Tuesday, June 1, 2021

Reviewing Restoring A Metal Garden Swing Seat

 

restored metal garden swing

We bought a metal garden swing seat recently for a good price as it needed some work and the shop needed the space. 

The swing is all metal and would have originally been painted black. It is very sturdy and quite heavy. It took two strong guys to carry it into our garden. 

My husband and I love this garden seat and like a bit of a challenge, so we embarked on revamping it. 

I always think if the bones are good then most things can be restored to look beautiful and useful again. 


weather garden swing that needs restoration
Original State Of the Garden Swing Seat


From the minute it arrived in our garden albeit quite rusty and certainly neglected and in need of serious tender loving care,  we loved it and it felt like it had been there forever. I love the details of the leaves and flowers and the general shape of the seat.

It is super comfortable as well. The swing has a lovely action and it feels so relaxing to sit on it and gently rock back and forth. It belonged in our garden and we love it! 


Preparation Work For Restoring The Garden Swing. Using Wire Wool Brushes. 

They say that preparation is the most important part of any project and it is important to take your time doing this part. 

While I love to get to the exciting part of making it beautiful, I am happy to accept that this preparation element needs to be given care. 

First, we used wire wool brushes to get rid of any flaking rusty parts. Quite a lot of old rust and flaking damaged parts fell off at this stage! 

We chose quite slim brushes as there were many nooks and crannies to get into that a larger brush would not have been able to reach.

This part of the work was quite hard slow going as it is important to get rid of all the loose sections and make sure it was as clean as possible. 

I am very glad we chose to use brushes with long handles instead of steel wool bundles to hold by hand, as it would have been hard on our hands. Using the brushes our hands were protected and the brushes did a great job.  


 

Then we wiped down the whole seat with an antibacterial spray to clean it all up and remove any dust particles. We repeated this again before painting.

We initially thought we might have to get in a welder to mend some of the worst parts, especially on this armrest section, but wanted to try out epoxy resin first to see if that would work. 


damaged metal garden swing that needs repair
Damage On The Garden Swing Seat


Repairing The Damaged Metal Sections

The next step was to use epoxy resin sticks to repair some of the damaged areas. Using this is quite easy. Do wear gloves as your skin may react to the epoxy resin. 

You simply cut the wrapping and the tube and I took a small piece and rolled it up in my gloved hands until the two parts were mixed evenly then simply applied it to the metal gap I needed covering.

It reminded me of using plasticine as a child. However, it is advisable to wear gloves when handling epoxy resin and of course, keep away from children and pets. 


repairing a damaged metal swing
Epoxy Resin Use On The Garden Swing Seat


I found you do need to work fairly quickly as it does dry in about 10 minutes. So best to only take what you need from the tube. I would keep any unused in a sealed container to help prevent it from drying out.  

I then smoothed it down and allowed it to dry. It took only about an hour before it was cured but we left it overnight before painting.

I thought I would need to sand it down but actually, on this type of item, it looked just fine as it was. I had taken care to smooth it out as much as possible when applying through. On some projects, you would need to sand down first. 

This type of epoxy resin can be drilled and sanded. It can even be used underwater and is waterproof rather than just water-resistant. We wanted this level of protection as this garden swing seat is too heavy to move around a lot so will be out in all weather. 

We were very pleased with the result. Even on the worst damaged sections of the armrest, the resin had set well and firm and the damaged sections were stable again.


Painting The Garden Swing Seat With Hammerite Paint. 

Once the epoxy resin was set hard we decided to paint the whole swing seat black with Hammerite Direct To Rust Paint.

This paint says it gives up to 8 years of rust protection and can be painted directly onto rust, though I still think sanding down and filling any damaged sections is advisable. I do think that with an outdoor seat like this we will repaint every couple of years to keep it looking good.

It is a great paint for a quick job as it is a primer, undercoat and topcoat all in one. This is very useful for outdoor painting when you are trying to paint when it is not raining for a while! 

You must keep it away from any aquatic life as it could be very harmful to them. Please wear gloves when handling and painting as it can provoke an allergic reaction and it is flammable so be careful where you leave it. 

It is important to keep Hammerite Paint away from children and pets. We even stayed out in the garden to make sure none of the local wildlife went near it until dry! 

Hammerite do many different colours, including gold, copper, white and green but as I eventually want to grow plants and climbers all around this seat we decided on a simple black so that the flowers and greenery will show up against it. I also think that this white would also have looked very stylish.



We have not used Hammerite paint before but we were very happy with the way it went on. It was about the right consistency. It did drip a little if we had too much paint on the brush so we learned to carefully wipe off the excess on the tin then paint.

We found it worked well on the larger sections of the A-frame and the broader metal lengths. It was also quite easy to use on the quite intricate leaves, stems and flowers as long as we did not load the brush up too much.


flower and leaf design on the frame of a metal swing
Beautiful Painted Leaves And Flowers


The Hammerite paint dried to a smooth sheen. It is a slightly glossy look which is what we wanted, rather than the rougher hammered finish of the original Hammerite paint. The finish is of course completely down to personal preference. 

