help with botch job

[Stirton]

Hello,

I've just paid to have my hall plastered and the bloke has, well i think he's made an arse of it.

I've small dimble bits everywhere, they actually like like air holes. I took off my skirtings and door surrounds and he's plastered over the wood which is now falling off as plaster doesn't stick to wood, but it's taking bits off the wall plaster with it when it falls off and there's small lump bits around ceiling and at edge.

The lumps of paster, can i just cut or chip them off and then water the area and try and smooth it out??

The wee air holes can i just try and do as above or would i be best trying to fill the wee holes with filla??

Also, i've read another post on here which says i should paint with watered down paint for a couple of applications before applying proper coats but there was a bit of disagreement of percentage of watering down??

Any help would be appreciated, thanks

 

[Micilin]

Obviously without seeing it, and assuming you can't get him back-

Clean off the doorframe, and see how far proud of it he has come (ie is his plaster sticking out much past the doorframe?) he should be quite tight on it, but if it is more than a couple of mil, you might have to think about rebating your architrave, planting a bit wood on the frame to alllow you to fix the architrave , or using filler/caulk.

The best bet (IMO) for the rest is to get a hand or stick sander, sand down all angles and probably all the wall, fill the misses with easi fill or decorators filler dependig on how much there is to be done. Sand it down again, when happy wipe dust off with damp sponge or simlar and the then mist coat and paint.

Was teh guy reccomended?

 

[Stirton]

Obviously without seeing it, and assuming you can't get him back-

Clean off the doorframe, and see how far proud of it he has come (ie is his plaster sticking out much past the doorframe?) he should be quite tight on it, but if it is more than a couple of mil, you might have to think about rebating your architrave, planting a bit wood on the frame to alllow you to fix the architrave , or using filler/caulk.

The best bet (IMO) for the rest is to get a hand or stick sander, sand down all angles and probably all the wall, fill the misses with easi fill or decorators filler dependig on how much there is to be done. Sand it down again, when happy wipe dust off with damp sponge or simlar and the then mist coat and paint.

Was teh guy reccomended?

Cheers for getting back to me.

The plaster does stick out quite a bit past the door frame, by a good few mill in places even a bout 1cm around one door. I take it i have to knock all the plaster off the door frame cause it won't stick long term anyway, will prob fall off when i try to nail covering back on!!!

No he wasn't recommended, got his details out local rag. uou should have seen the mess he left as well, i was expecting a bit of mess but i had plaster bloody EVERYWHERE!!!!

Even the metal trim for the edge isn't covered completely so that'll show through the paint!!!

 

[Richard C]

Yet another one gets caught out He sounds like a bit of a disaster but its unfortunate that many who masquerade as plasterers can’t actually plaster to even an acceptable standard. That can be the case in any trade & price is sometimes a good guide, how long was he there & how much did he charge you? Golden rule with any trade on small jobs is to go on personal recommendation if you can & always try & see some previous work.

If you weren’t satisfied, why on earth did you pay him, have you tried getting him back to do the remedial work? If he’s left it in such a mess, he’s the one that should be doing the filling & sanding as a learning curve for him & at no extra cost to you. Filling minor blemishes & pin holes is one thing but Gypsum finish plaster is not meant to be sanded, overdoing it will expose the plaster grain & it ends up looking at bit like suede brushed the wrong way requiring many coats of paint to hide it.

He should have removed the “snots” around the ceiling as part of the normal cleaning up process, if it’s not been left too long sometimes damping them down well will soften them up enough to come off easier with a sharp scraper. He should have feathered the skim into the door lining but sometimes the plaster “picks up” on the edge of the wood, especially if it’s shrunk back below the original skim. Cut down the edge of the door lining with a sharp Stanley knife so you can remove the plaster on the wood lining without risking pulling lumps off the wall. Then try the architrave, once it’s nailed into position you won’t see the raw plaster edge & a bead of caulk will fill any small gap but anything more than 1mm or so is going to be difficult to accommodate.

When you say the metal trim isn’t covered, what do you mean? The extreme edge of corner beads isn’t meant to be covered with plaster but there is no way you should see the rest of it!

Regards mist coats; 2/3 coats of cheap white matt in quick succession, thinned 25–30% is what I use; let it dry overnight before applying final decorative finish of your choice.

 

[Stirton]

Yet another one gets caught out He sounds like a bit of a disaster but its unfortunate that many who masquerade as plasterers can’t actually plaster to even an acceptable standard. That can be the case in any trade & price is sometimes a good guide, how long was he there & how much did he charge you? Golden rule with any trade on small jobs is to go on personal recommendation if you can & always try & see some previous work.

If you weren’t satisfied, why on earth did you pay him, have you tried getting him back to do the remedial work? If he’s left it in such a mess, he’s the one that should be doing the filling & sanding as a learning curve for him & at no extra cost to you. Filling minor blemishes & pin holes is one thing but Gypsum finish plaster is not meant to be sanded, overdoing it will expose the plaster grain & it ends up looking at bit like suede brushed the wrong way requiring many coats of paint to hide it.

