Door options : paint one side, stain the other...

Art Mulder

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London, Ontario
Hey folks,

I live in a circa 1984 house. Pretty standard. It had painted walls, and stained trim and passage doors.

So, upstairs the three bedrooms all have plain flat mahogany (or reasonable facsimilie) hollow-core doors, stained a light brown, as is the casing and baseboard.

However, the previous owner decided to redo the MBR and painted all the trim, and the closet doors, and the inside of the bedroom door. So now I've got a door which has stain on the outside and paint on the inside.
The inside has never looked that great - these cheapy stain grade doors do not take paint well.

I've wanted to replace this door for ages, it is slightly damaged on the inside, but have never been able to figure out just what to do about this. The door is highly visible -- we have a vaulted entry way with all three bedrooms opening onto the upstairs landing. So it needs to look like it belongs there. And no, I don't really want to replace all the bedroom doors (plus linen closet, plus bathroom) as well as the old baseboard...

Is there such a thing as a door that has a paint-grade skin on one side and stain-grade on the other?

Got any other ideas?
 
if i`ve got this right it`s the painted side you don`t like right?
if so it`s a fairly simple matter to scrape/sand and repair the painted surface in order to apply a decient paint job......it`s very dificult to match stain under aged varnish, so if you`re able to work with what you have you`ll come out ahead......
if you plan on living in the house for a good while then start thinking about upgrading the doors and saving for the project...good doors ain`t cheap and cheap doors ain`t good......
 
Tod beat me to the suggestion, but with a bit of sanding (and perhaps filling), the painted side could be made into "paint grade" pretty easily.
 
Well you could always reface the door with vernner to save some money.

unlikely? even most trade folk can`t buy door skins as cheaply as the borg sells hollow core doors, and a single piece of paper backed veneer to covor a door is still more than a borg door.......and we`re back to "good doors ain`t cheap and cheap doors ain`t good"........living up in canada makes clear pine an option for building your own, it can be done with little more than a table saw and a router.....i`ve done it, lotsa work but the end product will speak for itself.....
 
....living up in canada makes clear pine an option for building your own, it can be done with little more than a table saw and a router.....i`ve done it, lotsa work but the end product will speak for itself.....

Actually, I've seen solid pine -- not perfectly clear, IIRC -- doors at Rona (local Borg) and the price wasn't that outrageous. But then when you mulitply it by 5, even a modest $100 door turns into an expensive job. :( (I don't actually remember the price, but I think it was less than $150)

But it would be a durn shame to take a nice pine door and stain it muddy to match that contractor trim.

And Tod, I really have no idea if I'll be in this house for the long haul. (Current job is on shaky ground, changing jobs might mean changing cities) If I was, you're right, I should just chip away at the job, putting in the quality that I want.

Mostly i was curious to see if anyone had ever seen a stock door that had a stain grade skin on one side, and a paint grade on the other. Around here, the stain grade doors usually have a Luan or other mahogany-like skin, while the paint-grade doors are flat/smooth masonite or such.

Oh well, I'll keep looking around.

...art
 
...Mostly i was curious to see if anyone had ever seen a stock door that had a stain grade skin on one side, and a paint grade on the other. Around here, the stain grade doors usually have a Luan or other mahogany-like skin, while the paint-grade doors are flat/smooth masonite or such...
With a bit of extra work (not much) the luan skin could be filled and made into a nice paintable surface on one side. Would that work?
 
Unfortunately the damage is on the stained side... :bang:

Oh darn. If the door is flat you could apply an 1/8" skin and stain to match. This will lead to trim adjustments for the additional thickness and so on. I don't know of a quick and dirty way out of this. Could you post a pic of the damage? Maybe a visual would kick start out brains.
 
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