Rust-Oleum Chalkboard Paint

Product: Rust-Oleum Chalkboard Paint (spray can)
Purchased at: Home Depot (Note: not sold online)
Price: $4.95
Recommend: No

I recently got this idea that I wanted a large memo center in our  laundry room hallway, near our back door.  It needed to be oversized so I knew it wasn’t something that I’d be able to buy.  So I came up with the drawings and then handed it over to Phil to build for me.  Each of three frames would be 30″x30″.  One would be a magnetic board, covered with fabric.  One would be a chalkboard, and one would be a corkboard, also covered with fabric.

When I went to Home Depot to get the supplies all they had for chalkboard paint was Rust-Oleum’s spray can, as well as Rust-Oleum’s Brush On chalkboard paint.  Since the brush on paint was $21/can, I decided to get the $5 spray can, since I only needed enough for 30×30″.

I went home, sprayed the 1/4″ MDF that we had bought and waited for it to dry.  The drying time was really fast, since I was doing it out in the sun.  I think I ended up putting at least 4 or 5 coats of it, just to be on the safe side.  After it was completely covered, and completely dry I took a look at it and noticed that the surface of the MDF was really flaky-ish.  Almost like it had little particles in it or something.  I wondered if this was something that was in the paint, so I looked at the directions again.  It said to cover the entire surface with chalk, erase it, and you’d be ready to go.  Hmmm….seemed odd, but OK, I was game.  And it didn’t mention anything about the flaky particles so I thought that maybe using the chalk would get rid of them.  I tried the chalk trick but not only did the particles not disappear, but erasing the chalk was almost useless.  The entire chalkboard looked white.   My next step was to try water to remove the chalk.  But all this did was smear it around a bit.  Next I turn to some steel wool pads.  That worked for removing all the particles and making the surface nice and smooth.  Now I take a damp paper towel and wipe it all over the board (several times) to remove all the steel wool shavings as well as the chalk.  Wow!  The paper towel was black!  I think I ended up using 7 or 8 total and each one was completely black after being rubbed against the chalkboard.

Geez, they made it look so easy on HGTV!

To make a long story short, it’s not great.  It seemed like a good idea but if I had talked to another user first I probably would’ve passed on this product.  But maybe the Brush-On Paint works a little better?

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Tagged as: chalkboard, corkboard, magnetic, paint, rust-oleum