Painting soffit and fascia

[walleyetis]

Just curious if anyone has experience in painting aluminum soffit and fascia. My house is about 20 years old and I need to replace the eavestroughs. The original builder put in an ugly light blue colour soffit, fascia, and eaves. I’d like to paint the soffit and and fascia to match the colour of the new eaves. Any advice on type of paint, prep, etc?

[fishtank]

Might have to take it down and spray wash it. Then use a light spray paint , cause you don’t want to plug up the little holes in the soffit.

[big zeke]

Over the years my soffits had a lot of overbrush marks from painting the wood siding. The cover them up I used spraybombs of Tremclad directly on the soffits and it worked great. Time consuming as I had to mask the siding and it took like 4 coats (covering dark green with white) but many years later it looks fine. The soffits had been in place for several years and had already weathered a bit so the surface was a bit rough and had something for the paint to grab onto.

I think you'd be best to spray as brush or roller will not give the same finish and you'll have to move fast so everything is dry for when the new trough is put up.

[ghfalls]

It’d probably be easier and be nicer to just replace it. I bought some soffit the other day and it was $12.67 a piece at Wayne building products. 12’ long. You’d probably spend as much in paint and have an inferior finish. Rona sells brown soffit for $30 a piece so it’s worth going to a supplier.

[Grizzly Adams]

It’d probably be easier and be nicer to just replace it. I bought some soffit the other day and it was $12.67 a piece at Wayne building products. 12’ long. You’d probably spend as much in paint and have an inferior finish. Rona sells brown soffit for $30 a piece so it’s worth going to a supplier.

Yup, the stuff is cheap and easy to replace.

Grizz

[Tungsten,]

The tuff part is cleaning and sanding all those little valleys. The vents protrude out. Man if it’s a bungalow it’s so much easier to just replace.

[Grizzly Adams]

The tuff part is cleaning and sanding all those little valleys. The vents protrude out. Man if it’s a bungalow it’s so much easier to just replace.

And the only way to get an acceptable paint job would be to spray it.

Grizz

[Puddle]

Your house is at the age that if you replaced the soffit, you can have a good look at the ventilation to the roof and ensure everything is working like it should. Soffit/fascia isn’t expensive. Never paint. The aluminum will expand/contract and show the old paint

[Cross Eyed Cowboy]

I would recomend replacing for most of the reasons allready mentioned.

Not sure what style of soffit you have but take a hard look at how its installed towards the siding end at least.

If its butting up to the siding it should be an easy replacement.

If the siding is butting up to the underside of the soffit then it may not be that easy to replace.

[Travco1]

You could leave the original j-trim on most places if the siding is hiding it .
Painting it can be a real PIDA . If you dont clean it properly your looking at pealing and crap down the road . Just replace it . its not difficult to do. Buy a soffit stapler for 150 buck from prime fasteners and off you go . Cut it with a skill saw , three sheets at a time . Make a cross cut jig.