196 PAINT TECHNOLOGY AND TESTS 



"As before stated, the committee believes that a serious mis- 

 take was made on the test fence in painting out the leads and 

 other formulas on the various woods without any special attention 

 to reduction to suit the nature of the wood, thus accounting 

 largely for the difference of the wearing of the paints on the 

 different woods. 



" The reduction of the white leads especially was to be criti- 

 cised in these tests, in many cases too much oil and not sufficient 

 turpentine being present to cause penetration. 



" The application of paint to cedar was satisfactory in most 

 all cases, and this wood showed much better results than the 

 other woods upon the fences. The exudation of resinous pitch 

 on the hard pine was extremely serious, in some cases coming 

 through the paint in large streaks, causing bad results. 



"It is to be regretted that the house repainting tests which 

 were conducted are of no special value, inasmuch as no informa- 

 tion is on file as to the composition of the old paints originally 

 on the houses before the application of the test paints. Imper- 

 fections in the old coating, such as excessive chalking, deep check- 

 ing, scaling, rosin exudations, etc., affected the subsequent coats 

 in such a manner as to prevent any knowledge of where the new 

 and old paint troubles began. The committee, therefore, omitted 

 a detailed inspection of such tests. 



" Examination of the three houses which were painted over 

 new wood showed results which correspond with the results 

 obtained from the fence tests. That is, they showed the ulti- 

 mate value of high type mixtures of several pigments over one 

 pigment alone. These tests seem to indicate that very good 

 results can be secured from most of the paints sold in North 

 Dakota. If the consumer or householder would exercise more 

 care in the selection of wood and preparation of surfaces, with 

 due regard to the proper reduction for various coats, more 

 satisfactory results would be obtained. 



" From an examination of certain paints on the 1908 fence 

 containing petroleum spirits, it would appear that this paint 

 thinner is of value, and in the face of conditions such as are pre- 

 sented by the present scarcity of turpentine, the use of petroleum 

 spirits in moderate quantity would be justified." 



