What is Trade1st advice when selecting Paint Rollers?

Quality paint roller sleeves have higher quality fabrics and can hold more paint; this increases the time spent rolling the paint and reduces the user time spent reloading the roller. However decorating with a roller uses about 10% more paint.

Paint rollers are available with different size widths, the correct width will depend upon the size and the strength of the user. Sizes are 4 Inches for narrow or detailed painting to 15 Inches for large surfaces and 24 Inches for large floor areas.The most common width is 9 inch as this is a good average size.

The roller sleeve, both 7 and 9 Inch come with a hollow core which attaches to a cage frame. For 4, 12, 15 and 24 Inch a common pin mechanism operates.

Both 7 and 9 inch roller sleeves come in two core size diameters.  These are 1.5 Inch which is normally associated with DIY retailers and 1.75 Inch which is popular for the trade market.

1.75 Inch diameter is larger thereby reducing splatter and is able to hold more paint for this reason is best suited to professionals.

Many of these frames will in turn attach to various extension poles removing the need of a ladder.

paint roller sleeves

Paint Roller Sleeves - Selecting the paint roller sleeve.

The key to selecting the correct rollers is to assess the smoothness and the size of the area that needs to be coated.

For rough surfaces select a longer pile sleeve and for smooth or semi smooth surfaces select a Short or Medium pile sleeve.

Polyester is a hard wearing fabric and has a dense fibre structure - ideally suited for all dispersion and binding paints.

Polyamide is superior in quality, has more effective paint pick up and release, is easier to clean and has reduced fibre loss- best suited to thick high quality trade paints.

Micropoly is a high absorbent fabric with effective high release without splatter- recommended for thin coatings, such as primers, stains, lacquers and latex paints.

Solvent resistant fabrics these have been specifically designed for the application of solvents, oil and lacquer paints, synthetic resins, anti rust paints and liquid plastics.

Sheepskin is a natural material and has excellent pick up and release with a fine finish.

Simulated Mohair are recommended for high quality finish, using viscous coatings and are ideally suited to gloss and under coat paints and/or water based or acrylic lacquer.

Foam and Flocked Foam are recommended for gloss and under coat paints and/or water based or acrylic lacquer.

 

Paint rollers - Watch out for.

Less expensive paint rollers are manufactured with poor quality fabric, less paint can be loaded onto the fabric and a shorter life for the sleeve. Cheap paint roller sleeves are commonly glued to the roller core.  Adhesives have downsides as certain coatings can react with them, causing the roller fabric to come apart from the plastic core.  Also, if the core is not equally coated in glue it can lead to dead patches which may lead to the delamination of the fabric from the roller core.

 

Paint rollers - What to look for.

Thermo fused or Thermo bonded™, means the surface of the plastic sleeve core is melted and the fabric is wound on to the molten core. This allows greater longevity of the roller as there is no glue to break down.