All airless tips regardless of brand are sized in a 3-number format. For example, 517 or 323 or 415.

The first digit, a 3, 4, 5, or 6 in my examples represent the spray fan width. The first digit multiplied by 2 equals the spray fan width in inches, i.e. 5=10, 3=6, 4=8. 

The last 2 digits of the spray tip size indicate the hole orifice in thousandths, determining how much paint the tip lets out. 

Examples: 

• 325 is a tip that sprays a 6-inch fan and lets out 25 thousandths of material. 
• 319 is the same 6-inch fan as a 325 but it lets out less material (19 thousandths). 

You can find recommended tip sizes for our products in our product data information on our website.

This will cover actual application methodology, not product selection or sprayer operation.

1. MOST IMPORTANT - Wear proper personal protective equipment before you start any paint project and keep it on until cleanup is complete. A respirator or dust mask that is approved for the type of coating being used to help prevent the inhalation of paint materials is strongly recommended. Safety glasses keep overspray and other foreign material out of your eyes. Gloves to protect your hands from injection. It is highly recommended to wear a painter’s suit or long sleeves and pants. Also spray head socks are a great way to keep your face and hair clean. We also recommend applying a small amount of petroleum jelly to any exposed skin, this makes cleaning up at the end of the day easier.

2. Plan where you plan to place the sprayer and hoses. Avoid placing the sprayer and hoses near objects you do not want to get paint on. Hoses can bust and break unexpectedly. Additional wind speed and direction can carry overspray to nearby driveways, barns, sheds, houses, equipment, etc..

3. 3 rail or 4 board wooden fencing generally takes 1 gallon of paint per panel. A panel is composed of 2 posts and 3 or 4 16-foot fence boards. No panel is exactly 16 feet, they will commonly be a few inches short. The easiest way to estimate paint needs for your fence job is to count your fence posts and divide by 2, this equals gallons needed to complete the project.

4. When looking at a fence always spray from post to post, on the horizontal boards, in one single stroke. Do not stop and start spraying in the middle of a board. You will notice vertical paint lines in your boards in the future if you paint this way. One coat of paint on a fence consists of a least 2 strokes per horizontal board, down and back.

5. Spray the tops of posts and the top narrow edges of the horizontal boards from both sides of the fence. This essentially applies double paint to the areas that wear the quickest and take the most abuse. 

6. Posts have angles and will take multiple strokes to cover. This makes it advantageous to tun your gun sideways and spray in vertical strokes as opposed to the horizontal strokes used for the boards. 

7. Never paint the bottem of your fence panels. These edges are left unpainted and open so the wood can breathe, allowing moisture to escape. Completely incapsulating your horizontal boards in paint will not allow the board to naturally expand and contract as it wants to. Failure to follow this rule can lead to premature paint failure and wood rot.

Painting a long fence may seem like a huge undertaking, but by following these simple steps it can be done easier than many people think. Feel free to give us a call if you have any questions about this process, we are happy to help.

3 rail or 4 board wooden fencing generally takes 1 gallon of paint per panel. A panel is composed of 2 posts and 3 or 4 16-foot fence boards. No panel is exactly 16 feet, they will commonly be a few inches short. The easiest way to estimate paint needs for your fence job is to count your fence posts and divide by 2, this equals gallons needed to complete the project.

1 board fence with wire generally takes 1 gallon of paint per 27 running feet of fence, covering both sides. We like to say 1 board takes 6/10 of a gallon per 16 linear feet, covering both sides. 

Posts with wire, while only painting the posts, take roughly 1 gallon of paint per 15 posts.

New boards, whether completely new fence or just repair, that will be painted white warrant special and different treatment from black. 

Wood has oils and resin and sap in it. These natural chemicals are called tannin which can cause staining that will bleed through latex white paint. 

Nail head rust will also bleed through latex white paint. 

To combat these issues, apply a light coat of oil base white as a primer coat. Oil base white will lock in the tannin stain and nail head rust. It is not necessary to apply a heavy coat of white oil base unless you intend to not top coat it for years. 

After one coat of oil base white has been applied to a board latex white is the superior product for future painting. Latex white is a brighter white than oil base and less prone to cracking and peeling in the long term. 

Gloss is also superior to flat white paint. Gloss paint washes easier in the rain. Dirt, grass and bird droppings do not stick to gloss nearly as well as flat paint. 

All our white paints contain a mold and mildew inhibitor. There are other things you can do to increase the longevity of a white paint job. For more tips on increasing the longevity of your white fence paint give us a call.

We get calls and walk in customers every day that have small amounts of fence or specialty jobs that do not lend well to the spray method of applying our products. While rolling and brushing fence may sound easy it can be intimidating and overwhelming to get started. 

Sprayers are great and can be an awesome way to paint fence; however, their complexity, price, and potential for mess needs to be considered.

Did you know if you have 1,000 feet of 4 board fence you can roll it in the same time it takes to setup a spray rig? 

Our rule of thumb is one hard-working painter can roll both sides of 1,000 feet of fence in one 8-hour day, depending on a variety of other factors.

Rolling may be advantageous for those that have fence in close proximity to landscaping or outbuildings or other objects that would make spraying difficult due to overspray. Some customers are willing to roll and brush just to keep paint off of their grass and surroundings.

For fence we recommend a 7” roller with no extension pole. 9” rollers are much wider than 6” fence boards and waste paint The best roller covers to use are 1” or more thick nap. This size roller and cover allows you to get in most cracks and crevices on fence. This size nap and roller also allows for easy rolling of posts. Thick naps allow the roller more curvature to cover more of a post in one pass. 

A wire mesh roller screen in your bucket will help conserve paint. These are way better than typical roller pans. 

Paint posts with a vertical motion then turn your roller horizontally to get in behind where boards meet posts, they will fit in that crack. 

When rolling fence or painting it with equipment it is important to remember not to paint the bottom of the horizontal boards. Wood naturally absorbs moisture and leaving board bottoms unpainted satisfies their need to breathe to release this moisture. 

Paint the tops of boards and posts when going down both sides of the fence. This gives the posts and board tops essentially 2 coats. This is important for board and post life because they take the majority of weathering. 

New unpainted fence with baton boards and woven wire fence with wire can be challenging to roll. It is hard to get a brush or roller behind baton boards on new fence. You generally don’t have to worry about this as much on recoats because this area takes almost no weather and paint will last behind baton boards longer than on horizontal boards.

While any fence painting job may seem challenging or daunting, once you get going it will go faster than you think. One of the largest horse farms in central Kentucky maintains over 100 miles of 4 board horse fence with rollers. This is their personal preference, probably not the most economical choice for them. 

Do not hesitate to call us, we are more than happy to share our knowledge and experience in any way we can to meet your project goals and make it a success.

Surface areas are vast for the majority of agricultural painting projects. This equates to large volumes of coatings needing to be sprayed in timely and efficient manners. 

The majority of airless paint sprayers, from the lower end home owner DIY units to the multi-thousand dollar commercial contracting units, make 2000+ psi. PSI is somewhat irrelevant, based on the previous statement. 

Gallons per mininute (GPM) is the most important thing to consider when purchasing or renting a sprayer. Based on your budget it is advantageous to acquire the sprayer with the largest GPM rating possible, allowing you to spray more material quicker over vast surface areas.