How can I paint/refinish a piano?

Question

I am getting an upright piano, its old and has some natural wear and tear. how would i repaint or finish it?

Answer 1

Is this an old, stained oak upright piano? I'm going to guess that it has a stained natural finish? This would be like any furniture refinishing job:

Strip the old finish. Use any common paint remover, scrub off as much of the finish as you can. Use different shaped knives - grind your own, even - to aid in removing finish from any carved detailing on this piano. The stripper won't do everything and in detailed cracks and crevasses you'll need to do some careful work with tools to remove old finish.

Hopefully all the woodwork is in good shape and will only require some light finish sanding before proceeding with the stain.

Apply stain evenly throughout. Did this piano have any special staining effects? like opaque, or near opaque finish in the valleys to clear stained finish in the peaks? Mix your own toner with thinned varnish and stain. Brush it on, and then rub it off in the high, peak areas. Do this in several coats. This is a hard to describe technique, but it's very common on old carved pianos and looks very nice.

Once you're happy with the coloration of the wood, apply clear finish. For this I would recommend a good grade of varnish first, spray lacquer second (if you have a good place to work and can deal with a lot of fumes from spraying a large piece like your piano). Do NOT use polyurethane, it is a fake looking finish that will definitely take away from the value of your piano.

If you opt for the varnish, use a good grade, like McCloskey's Heirloom Varnish (http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000Z75HUG?smid... which is my personal favorite. Apply multiple coats, by brush, allow for some sanding between coats and then rub out with your choice of 0000 steel wool for satin, or the pumice and rottenstone treatment for a higher gloss. There are also liquid polishes, like those for auto finishes that are nice for rubbing out a finish over a large area.

Don't do a lot of machine sanding. In fact, don't do any if you can avoid it. Your piano may be veneered and you could easily sand right through the veneer. Machine sanding will just introduce swirl marks that you'll want to sand out by hand anyway.

Don't use polyurethane. This is a piano, you don't want it to look like it was laminated in plastic.

Make sure that when you're applying finish, or even doing the stripping and sanding, that you protect the keys and the action from getting gunked up.

Answer 2

It depends on the color of the Piano.  If it is Black then you can strip the paint down to the grain, patch the cracks and imperfections with automotive putty, and spray paint it with automotive lacquer paint, and over spary it clear top coat.  To save you all the hassle and the fumes... pay someone to do it for you.

Answer 3

follow these steps:

1. strip off the old finish (any home improvement store sells it)

2. sand it down (you can use a power sander, but there will

     always be some hand sanding)

3.  stain it or paint it (i prefer the look of wood grain to paint)

4.  put on a clear polyurethane finish (at least three coats)

Answer 4

you may want to call a piano store, or the store where you got the piano and ask them.

it also depends on what kind of piano you have.