How To Repair Water Damaged Window Frame

H2o stained window sashes are a common problem in many homes. It'south frustrating to see not only the eyesore of a stained window sash and sill but window are expensive and nobody wants to replace their windows before they have to!

Thankfully, repairing window sash and sill harm is an piece of cake DIY project that requires minimal tools and a bit of patience. In this mail, I'm going to show yous how you can easily repair your window sill in under two hours.

Better yet, once your windows are fixed, I'm going to requite you an incredibly uncomplicated way to go on them looking great and prevent future damage.

Index

Tools and Materials Needed
What Causes Window Sash Damage
How To Repair Window Sash Stains
Printable Instructions
How To Prevent Water Damage on Your Window Sash

Repairing window sills and sashes doesn't require a lot of expensive tools. Below are the tools I recommend to make the job go as rapidly and easily as possible.

Multi-Tool with Sanding Head

A multi-tool is a bully tool for many around the house projects. For this project, I employ my multi-tool with the sanding head attached. The triangle sanding pads are perfect to become into minor corners on the window sills and sashes and make quick work of sanding away damaged area.

You could as well become with a detail sander, which accomplishes the same affair. Just for the money, the multi-tool gives y'all and so much more versatility.

Other Tools and Materials

Shop-Vac
Drib Cloths
Painter's Tape
Minwax Clear Satin Polyurethane
i.v″ White Bristle Stain Castor
Minwax Wood Hardener
Minwax Wood Filler
Oxalic Acid Wood Bleach

What Causes Window Sash Impairment

Most window sash and sill damage is caused by moisture in the form of condensation getting into the wooden window sill.

Condensation forms on the windows when the temperature outside cools down and in return lowers the temperature of the glass on your window. When humid air within your abode and then comes into contact with the drinking glass on the window, water droplets form on the glass and somewhen run down into the window sill.

Over fourth dimension, this water forming on your window and getting on your sash slowly causes damage. It first breaks down the protective clear coat on the window sill and then information technology starts damaging the wood.

How To Repair H2o Damaged Windows

Asses The Damage To The Window Sash and Sill

The first thing you are going to want to exercise is asses how much damage in that location currently is on your window sash and sill.

Is the clear coat merely starting to fail by cracking and flaking off the wood? If so, you're in luck as this is your easiest set up and will require minimal work.

Do you have black water harm simply the wood its self is however solid? This can still exist fixed and should be before the forest begins to rot.

Is the wood soft and squishy? If this is the example, your forest has begun to rot and you volition have to decide if the rot has affected the integrity of the entire window, or if the expanse is small and still salvageable.

The window in the above picture has lots of failing articulate coat and water damage to the window sash and sill. However, the forest is nevertheless solid and fixable.

Prep Your Work Area

The starting time thing you need to do for whatever paint job is to prep your work area to contain your mess and protect the surrounding areas.

For this projection, I like to lay out a large drib cloth to take hold of my sanding dust and run a piece of record on the glass surface of the window. This is to prevent scratching the glass while I am sanding the window sash.

Sand Away H2o Damaged Wood

The first affair I am going to do is start sanding abroad the damaged surfaces.

How much you need to sand is entirely dependant upon how much damage there currently is on your window.

If your window sills and sash just have damage to the clear coat but at that place is no rot in the wood and not blackening, then merely sand downwardly the existing clear glaze.

If your windows have black water damage, yous're going to want to sand off the clear coat and sand as far downwardly needed with your sanding tool to remove every bit much the black water damage as possible. This may end up re-shaping the edges of your sash and sill, but this is acceptable collateral damage. Only endeavour to keep it to a minimum.

Stabilize, Remove, or Supersede Rotten Woods

If you have soft, rotted woods on your windows, y'all will have to practice 1 of three things.

Stabilize the rotted forest. Minwax Wood Hardener is a product I like to use a lot for projects like this (and a lot on exteriors as well). It is not a perfect solution simply works great for many situations.

Minwax Wood Hardener penetrates the routing wood and uses a resin to bond and harden the rotting wood fibers. It also deals the area against futurity wet damage.

Another option for rotting wood is to remove (dig out) the routing wood and make full the area with forest filler. This method is perfect for small areas and is preferred past many painters over using wood gardener. One time your wood filler has dried difficult, you can sand it to shape, stain and seal. A warning near this method, wood filler never stains the same color as real wood, it commonly stands out quite a bit.