Here is the garden swing seat when we had just painted the main A-frame but not yet painted the seat. 

You can see the difference once painted it looks significantly smarter, the rust is no longer visible and the metal is more protected from the elements. 


painted garden swing
A-Frame Hammerite Painted Garden Swing Seat

 

I would advise using an old paintbrush that you are happy to throw away afterward as getting Hammerite out of a brush is a difficult task! 

Normally I am not an advocate of throwing things away but in this case, weighing it up, I feel that using the necessary non-environmentally friendly cleaner is probably worse than throwing away the brush. 

The brushes were certainly a mess after use and I think it would have taken a lot of work and product to get them clean enough to use on any other project. 

So we got off the worst of the paint then wrapped the brush in newspaper and took it to the skip for safe disposal. 


The Finished Restoration Of The Garden Swing Seat!

So was it worth all the work? Well, I would say yes absolutely!

We do not mind the work and got quite a lot of satisfaction from restoring a decaying piece of garden furniture into a once again beautiful and useful garden swing.

 After one coat of Hammerite paint we have achieved a good finish. We will do another coat of paint at some point but it has rained part of every day since so it can wait a while. 

Here is the finished product! 

 

restored metal garden swing
Finished Renovation Of Garden Swing Seat 


It may well have been easier to simply buy a brand new garden swing seat. However, that would have cost us hundreds more. 

This way we have learned new skills, saved a lovely garden seat and now we have a beautiful piece we love sitting on with a nice cup of coffee and are very proud to have in our garden. 

The next stage is to choose suitable plants to position around the garden swing and to beautify it further with plants. 

Then I need to make some cushions for the seat. Now I am not all that handy with sewing. However, once we replace our mattress and memory foam topper, I feel I can cut the old one to size and use it as a garden seat cushion with a simple removable cushion cover. 


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16 comments:

  1. A great article on restoration of a valuable item. I watch the Repair shop and this is equal to anything on that. ❤️

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    Replies
    1. Wow! Thank you so much. We very much enjoyed restoring this metal swing seat.

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  2. Wow Jasmine, that is a beautiful swing that you were working on. It came out perfectly in my books. You and your husband did a great job in restoring it and I know you will get many years of use from this project. Glad to know that there are expoxies and paints that will withstand the weather. I hope you enjoy this spot in your garden, I know I would!

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    Replies
    1. Thank you so much! We are really enjoying the warm summer days whenever we get a chance to relax on this garden swing seat. So far all the repairs and paint are holding up well!

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  3. What a gorgeous swing Jasmine! It is perfect for that spot in your garden too. I've never worked with Hammerite Metal Paint before, but it sounds like the perfect paint for a restoration job. I love a swing in a garden setting. I would say you two found quite a treasure, or perhaps it found just the right loving owners. Beautifully done!

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    Replies
    1. Thank you, we love it! So happy we found this garden swing seat and decided to take the plunge to restore it. The Hammerite paint is still looking good. I am thinking we will repaint once a year or every couple of years depending on how it looks. It is lovely to relax on in the garden and also to look at from the house!

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  4. A beautiful restoration project and one that has brought back to life a lovely garden seat. You & hubby have done a wonderful job. I enjoyed your step-by-step directions and how-tos. Helpful for anyone embarking on a similar outdoor project.

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    Replies
    1. Thank you so much! I am glad you found it interesting. We did enjoy the process of restoring the garden seat and now enjoying the relaxing on it part whenever we get the chance :)

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  5. Jasmine, what a beautiful restoration job on this gorgeous find! I’m very impressed. in addition to the tremendous cost savings and personal satisfaction of purchasing, repairing and restoring this piece yourselves, you and your husband have given each other the gift of a stunning metal garden swing set that is likely better made and more aesthetically pleasing than most brand-new sets that don’t cost a fortune. Well done!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you for your kind words. Having worked on the garden seat we know it more and I think appreciate it more. You are right there is a lot of personal satisfaction from completing a job like this a is a great gift to each other :)

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  6. Great job Jasmine. I see you having hours of pleasant times enjoying that swing and your garden.

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    Replies
    1. Thank you very much!.Yes we are certainly enjoying our metal garden swing seat this Spring and Summer in the garden so far.

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  7. What a beautiful swing and amazing work on the restoration. I agree that the prep work is always the most difficult, but I find if you take time and care on prep work the job is so much more rewarding.

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    Replies
    1. Thank you so much! You are right the prep work can be the most difficult and time consuming. However it is really important to get that part right then the finished result is so much better :)

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  8. You did a beautiful job with this swing! I love the fact that it's very heavy as well - that's a good thing on windy days. The detail and care you put into this is very impressive. Also love the color you chose. I can understand pride of workmanship in this piece, it means so much more than buying something.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you so much for your kind words. Yes the metal garden swing seat is very heavy! There is no danger of it being blown away. Thank you we think the colour works well in our garden and we did enjoy doing the restoration.

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