Need help with estimate

[Palmetto Home and Deck 167]

Until recently I was a bridge construction superintendent with over thirty years experience. I always enjoyed the work, but I woke up one day and realized I was spending my life living out of a suitcase going to where ever the company I was working for sent me. After some soul searching, a divorce because I was never home and seeing my children grow up with out me. Worse of all was when my daughter died a few months from cancer and I realized I had only seen her mostly on weekends at best. In an attempt to try to spend more time at home I decided to go out on and start my own home maintenance and repair business. It seems to have been a good decision. Business has been better than I ever expected and I growing bigger everyday. It is becoming apparent I am going to have to hire some help soon to try to keep up with demand.

The reason for my post this time is I am looking for some help with an estimate. I have been asked to give an estimate to repaint 6,900 l.f. of four rail fence. That translates to approximately 900 4x4x5’ post. With four rails of 1x6s and post I am estimating around 29,412 sq.ft.. The fence was previously painted with white latex paint that is flaking or peeling off. I figure 1000’ has two to three coats of paint that the last coat is blistering and peeling off in sheets. The entire fence is covered with green and black mold and mildew. The new paint the customer wants is a black acrylic lacquer. I am planning on pressure washing the fence to clean it. I am figuring on spraying and back brushing on the fence coat.

I want to thank any of you in advance that can offer any suggestion or ideas both for pressure washing and painting this fence that could help with estimating and accomplishing this project.

Len Sutton

Len’s Home Services

slen@charter.net

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You have failed if you fail to try.

[Dale 16]

Len,

You may want to run from this one it sounds like a disaster waiting to happen. Bid on it only if you make it clear that the new coating may fail within months. It kinda sounds like the last coat of paint may have been applied with no or little prep or there was road or wind blown dust or dirt that wasn't cleaned and any coating that is put on top of that can only adhere to the existing coat. So if its peeling in sheets now adding a coat of paint is only doing 2 things..one its adding weight to an a coating that is already loseing adhesion and also in the process of curing a coat of paint there is a lot of force exerted as the coating shrinks. You might want to give it a second thought.

Dale

[Don EMS 14]

I would quote them everything from removing all the old paint, cleaning, prep and repainting. Sounds like a BIG job 6,900 LF. I hope thay know its not going to be cheap. Are you looking at doing both sides?

Good luck

[PressurePros 249]

This job would definitely be a nightmare. I would guess you have about 40 hours of prep work alone. Forget stripping it unless you wanna use methlyene chloride which will be both expensive and dangerous. Not too mention if this thing has anything alive near it. I did a fence that was 40 linear feet of shadow box fence(two sides) and by the time I cleaned with bleach/soap, treated with TSP, scraped off all flaking paint and sanded smooth, I lost my behind on the estimate.

[PressurePros 249]

I was curious so I called a painting contractor in my area. Describing exactly what you have and what I would want done I asked him for a ball park figure...He said it would be over 20K to properly prep, paint and be able to guarantee the job.

[JFife 14]

whatever you do, scrap the back-brushing idea. Takes forever, and makes paint look worse. Really price around on black fence paint, I bet you can find it for less than $10 a gallon at tractor supply or somewhere similar. Make sure they know that the grass below the fence will temporarily be black and may die. Surely they don't expect you to do cover-up.

jon

[Gavin 14]

Sounds like it would be probably be quicker & cheaper to just replace the fence itself.

[Palmetto Home and Deck 167]

I would quote them everything from removing all the old paint, cleaning, prep and repainting. Sounds like a BIG job 6,900 LF. I hope thay know its not going to be cheap. Are you looking at doing both sides?

Don,

Yes, it is both sides of the fence. I was thinking about using something like HD80 on the fence to strip the old paint in the worse areas. EFC38 in the other areas.

I don't think killing the grass under the fence would be a problem. Only thing I might be worried about are the high $$ horses. I'm sure they would be frightened of the pressure washing noise and have to be moved to other areas, but how long would it take for it to be safe if the horses are put back in the pastures that has had dangerous chemicals sprayed on the grass. Questions, questions, Sure makes life interesting doesn't it?

Also, I was wondering if there is something that can be added to the chemicals to increase the hang time on the vertical surfaces.

I have found that this job will take ten 55 gallon drums of fence coat from Lexington Paints in Lexington KY. Also fence painting in KY where they paint miles and miles of fence is going dirt cheap. It may be entirely possible for me to sub out the painting. Even if a painting contractor has to come from Ky to South Carolina it still may be less expensive than if I do the painting my self. So this most likely will just be a cleaning job for me.

I'm still pretty new at pressure cleaning and still have lots of questions and need lots of guidance. ( estimating and pricing seems to be the toughest problems) Someone said run from this one, but usually when a job gets tough is when I like it the best. When I was building bridges I never backed down from anything, but that was where my experience was. These boards are very helpfull to me and I appreciate all the knowedge I am gaining from them.

Len

Len's Home Services

slen@charter.net

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You have failed if you fail to try

[mtnframer 14]

len

this fence will not be EZ,how close is water & electric to farthest point of fence

you may need a generator,water truck/tank.you will not need any rebar concrete or cranes,kind a nice eh.good luck

steve

[Gavin 14]

Len, I don't think the contractors on this board are telling you to run because they are afraid of a challenge. Quite the opposite. I think most contractors here have enough experience to KNOW when to run, not because they can't do it but mostly because it would be cost & time prohibitive. Another reason to run could be because of your experiance level combined with the size of the job combined with what equipment you have to do the job effectively in a reasonable amount of time. Example: I personally would not bid on cleaning a 100,000 sq ft parking lot. Why? Because when I show up with only my wand in hand, it would probably take me a month to clean it.

Don't know if you thought of this already but what about the mess stripping is going to make? I mean 30,000 sq ft of (possibly 3 coats) of paint? Yuck! You'd probably spend and entire day if not 2 days, just cleaning up. And with very expensive animals around..... no thanks.

Of course that's me. If you decide to take it I wish you the best and would really like to hear how it works out for you.

[Palmetto Home and Deck 167]

Don't know if you thought of this already but what about the mess stripping is going to make? I mean 30,000 sq ft of (possibly 3 coats) of paint? Yuck! You'd probably spend and entire day if not 2 days, just cleaning up. And with very expensive animals around..... no thanks.

Thanks Gavin,

You know, you are probably right about the mess...I didn't think of that. I should have though. I stripped a 20 x20 deck a few weeks ago with three coats of latex paint on it and there was a lot of mess. No problem there because of where it was, but in a place where horses ( not the kind ready for the glue factory either) are around that is something else I will have to consider.