Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Hello. I purchased the Wagner 518080 to paint 12 doors that I had purchased to remodel my house. I had replaced the door moldings and fitted new panel doors. After doing this I then hand painted the new moldings and door jambs. But the thought of hand painting 12 panel doors made me think I really needed to spray them. Quite frankly, I don't know why I thought that way since my previous experiences with spray outfits had always led to disaster. But, I was intrigued by all the positive feedback on this sprayer so I decided to take the plunge. In the grand scheme of things, it was only $99 so not much of a plunge. I spent an inordinate amount of time researching how to spray latex. I planned to spray the doors with a white gloss Latex enamal, the same paint I had used on the moldings and door jambs. I got a ton a conflicting information with many bloggers saying, "Don't even try it with a cheap sprayer." Anyway, long story short, I happened upon a video from the manufacturer of a rather expensive three stage HVLP unit that explained how to spray latex using their system. They explained that you mix 4 parts paint to 1 part Floetrol to 2 parts of a water borne polyurethane. They suggested using either Home Depot's water based clear Profinisher or Minwax Polycrytic. They also explained that you should filter the mixture before spraying. Now armed with "how" along a $99 spray outfit I began my next adventure. I followed the video's directions to a tee on how to prepare the paint. One note, the polyurethanes and Polycrytic come in gloss, semi-gloss and flat. Make sure you match against the type of paint you are using. With everything ready to go I spent all of two minutes adjusting my sprayer while spraying on some cardboard. I ended up setting the pressure about 3/4" up and the trigger flow adjuster til the paint seemed to spray evenly. I then began spraying the doors. It was unbelievable how easy this was. Here I was spraying just like a pro. I had done this so many times before with utter disaster. This time I was a pro! My doors came out as good as I've seen anywhere. They were really that good. The only problem I had was when spraying the edge with the hinge pockets. I had to be careful not to put too much paint on them or I got runs. But, that was the only area where my inexperience showed up. I couldn't be happier with this sprayer and the advice I followed on preparing the paint. The only problem is that the Minwax Polycrytic I used used was pretty expensive. It basically doubled my paint cost. All the while I wondered if using the Floetrol alone would have done the job. But, I was having so much success I didn't want to even try something different. Afterwords my only reqret was that I should have used the sprayer to do the jambs and moldings. It would have been so much easier and they would have looked so much better. Good luck on your projects