Your last option is to replace the tired piece of wood. This is for when at that place is too much to repair. I won't be roofing this option here.

Bleach Out The Water Stains

Afterward you have sanded off any articulate coat, an option I like to employ is bleaching away water stains using oxalic acrid.

Oxalic acid will effectively black away light surface staining on wood. It does require a lot of time to work properly and a handful of coats.

Oxalic acid can at the very to the lowest degree lighten the blackness staining in woods and at its best, completely eliminate it.

Make certain you use beating and skin protection when using oxalic acid though as it is some nasty stuff.

When y'all are done bleaching am area, you will need to neutralize the expanse with baking soda. A mix of blistering soda and h2o will neutralize the acid and make the wood ready for staining and sealing.

Sand and Clean Any Remaining Discoloration

After you have finished repairing any rotted forest and bleaching away h2o stains, it's time for your last Sanding.

This is where I go and away any remaining dark stain, missed clear coat, and give information technology a fine smooth surface (unremarkably 150 – 180 grit sandpaper).

When you're satisfied with your sanding information technology's time to make clean the window and become set up for stain.

I like to store vac the area every bit clean every bit possible so get back with a slightly damp rag and clean the expanse of whatsoever remaining dust.

Re-Stain The Window Sill

If you lot have the original stain color, and so staining your windows sills and sashes is as easy as applying the stain, allow it to sit, so wrote off the excess.

If you don't have the original stain color yous are going to accept to exercise one of two things.

The easiest is to remove a slice of trim from your home and bring it to the paint store for a custom match. I like to go into a closet and take a small piece of trim that is out of sight. To re-install the piece of trim, you can use liquid nails or whatsoever other adhesive.

The 2d option is to try to mix a custom match yourself. I frequently exercise this, merely I also take a large stain kit with many different colors, pigments, and dyes. And then this likely won't piece of work for everyone.

You tin can also take your chances eyeballing the color. Many homes are stained with very common stain colors such equally Golden Oak. If you lot think that your color might exist i of these common stain colors, give it a shot.

Clear Coat The Window Sill & Sash

The last step in repairing rotted window sills is to articulate glaze the expanse that you have repaired.

Match your existing sheen (typically stain and occasionally semi-gloss) and brush on ii coats of Minwax Clear Polyurethane clear coat. Permit the finish to dry between coats and lightly sand with a 220 grit sandpaper to get the smoothest finish possible.

Printable Instructions

Prep Fourth dimension 15 minutes

Active Time 1 hr 15 minutes

Total Time 1 hour 30 minutes

Difficulty Medium

Estimated Price $25-$200

Instructions

Asses The Impairment To The Window Sill
Prep Your Work Area
Sand Abroad H2o Impairment Wood
Stabilize, Remove and Supplant Rotted Wood
Bleach Out The Water Stains
Sand and Clean the Remaining Sill
Re-Stain The Window Sill
Clear Coat The Window Sill

How To Prevent Window Sash Damage From Happening

If you've already repaired your window sills or you lot are lucky enough to have caught them before whatever major harm has happened (maybe the clear coat is merely starting to intermission downwardly), now is the time to have a plan to prevent future harm.

Preventative window maintenance is incredibly piece of cake and will save you hours of DIY piece of work, thousands of dollars to hire someone like me, or fifty-fifty tens of thousands of dollars in replacing your windows.

In my domicile, and what I recommend all my clients doing, is to continue a quart of articulate coat that matches your current clear coat sheen (satin, semi-gloss etc.) and apply a fresh clear coat on your window sills every 1-two years.

Start by giving your window sills a small scuff with some 150 or 180 grit sanding paper. Don't over sand. Continue it calorie-free and just scuff the surface. Vacuum the surface clean (or wipe it make clean).

Next, accept a small 1 inch angled castor and brush and your clear coat and brush i fresh coat onto the bottoms of your window sills. It'south that simple.

This should only take 5 minutes per window.

What information technology does is information technology keeps the wood on your window sill sealed and protected confronting moisture damage.

Of course, controlling humidity through humidifiers, dehumidifiers and air exchangers is recommended (only that's for a different website).