Spray Painting near you

HSE's guidance HSG276 on managing spray booths and rooms explains the problem with numbers that are hard to argue with. Spray guns powered by compressed air discharge from the gun's air cap at over 100 metres per second, with a throw of well over 5 metres from the gun. Most ventilation only generates air movement of around 0.5 metres per second. The air jet from the gun therefore overwhelms the air movement in the space and rapidly fills it with fine paint mist. A window, a fan or an open door is not in the same order of magnitude as the thing it is being asked to control.

The same guidance dismantles the other common assumption, which is that a ventilated enclosure sweeps the mist away tidily. In a spray room, air movement tends to be quite random and reasonably well mixed, with noticeable direction only close to the inlets and very close to the extract fan; spraying near the fan in the belief that the overspray will be captured is described as misguided, because the flow from the gun easily overcomes the pull of the fan. Even in a purpose-made downdraft booth, large slow-moving vortices form along all four walls from floor to ceiling, and the fine invisible mist becomes trapped in exactly the areas where the sprayer is standing.

Clearance time is the number that follows from all of that, and it is the one to ask about on any job. HSG276 defines clearance time as the time taken for the fine paint mist to be removed once spraying stops, and states that typically a booth will clear in less than five minutes but a room could take 20 minutes or longer. The practical translation for a homeowner is simple: after spraying finishes in your house, the air in that space is not clean, and how long it stays that way depends on the enclosure and the extraction, not on how the room smells.

The United Kingdom has a workplace exposure limit for isocyanates of 20 micrograms per cubic metre of air, and HSG276 is explicit that levels in the air during spraying and clearance always substantially exceed it, and that the limit is not a guaranteed safe level in any case. Two-pack systems on kitchens, vehicles and industrial steelwork are the common isocyanate-containing products in this trade. The clinical side of that - occupational asthma, air-fed breathing apparatus and health surveillance - is covered in the cabinet refacing guide on this site; what matters when you are choosing a contractor is that they can describe the containment rather than just the mask.

Extraction is not a fit-and-forget item. HSG276 states that a spray booth, room or extracted enclosure should be thoroughly examined and tested by a competent person at least once every 14 months, and that this is a requirement of regulation 9 of the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 2002. Records have to be kept for at least five years, the report should include smoke tests for clearance and leakage, and industry practice is to attach a label stating when it was tested, by whom and when it is due again, with a separate label if it failed. Asking to see that label is a very quick way to judge a workshop.

There is also a reporting duty that tells you how seriously the trade treats this. Under the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations 2013, employers must report any medically confirmed case of asthma or dermatitis caused by exposure to isocyanates at work. A sprayer who knows that, and who can explain their clearance time and their examination schedule without looking it up, is a different proposition from one who offers to open the patio doors.

Spraying buys uniformity. There is no brush texture, no roller stipple and no lap marking, the film lies down evenly over mouldings and profiles that a brush would flood, and on a large surface it is far quicker once the setup is done. On radiators, railings, window sections and anything with repeated detail it produces a result hand application cannot match.

What you give up is setup time, containment and repairability. Masking commonly takes longer than spraying; a small job can be almost entirely preparation. Touching up a sprayed surface later is difficult because the surrounding film has no texture to hide a repair, and matching a custom-tinted or two-pack product months afterwards is harder still. The sensible decision is job by job rather than by preference: doors, furniture and metalwork suit spraying, while a single wall in an occupied room usually does not.

Products sold for spraying sit across several of the sub-categories set out in Schedule 1 to the Volatile Organic Compounds in Paints, Varnishes and Vehicle Refinishing Products Regulations 2012, and the tin has to say which one it belongs to. That is useful, because the allowances differ sharply: Schedule 2 permits one-pack performance coatings 140 grams per litre water-borne and 500 solvent-borne, and sets separate figures again for vehicle refinishing products, where preparatory and cleaning products are allowed 850 grams per litre and special finishes 840.

Those vehicle refinishing figures are worth knowing about even if you are not painting a car, because gunwash and cleaning products are part of every spray job and they are the highest-solvent thing in the van. Enforcement of the regulations is devolved: regulation 6 makes the local authority the enforcing body in England and Wales, gives the Scottish Environment Protection Agency a role in Scotland alongside the local authority for points of use and productive processes it regulates, and leaves it to the district council in Northern Ireland under Schedule 4. Under regulation 8, contravening the marketing limitation is an offence punishable on summary conviction by a fine not exceeding the statutory maximum.

Masking and containment, not spraying, are what a sprayer is mostly selling. The variables are how much of the surrounding area has to be sheeted and sealed, whether the work can be done off site or has to be enclosed in an occupied building, how many separate items and colours are involved, the product system and its cure requirements, the amount of profile and detail on the surfaces, the access needed for high or awkward work, and how long the household or business has to stay out of the space while spraying and clearance happen. A job that can go into a workshop is usually the cheaper and cleaner answer even though the transport looks like an extra cost.

LokalMatch is simply the introduction. Set out what needs spraying, where it is, and whether the items can leave the building, add the postcode, and spray specialists covering that area get in touch with you. There is no charge to the person posting the job; the professionals pay for the requests they receive. LokalMatch does not do any spraying, does not set prices and does not vet, rank or recommend anyone who responds, so asking each of them how they will contain the mist and how long the space will be unusable is the comparison that matters.