He should have removed the “snots” around the ceiling as part of the normal cleaning up process, if it’s not been left too long sometimes damping them down well will soften them up enough to come off easier with a sharp scraper. He should have feathered the skim into the door lining but sometimes the plaster “picks up” on the edge of the wood, especially if it’s shrunk back below the original skim. Cut down the edge of the door lining with a sharp Stanley knife so you can remove the plaster on the wood lining without risking pulling lumps off the wall. Then try the architrave, once it’s nailed into position you won’t see the raw plaster edge & a bead of caulk will fill any small gap but anything more than 1mm or so is going to be difficult to accommodate.

When you say the metal trim isn’t covered, what do you mean? The extreme edge of corner beads isn’t meant to be covered with plaster but there is no way you should see the rest of it!

Regards mist coats; 2/3 coats of cheap white matt in quick succession, thinned 25–30% is what I use; let it dry overnight before applying final decorative finish of your choice.

Richard thanks for the post.

He was there for two days to do a relitavely small hallway and ceiling. One of the walls was back to the brick so he had to do several layers he said on that which was the most time consuming wall.

All in all it's cost the best part of £530, where i paid half upfront and the rest on the morning that he was due to complete as i was working so wouldn't see him later, prob a really bad idea.

Have tried to call him to come back and have a look at the bits i'm not happy with, but he never answers and doesn't respond to my answer messages.

It's the around the doors that will cause me the biggest probs cause it's far thicker at some points than others so i'll do what you said and cut down to frame edge and work from there.

I'll have to put in cornice around the ceiling though to hide the dodgy joins from wall to ceiling and the places where he hasn't even plasterd to the ceiling.

Any ideas for a really thick paint that might help cover the wee air like holes that appear on the surface at some bits?? Is wickes paint as thick as the advert says???

 

[Richard C]

You could try a power sander around the door lining to try & reduce the high spots a bit but keep your eye on it & stop once you start to expose the grain too much. For the pin holes, I wouldn’t advise the Wickes thick paint; as it’s unlikely to look good. I would use a decent fine mix powder filler as Micilin suggested & sand back locally where you have to. Mist coat the walls & let it dry first as you will be better able to see the blemishes; keep the wall slightly damp with a mist spray when filling. Coving may be a life saver in this instance but, personally, I think it’s now a very dated look.

It depends on how small “small” is but if he’s had to base coat a wall & do the ceiling, it’s likely to be over one day I suppose & your more likely to get charged to the next half or even full day! The £30 was probably the cost of materials so 50% up front is way too much IMO. I usually offer 10% but will never part with more than 20% but where material costs are significant, I will offer stage payments as work progresses; I always hang on to at least 10% as an incentive until satisfied. £250/day is a very healthy rate indeed & you should have got perfection for that; even a top notch spread can rarely command above £200/day in the current climate, even on small private jobs. A friend of mine is currently paying £280/day for a 2 man team on his latest 4 property development here in Norfolk & the guys are a top notch site team.

 

[Adrian80]

I bought a ryobi battery planer, and planed a step out the back of the architrave so it sits flat..

sometime a bit of sanding if its really bad..

good luck

 

[Micilin]

You could try a power sander around the door lining to try & reduce the high spots a bit but keep your eye on it & stop once you start to expose the grain too much. For the pin holes, I wouldn’t advise the Wickes thick paint; as it’s unlikely to look good. I would use a decent fine mix powder filler as Micilin suggested & sand back locally where you have to. Mist coat the walls & let it dry first as you will be better able to see the blemishes; keep the wall slightly damp with a mist spray when filling. Coving may be a life saver in this instance but, personally, I think it’s now a very dated look.

It depends on how small “small” is but if he’s had to base coat a wall & do the ceiling, it’s likely to be over one day I suppose & your more likely to get charged to the next half or even full day! The £30 was probably the cost of materials so 50% up front is way too much IMO. I usually offer 10% but will never part with more than 20% but where material costs are significant, I will offer stage payments as work progresses; I always hang on to at least 10% as an incentive until satisfied. £250/day is a very healthy rate indeed & you should have got perfection for that; even a top notch spread can rarely command above £200/day in the current climate, even on small private jobs. A friend of mine is currently paying £280/day for a 2 man team on his latest 4 property development here in Norfolk & the guys are a top notch site team.

Good comments there, I don't take money up front (or give it to someone working for me), but I will ask if they want to supply materials, (or I will buy them for the job I need doing )

Like you. staged payments for larger work is good for both parties, and no final payment until both agree on job.

This is the kind of thing that should be taught in schools, as part of Civics course (maybe they do?)

 

[Stirton]

Cheers for the responses i'll have a bash at it this wknd and see how it works out. I'll even try to get some photos of the job he's done uploaded so you can really judge the efforts.

Cheers