Dulux Weathershield BackPack Roller System July 2009
Take the strain out of painting
The Dulux Weathershield BackPack Roller System aims to paint the outside of your house at the press of a button – by pumping paint directly from a pot in a rucksack. We tried the Dulux Weathershield BackPack Roller System out on a 1970s part-rendered house to see if it could make the chore any easier.
The Dulux Weathershield BackPack Roller System is designed to help you paint the outside of your house quickly and easily - we've had a quick go at using it to bring you our first impressions.
We found that attaching the nozzled roller – rather than using a traditional roller – to the Dulux Weathershield BackPack Roller System means no messy pouring and minimal waste.
With the edging painted, we came to the moment of truth: time to strap the Dulux Weathershield BackPack Roller System on. The embarrassment of looking like mountaineer rather than house painter – with colourful rucksack, utility belt (for the edging pot and brush), the extension pole, roller and hoses – was soon overcome as we made rapid progress in applying the Dulux Weathershield paint evenly with minimal effort.
Intermittent flicks of the trigger topped the roller up nicely. Pumping too long caused a few drips, but that’s about as messy as it got. Overall, the Dulux Weathershield BackPack Roller System was clean, fast and effective. Two coats covered the old paint, but we applied a third for luck.
On smooth exterior walls the Dulux BackPack Roller System proved itself as fast and efficient and there was minimal waste. We haven’t painted other surfaces, but think it’s worth a look, not just for exterior walls but for interior ceilings, too.
There was one hiccup during the clean up. The Dulux Weathershield BackPack Roller System's tap adapter was too large for our tap, something we didn't discover until we had dirty pipes to clean. Using the adapter should have allowed us to turn the tap on and leave it to clean the pipes in 10 minutes. Cleaning was much trickier without it, taking more like half an hour and requiring our constant attention.
Dulux Weathershield BackPack Roller System parts are sold separately at B&Q: Backpack kit £49.98; 1.2m extension handle £11.98; edging kit £14.98; 5 litre pot of Dulux Weathershield paint (coverage 55 sq metres to 65 sq metres) £24.98; which totals £101.92.
Pros Fast, even coverage, minimal wastage, minimal mess, minimal effort
Cons Difficult to clean if you don’t have the right tap fittings
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