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That $80 airless sprayer I bought on a whim after a painter ranted for 20 minutes
I was at the hardware store last spring trying to grab a gallon of primer for a small fence job and this painter guy just starts unloading on me about how rollers are a waste of time. He went on for maybe 20 minutes about his Graco sprayer and how it saved him three days on a single house. I have no idea who he was but I walked out with a cheap $80 sprayer anyway. First time I used it the thing clogged up within 5 minutes because I didn't thin the paint right. Second time I got the hang of it and sprayed my whole shed in like 45 minutes flat. Third time the motor burned out halfway through a deck job so now I'm back to rollers and wondering if that painter was just trying to sell me on his own mistakes. Has anyone else had a random stranger's advice lead them to buy something that let them down hard?
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karenh561mo ago
Learn from your mistakes and move on, that cheap sprayer was never meant to last anyway
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michael6691mo ago
Funny how that applies to so much more than just paint sprayers though. There's this whole pattern where people get told to just buy the cheap version of something to "see if they like it" and then when it breaks they feel like they wasted money. Your mileage may vary but I've had better luck saving up for one solid tool than replacing three cheap ones over a few years. Same thing happens with those budget circular saws and even kitchen mixers honestly. The whole "buy once, cry once" thing gets thrown around a lot but there's some truth to it when you look at the long run.
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michael6691mo ago
Did that painter ever tell you what brand he was actually using or was he just ranting in general? Because there's a huge difference between a $400 Graco and the $80 specials they stack by the checkout. Honestly I think a lot of those store employees and random contractors get paid to hype up certain brands without saying it outright. Tbh you probably got burned more by the price point than the advice itself.
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