So what have I learned from all this window craziness?
1. It takes longer than I thought.
Best thing I can say is suck it up and know that after you're done, you won't need to worry about them for a while. One, you're saving money by maintaining them and not having to replace them with new windows. And two, it is just the cool thing to do to up your DIY cred. :)
2. Should I not cheap out and actually restore these to fully working order?
I've thought alot about this. Aside from the peace of mind that I completely restored the windows, I'm not sure that future owners of this home will appreciate the amount of work I put into them. I mean this is already taking forever -- I can't imagine taking the sash out, heatgunning all the glaze and paint off. Removing glass without breaking it. Reglazing and repainting? Ouch. I have a day job you know? I'd like to finish these sometime in my lifetime. This is why I've decided to keep the downstairs windows inoperable. Several windows have the sash cords and/or weights removed. However as I complete each window I take great pains to really scrape the heck out of the border between sash and frame. Meaning they are superficially painted shut. It shouldn't be too hard to unstick them if you wanted to. At some point far in the future I may decide to do this, but right now it's just not in the cards. I think I will have my work cut out for me by taking on the top floor windows. The monster windows in the office (sun room) scare me, but it needs to be done.
3. Should these windows be fully stripped down to bare wood?
I don't think it's completely necessary, I'm hoping that if you're having a hard time getting it off, it's still good. At least for a while. Over time as you scrape and repaint it will most likely be to the parts that were not scraped down all the way. I don't think that's too big a deal though.
4. Can I apply the primer over non-bare wood?
I conveniently sidestepped this issue when I redid the dining room windows on the rear of the house. The paint was mostly already off and what was left was seriously flaking. I easily took these down to 90% wood at least. I don't believe these had been recently painted as those on the other side of the room so there were no issues with latex paint. I hadn't really thought about this until after the fact. I believe the standard is latex over oil but never the other way around. When you get down to bare wood you don't have to worry about this. Just primer the whole thing, then give two coats latex. But what if you're windows have a coat of latex that you weren't able to completely get off? You then put an oil based primer over it and proceeded with another layer of latex. Depending on how much we're talking about this could be an issue with the paint flaking up prematurely. I've chalked this up to experience and will keep an eye on my recently completed windows to see if this does indeed prove to have been a mistake. On future windows that do have significant amounts of latex still there after the scraping/sanding phase I will apply primer to only the exposed wood. Hopefully in 10 years there will be no difference between the two. Or I could be at it again on the windows in question in 2 - 3 years. I hope I'm being overly paranoid.
Needless to say, I've decided to invest in a book I recently found out about. It's called "Working Windows". I'm hoping the experts will guide me through the many questions I will eventually endure when I start tackling the upstairs windows. Until then I shall restore in ignorant bliss.
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