Removing plasterboard ceiling

[TheKeymeister]

I need to take the ceiling down in my kitchen and utility room, I need to put in new central heating pipes, spot lights in the ceilings, extractor ducts, etc. Upstairs is chipboard floors and the ceilings are artex which I want rid of anyway so it seemed like the best solution. House was built in 1997 so should be free of azzy. I didn't realise artex was still in fashion then, but it's even on the ceiling of the cupboard under the stairs...

The existing ceiling isn't in bad nick but lots of it is going to have to come down to do everything I need to do, rather than patching it up everywhere I thought it would be easier to take the whole lot down and get it re boarded then skimmed. I am hoping to get away with just a patch in the dining room though.

Whats the best/cleanest/easiest way to tackle this? It will be me doing it on my own off a hop up most likely. Need to know if I need any more tools in to do it.

 

[PrenticeBoyofDerry]

Remove all furniture, lift up floor cover if poss! The dust sheet/seal doors. Get yourself PPE (gloves, safety specs, work books, dust mask)
You will need to be careful of any service that exist in ceiling, as you never know how put them in, and where they could be. I would bash a hole with hammer, then pull down by hand.

 

[TheKeymeister]

Floor coverings are ceramic tiles in kitchen/utility so should be good to go with that. Will make sure the carpet in dining room gets rolled back. Good shout on sealing the doors, should be workable as there's a door to outside off the utility room so will work through that.

Might buy one of those cheap endoscopes to avoid hitting stuff in the ceiling. Loads of the stuff I've found so far has been rough as arseholes, they obviously used the cheapest possible to build these houses.

While I'm here, in the dining room ceiling, there's plaster coving round the edges, is it even possible to have the ceiling skimmed with that artex on and keep the coving? Or will it lose the lip by the time it's been skimmed and look a bit silly?

 

[vinn]

I think that the lip is a trowel flattened margin effect in artex so it would be OK to cut at the cove edge with a utility knife to release the plaster board field.

When you come to re-board you can fit noggins, or similar backing, to pick up the edges of the p/board at the cove.

Isolate at the CU before removing any elec devices, and make safe all exposed wires.