Best Fence Staining Practices

Having a wooden fence brings many benefits to the homeowners, including privacy, security and clean look. Wooden fences bring with it certain responsibilities as well, including washing, sealing or staining it to keep its strength and visual appeal. Wooden fence when installed and maintained correctly can benefit homeowners for decades. The issue arrises when many people aren’t all that aware of maintenance schedule and how to stain their fence for instance. This binds homeowners to the requirement to either paying to have it done, or putting forth an DIY effort.

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

To help readers in making a decision, we have created a list of easy steps explaining how this process should work.

Like they say: “Everything is easy if you know how to do it”.

​

Here are our suggestions:

​

 

Cleaning the Wooden Fence

​

Any stain or sealer should be applied to a surface that has been thoroughly cleaned and dried before the application. This means rinsing it with water, in most of the cases this should be done by using a pressure washer to get rid of any debris, algae, tanis or mould that might have collected on it. By using pressure washer, your fence should be uniform after it dries. Once the wash has been completed, wait until the wood is completely dry before applying the stain, drying period should last between 24-48 hours.  Should it rain during drying period, repeat the drying cycle again. 

​

​

Preparing the area for staining

​

To bring out the fence stain and applying it to the fence is trouble asking to happen, you will most likely leave a mess and that can cause more work than staining the fence it self.  Therefor, make sure you protect the area by covering anything that happens to be located nearby. Scrubs, grass and leaves usually don’t need to be covered thus it will outgrow the stain, but anything that can’t replenish it selves should be covered. Use drop cloth, tarp or any material you can find, even old newspaper and pesky flyers could do the job. Make sure you tape all material you use to cover surrounding areas, this way shifting will be minimized.

​

​

How to apply the stain to your Fence

​

Now here it gets a bit tricky, you can buy your stain at your local hardware store or even order your stain from online suppliers, whatever choice you shall make, it makes sense to do your own home work before making a choice. That’s because not all stains are alike, manufacturers promise one thing but the outcome might be a different one. We encourage you to read reviews, join chat rooms or ask your friends and neighbours what experience they had with certain stains. You should get familiar with weather patterns in our area thus this should be considered when buying a certain stain.  Don’t go to dark and don’t go to light on your colour choices, dark colour will absorb most UV radiation and will brake faster, light colour is safer with UV radiation but the surface would need to be cleaned more often. When choosing application medium, you can use a brush to handle the job, you may prefer either a roller or sprayer if you happen to have one. To make a proper choice on what to use, you might refer to manufacturer instructions or ask someone who did a similar job. We recommend using professional grade products, yes it costs more than consumer grade or dollar store products, but when it comes to quality for your home, spending more money initially will save you grief down the road.

In addition, most products can’t be used if the temperature dips to a certain level or if the sun is beating down, a safe way is always to use the product according the manufacturer instructions. 

​

​

Wrapping Up Staining Project

​

Depending on what product you use when staining your fence, cleaning brushes, rollers or sprayer is inevitable. To speed up the cleaning effort most likely you’ll need mineral spirits. Make sure you wear rubber gloves and safety googles for your protection, most mineral spirits are corrosive and not very healthy. You can dip your rollers and brushes in mineral spirits and what for the magic to happen. You can also run mineral spirits through your sprayer to clean it out. 

Should you thing that staining your fence is a bit too much hassle, referring to a professional fence staining contractor is probably you best bet.

​

​

​