and Ultrahold across the common sizes, and we mix and tint to order from the Haymes range at the counter. Give us a ring on (08) 8536 4333 to check what's on the shelf, or read more on our Haymes paint and mixing page. The brushes and rollers are in paint and accessories.

Read next

Talking myself into the prepcoat is the hardest part of any paint job I do, and it's the part I'm always glad of.

Cheers,
Candeece

Follow our Facebook Page: Strathalbyn H Hardware on Facebook

Back to blog

Blog posts

View all
1 3
View all