Hi! My house was built in the 1950's and we have the original window screens. Instead of replacing all of them, I was wondering if their might be a way to make them look new again, or even to paint them white!

They are pretty faded and have some spots on them, almost like rust. Any ideas or guidance would be appreciated!

Replace them. You can get new screens in the $30 each range (depending on size). You can spend more than that trying to make the old screens look presentable.

remove the screen material and put in new screen material. any good hardware store sells the screening material by the yard... it is a very easy job.google replacing window screen and you get a heap of vidios of how to do it. this way you are sure they will fit your windows.

What about the frames of the screen? Those are what really need the work! I can't see that a whole screen is an easy replacement, is it?

quote:

Originally posted by jolesd:
What about the frames of the screen? Those are what really need the work! I can't see that a whole screen is an easy replacement, is it?

That's what I was referring to. It is easy and it is not expensive. You can buy screen frame parts (the aluminum frame and corner joint pieces) at any home store. However, this is one of those things where you could buy all the materials and do it yourself but a regular screen shop would do everything (materials and labor to build) for the same price.

Check around for a window / screen company in your area.

Sure would be nice to see a picture.
Are you talking about aluminum frames?

I'll take some pictures this weekend and post them for further details...

it is possible to replace whole screen units, even on the old 2 or 3 track aluminum storm/screen exterior windows.

the parts are not that common in shops any more, and you might have to hunt 'em down hard.

you also might have to dump the units and upgrade.

I would not toss the screen units, and rescreen with good fiberglass material. the "silver" would either be galvanized steel or aluminum screen cloth.

once you knock the screens out of square by horsing around with them, you end up cutting a lot of life out of them. many of the dogleg inserts that hold the things together used to be really soft metal, lead or bismuth or something like that. doesn't rework very well once it's been hosed up.