Wall striping question

[smalltown]

Got my upper and lower sections painted and next week I want to stripe the walls. I'm going to try the method posted on here several times where I seal each edge of the masking tape with the same color as the paint underneath the tape to prevent bleading. My walls will have dried for approx. 1 week before I start. I am leery about painting the edge and letting it dry before I paint the stripe thinking it will stick to my new paint, and pull it off.

How long after I paint the masking tape edge should I wait to paint the stripe?

 

[bshusted]

I waited only 24 hours before laying out my tape lines for my wall stripe and had no issue with the tape pulling off the base paint. I too used the method of sealing the tape with the base color. Make sure that you get a high quality tape. With my first try, the tape wrinkled and bled. Also go light on the sealing coat.

 

[icenfire01]

No need to paint the edge, just use a credit card to "seat" the edge of the tape and you will have little bleed thru. The little bit you do get you can touch up with an art style brush. 24hrs is enough time to wait as well.

 

[icenfire01]

Also remove the tape while still wet if possible. I had to do 2 coats and the first one was pretty much dry but the second one was still wet

 

[cybrdyke]

Frog Tape!!!
No need to paint the edges.
I have better results not painting the edges. The problem with painting the edge is that if you let the base paint dry before repainting with the stripe color, you can have problems pulling the tape off. If you paint the stripe over the base color before the base has properly dried, you get a weird color blend of base and stripe colors. Either way isn't great.
I bet that alot of the people that recommend painting the edges did their stripe before Frog Tape was commonly available.
The edges of this stuff seal GREAT!! As mentioned above, just go over them medium hard with a stiff credit card and paint away....
Good luck
CD

 

[smalltown]

Thanks for the replies. I'm a little late responding as I needed to go camping with the boy scouts all weekend. Now trying to recover!

I purchased the newer Frog tape (at lest new to me) the is supposed to have even less adhesion. Frog tape for delicate surfaces. Gues I'll try just the tape and no sealing paint. Wish me luck!

 

[Colin Len]

The other method you can use is to "seal" the tape with caulking instead of the base paint color. I haven't tried the technique discussed in this thread but I've used the caulking method and it works fantastically. I too have had lots of issues with paint peeling up if you let it dry on the masking tape, but seems others don't have this problem

 

[bottom feeder]

I strongly disagree with using frog tape. Tried using it last time I painted some rooms in the house and it was much worse than regular blue painter's tape. Sealing the edge with the same color paint that is beneath the tape has consistently worked the best for me.