paint not sticking..??

[taranichole]

I have an issue in my daughters' room. Last February, we painted it hot pink and I noticed that at the bottom of the wall in some spots, the paint would just not adhere. It looks almost like someone took some bleach and splashed it on the wall. It even has "drip lines" in some spots.When we bought the place we primed the walls using an oil based primer and then painted them an offwhite / light beige color so I didn't notice if it was an issue then. I mentioned this to my mom after I painted the pink on and she thought she remembered having an issue with it but couldn't really remember since we did a lot of painting (all of the walls).

It hasn't really bothered me until now (I actually forgot about it). We are ripping up the carpet in there to put in laminate (carpet was starting to get cat pee stinky) and with all the furniture pulled out from walls it's driving me nuts since I don't know what it's from. I was doing some research on sealing cat pee smell at subfloor level and saw some pics of cat pee spray under a blacklight and it honestly resembled the spots on the walls. Since the paint I used was latex, did it react with some ammonia on the walls and not adhere? The two cats we have are both female, and both fixed and really doubt they could get pee up that high (meaning it had to have been there when we bought it... right?)

I still have lots of the pink paint and will likely reprime and repaint those areas. Will Kilz odorless oil based primer be ok over those spots?

I've done a lot of painting in my day and I've never had this issue before.

Edited to add: We have a 16x80 Liberty from either 94 or 98 (can't remember)

[taranichole]

Ok... so for some reason last night it looked a lot better than I remembered it being. I have come to the conclusion that it cannot be cat urine because there is a line in the corner going up the wall where the paint wouldn't stick.

My best guess about what happened with the mysterious spots was due to the frigid weather in February. The spots are on the exterior walls and there has in the past (before I painted) been frost on the walls in there.

I'll update again after I repaint in case others have this issue!

[flcruising]

Frost is water. Sounds like you have water intrusion from a leak. Or could be that there are voids in the insulation, and the frost is the indoor humidity condensing and freezing on those areas. Is it only peeling only on exterior walls?

Since you have everything out of the room, now would be a good time to remove the wall panels and fix the insulation. You should not have frost on any of your walls, regardless of the temperature outside.

[taranichole]

I suppose there's no way to save the walls if I took them down? Meaning if I took down the walls to add/fix insulation I'd have to replace the walls with drywall?

Is there a product where I can just drill a hole and add a foam insulation?

[flcruising]

Yes, you can blow cellulose or fiberglass insulation into them, but then you are left with up to 4" holes to cover up.

If you can determine that only the bottom of the walls need the insulation, then you could wainscot the room to cover the holes you make. But without removing the wall board, I don't know how you could determine the condition of the insulation without making lots of inspection holes anyways.