Hi all. Thanks for the help. Antss, I found the technical specs you mentioned and now see that yes, of course, it is available in all bases for mixing. The BM site is a bit confusing on that, as for the waterborne satin impervo they specified not only what premixed colors are available but also which bases for custom made colors. On the alkyd base one there is no mention of the bases being available, only the premixed colors, leading me to conclude that the company had phased out the alkyd based custom colors. As for my contractor...I'm pretty sure that this is yet another case of combining incompetence with cheapness. BM paint is sold only in two places in the Baltimore area...by Ace hardware stores and one paint store that's inconveniently located. I've used my local Ace to buy all the BM paints for walls and trim elsewhere in the house and they've been great. But I guess they aren't as knowledgeable about the lesser used lines, such as the alkyd Satin Impervo. So, when the contractor went to the Ace store, I suspect he was genuinely misled. What I really fault him for was for not calling me and asking what I wanted to do rather than proceeding to paint with the latex. Had he asked, I would have explored other options, including asking here sooner....and hopefully found out that I COULD get what I wanted. Boxer, what is on the cabinets now is latex. The yellow cabs are BM waterborne satin impervo and the green is the Ace Brand. And, as I said, I can't imagine extending this nightmare any further, so I am stuck with it. I'm not at all happy with the quality of the doors and drawer fronts in other ways as well...they are poplar, rather than birch or maple...so soft and dent easily. But I'm resigned to living with them for a few years. Then, I hope to have new fronts made in a harder wood. When that happens, I may go through the effort of scraping and priming the exposed frames and side panels to repaint all in the oil/alkyd base BM I wanted in the first place. Till then, the photos will look good...but no one should look too closely!

You shouldn't have a problem with latex paint, it does not contain natural rubber. Here is a link that might be useful: Is latex paint safe for people with latex allergies?

well we have the satin impervo oil base. My painter wouldn't use anything but oil. I love the way the brush marks are so subtle and I have not seen any yellowing. It has been 4 1/2 yrs so far. I don't believe what your person says about the warranty...he might be " full of paint LOL"...our cabs are custom local and the builder could care less what we did to them once they were in our house. I think you should go with what you know and or what your reliable paint store suggests or what you have seen in homes you have visited to look at the kitchens. It is in the " eye of the beholder'. c

For a surface with multiple layers of paint, the very last layer (the one of top of them all) is only as strong as all the layers underneath it. If one layer has adhesion issues, then all paints applied on top of that will also have adhesion issues. In fact, when you put a layer of paint on top of other layers of paint that are not adhered, your new paint can actually help the previous layers to peel. The weight of the paint itself and the moisture content of the paint puts stress on all the layers underneath. So, there is no dissolving going on and there is no magic primer that will help get old layers of paint that are not adhering to adhere. The only real fix is to remove the failing paint to a sound surface. There are products like PeelBond, but these types of products are only meant to help lock down the edge where the paint has actually peeled. These products do nothing to help paint stick underneath other layers of paint. So, to answer your question, yes. If you paint over latex paint that is not stuck to old oil based paint, your paint and the old latex paint layer will both peel. The good news is that when you have a situation where somebody painted over oil based paint with latex and didn't do any prep, usually the peeling paint is not everywhere. You will most likely find areas where the paint has adhered and areas where it has not and of course, paint will always be most likely to peel in a kitchen because so many people paint over grease and other contaminants in that area...same deal with bathrooms. All you need to do is remove the paint that is peeling. It is not usually necessary to remove all the latex paint.