Cleaning/Lightening knotty pine paneling

[John]

We’ve purchased a home that was converted to a year round from a ‘camp’ built in the ’50s. The living room is entirely shiplap knotty pine, including the 15′ cathederal ceiling. It makes for a very dark room, it looks like some panels may have been replaced as most of the panels ‘feel’ smooth and somewhat glossy but some are stained but not glossy. Does anybody have experience with the best products/methods for cleaning and/or lightning (refinishing?) these panels. I’m really ‘knot’ looking forward to sanding all that space. Thanks in advance for the help!
-jp

[Henry in MI]

Hi, John. It is possible to use chemicals to bleach wood but I certainly would NOT encourage you to do this in place. The chemicals can be pretty trecherous. I think that the place to start is by giving the wood a good cleaning. Mix up some Dirtex cleaner with water according to label directions. Wash the walls with a damp sponge at several locations to see how much and what is coming off. Rinse with clear water on another sponge. You don’t want to get any more water on the walls than necessary. Start with just some test sections at a few different locations to see what kind of results you get. Dirtex is available at most specialty paint stores.

I can’t tell you what you will see doing this but it should give you a lot better idea of what the siding looks like. My guess is that you have a heavy buildup of smoking, fireplace, cooking oils and other residues. The cleaning should get a lot of this off. If the test sections show promise, you can continue cleaning. If the walls and ceiling are still too dark, I think that you should consider painting. If you do decide for the painting, the first step will be to wash the walls with the Dirtex anyway.

Good luck
Henry in MI

[maggie]

I have just purchased a home that has knotty walls. The previous owners lived there for over 50 years which means that thier paints hung on the wall for over fifty years. We can see where every since painting was located becuase the walls are stained. How can we correct this so we can hang our painting on the wall where we want and not where they were for the previous owner?

[Clara Pelfrey]

I have a lovely wood-paneled library. I tried cleaning the paneling with Murphy’s Oil soap. Only uncut soap worked, and then it took ages of scrubbing, elbow grease, etc. Each time I work on the SAME panel, I get more “black stuff” off on my sponge/scrungie. What is this and is there a less labor-intensive way to remove it?

Thanks!

[Author]

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