Sometimes I think I have to be dummer than dirt. In our last home, I didn't paint the inside of the fireplace with black fire-rated paint because the fireplace didn't have a gas lighter. I knew without a gas lighter we'd never use the fireplace. In the 19 ½ years we lived in that home, we only burned candles inside the fireplace.
The ten years we lived in Midland, we owned four different homes and each of them had a fireplace. In fact, one had two fireplaces. I painted black fire rated paint inside each of the fireplaces. It just looks neater when everything is black instead of just the places where flames touched the stone. Midland is one of those places where trees are in short supply, and the price of a chord of firewood is costly. Consequently, we used gas logs.
Okay, so it took delusional thinking to convince myself that you couldn't tell the difference between gas logs and real wood. In today's world, you can purchase gas logs that look real and radiate heat. Who wouldn't want to do that?
The technology is such that you can turn the fireplace on with a remote and adjust two different levels of flames. Our home has a gas lighter, and we are opting for gas logs that look authentic.
When we looked at logs, I asked about painting the inside of the fireplace. Unlike the homes we had in Midland, the fireplace is an insert rather than brick or stone on the inside. That was also true of our last home in Henly. But of course, we never used that fireplace.
The man said that the insert could be painted. I asked what they'd charge to paint the inside of the fireplace black. The General will tell you that the older I get, the less DIY projects I want to take on. When the guy said it would be $100, I decided that my name is DIY Don. I can do that. In fact, I've done it four times.
The man at the store told me they sell the paint and that I'd be well served to use paint purchased from them. He said it could be rolled on inside the fireplace. I almost choked when the pint of paint cost over $40. Perhaps that's where the "dummer than dirt" frame of reference came from. I took the man at his word.
Late yesterday afternoon, I painted inside the fireplace. I still have a headache from the smell of the paint and the application was anything but easy to apply. Forget rolling the paint on! My first clue was visible on the label of the paint – BRUSH on. I ignored the label and used a roller. It was a disaster in the making. The roller didn't get into the artificial grout lines. In addition, the first coat didn't come close to completely covering the surface. It took two coats.
Of course, I was using a flashlight before I finished. Is it covered? I'm saying good enough is good enough. I think it's covered, but I'm not going to look carefully in the light of day. Besides that, I used all of the paint.
All My Best!
Don
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