Hello-

I recently took on a project that involves some 80 old wooden windows, both double hung and casement. Some have rotten lower sashes, some just need paint and sash balances. All of them need new putty, and the worst are the ones where people have tried to re-putty them with various materials and varying degrees of skill over the years.

75 years in fact, which means that all of them have been repainted several times, usually right over the old flaking paint. I've rebuilt three of them (2 casements and one doublehung) so far, but it's a very slow process. I hoping you guys have some tips to speed things along.

What's the best way to get the old putty out? Everything I do seems to break the glass - that or gouge up the wood. I've ordered a heat gun - is that likely to break the glass like the propane torch does? Would covering the glass with something like foil or asbestos cloth (or whatever they make that stuff out of now) help? Or do I just bite the bullet like the glass guy does and break the glass right from the start? ($!)

Sanding to remove old paint results in undersized sashes. Propane torch does the job but it's slow and messy. I am also concerned with the lead release using both of those methods. How about a chemical stripper - anyone tried that? What does chemical stripper do to glass? Does it dissolve glazing putty? Would having these sashes dip-stripped ruin them - and would I have to remove the glass first?

Is there a service that rebuilds old sash balances? I talked to a guy who rebuilds his own, but I can't imagine it (he doesn't want to do mine.. <g>). They're not cheap and I need a lot of them - I don't want to replace them with new ones if I don't have to.

The bottom part of the lower sash usually fails when the dowels that hold the sash together rot through. Sometimes I can get the old dowels out, sometimes I can't. Any tips on getting out the broken dowel pins?

Any other tips?

Thanks!

Steve

 

Forgive me for answering my own post, but I've learned a few things (trial and error) that I thought I might pass on.

The heat gun works perfectly for removing the old window putty. Softens it right up and doesn't break the glass if I use the little directional attachment that came with the heat gun. It works well for stripping the piant too, but it's slow. It does break the glass if I am not careful about aiming while the paint is being stripped so I take the glass out first. I am going to try sending the next couple of windows out to a dip-strip place to speed the process - will have to see how they come out.

Chemical stripper is pretty close to worthless - slow and messy. I seem to remember that stuff working better than it does now. Maybe they've reformulated it. The paint bubbles but is hard to get off; window putty is completely un-fazed by it.

The quest continues...

 

I've also used a heat gun to soften & remove putty. I usually shield the glass with one of those large metal blades (the ones you use when you patch plaster). I've also read in the forums somewhere that a soldering iron works great to soften putty. I've puttied many a window and am going to try that myself.

When all the putty is removed, it's not a bad idea to coat the wood areas with a boiled linseed/turpentine (or paint thinner) mixture so the wood won't draw out the linseed oil from the new putty. I like Dap putty the best. Also read that dipping your putty knife in linseed oil will help to smooth the putty more easily, but I haven't tried this yet. And prime with an oil (alkyd) primer. The only mistake I made was priming too soon--should have waited a bit longer for the putty to harden a little on the surface.

Good luck restoring all those windows. It's tedious, but the end result is well worth it. It's hard to beat the quality of old, heavy wooden windows.