New on the forum and first post, so please be gentle. I will try to be concise and try not to assume. This post asks kindly for friendly, knowledgeable, advice, the overly critical, trolls and those who say "just get the professionals in", please stay at the door. I'm someone who through time has preferred to take the steep learning curve and acquire skills even if it's meant spending more time and money, buy tools and materials, and get to a result that is not as good as a professional' first time (or second...) 
I'm currently trying to sort the ceilings and walls of a 1960's 3 bedroom ex-local-authority house. The problems is that many of the plasterboard ceilings are in bad condition, many have long visible cracks, the odd plumbers foot and some brittle and dropping bits from old historical water leaks. The leaks are no longer an issue. Some of the ceilings have been covered with Artex to hide most of the sins, but even the cracks and levels now show through the Atrex. Some of the walls are in poor shape, some have lining/wall-paper that's been over painted many times which is also peeling/lifting/wrinkling.
The plasterers who have looked at the ceilings have stated they would over-board the existing ceilings to avoid dirt/debris/loft issues - including the unlevel/brittle/Artex'ed ones - then skim. They want the paper off the walls before doing the work to prevent trowel cuts and water leading to the paper peeling off more and to give something for the edges of the ceiling to stick to and ease cracking there. Fair enough. I realise removing lining/wall-paper would reveal more horrors, it's usually put up for more reasons than fashion.
I will be doing as much of the work as I possibly can - if I can do it all I'll feel a massive sense of accomplishment. I respect the trades (especially plastering), but I love to learn new skills. If a stage might be worth getting a pro in to do it, then so be it. Disruption and time required to do this are not considerations, I will do one room at a time and rotate. I want to remove the ceiling/s completely and replace them. This will be a great skill to acquire for the future. All the Artex coverings have been tested and cleared for asbestos by a UKAS approved lab, so no risks there.
I'm currently tackling the smallest (3m x 2.1m) upstairs bedroom in the house which sits below a pretty much empty loft. If I can do a half reasonable job, I'll tackle the other larger rooms after..
I've researched taper-edge plasterboard with paper-taping and jointing for the ceilings and it looks quite enjoyable so I'll be attempting that. I'm hoping I might even be able to get a finish that won't need a skim. (*I can sense the laughter already*) I understand the theory of how to tape and join taper-edge plasterboard and do internal-angle paper-joints for the ceiling to the walls, when the time is right to practice. I've bought a collated screw-gun off ebay and I'll be knocking up some dead men and I feel confident enough to have a go at learning that.
So, some photos of the room in question before I continue.
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I hit a bit of a snag in the yesterday. After stripping back multiple layers of latex/water paint then removing the terrible condition lining paper I'm back to the original walls and they are not in good shape - someone has stuck things all over the wall (days before blu-tack I think) and I can see about a hundred old badly filled screw holes, it even looks as though someone used a gallon of polyfiller (most of which sits proud ) and wore out a filling knife before putting the lining paper up. No wonder lining paper went up. A big area of plaster above the window is also now down, which was held up by the wooden curtain rail baton and thin air. I think this area was damaged when the double glazing went in over 7 years ago.
I'd like to strip and replace the ceiling, repair the deep damage above the window and get the walls and ceiling made good then decorate (not necessarily in that order).
I figure I will remove the ceiling and strip the room back to a shell as the next step.
So I'm left with questions.
How to remove the ceiling without damaging the tops of the walls that are still holding up - from looking above the fallen window plaster, the ceiling is held to the walls with a grid of hessian like material?
And then there's the order in which to redo - replace the ceiling then sort the walls, or vis-a-versa?
Looking at the walls I guess they will need a skim at the least, but alternatively I could drywall and tape and joint them - thought please? Until now plastering was an art best left to the skilled as I have no previous experience, but I'd like to learn and a small room might just be the place, go on encourage me?
Any other tips and pointers before I leap in?
I am prepared for error. If it get's real bad I'll get help in... Fingers crossed. Thanks for reading. Thanks for your time and advice.[/img]
I'm currently trying to sort the ceilings and walls of a 1960's 3 bedroom ex-local-authority house. The problems is that many of the plasterboard ceilings are in bad condition, many have long visible cracks, the odd plumbers foot and some brittle and dropping bits from old historical water leaks. The leaks are no longer an issue. Some of the ceilings have been covered with Artex to hide most of the sins, but even the cracks and levels now show through the Atrex. Some of the walls are in poor shape, some have lining/wall-paper that's been over painted many times which is also peeling/lifting/wrinkling.
The plasterers who have looked at the ceilings have stated they would over-board the existing ceilings to avoid dirt/debris/loft issues - including the unlevel/brittle/Artex'ed ones - then skim. They want the paper off the walls before doing the work to prevent trowel cuts and water leading to the paper peeling off more and to give something for the edges of the ceiling to stick to and ease cracking there. Fair enough. I realise removing lining/wall-paper would reveal more horrors, it's usually put up for more reasons than fashion.
I will be doing as much of the work as I possibly can - if I can do it all I'll feel a massive sense of accomplishment. I respect the trades (especially plastering), but I love to learn new skills. If a stage might be worth getting a pro in to do it, then so be it. Disruption and time required to do this are not considerations, I will do one room at a time and rotate. I want to remove the ceiling/s completely and replace them. This will be a great skill to acquire for the future. All the Artex coverings have been tested and cleared for asbestos by a UKAS approved lab, so no risks there.
I'm currently tackling the smallest (3m x 2.1m) upstairs bedroom in the house which sits below a pretty much empty loft. If I can do a half reasonable job, I'll tackle the other larger rooms after..
I've researched taper-edge plasterboard with paper-taping and jointing for the ceilings and it looks quite enjoyable so I'll be attempting that. I'm hoping I might even be able to get a finish that won't need a skim. (*I can sense the laughter already*) I understand the theory of how to tape and join taper-edge plasterboard and do internal-angle paper-joints for the ceiling to the walls, when the time is right to practice. I've bought a collated screw-gun off ebay and I'll be knocking up some dead men and I feel confident enough to have a go at learning that.
So, some photos of the room in question before I continue.
View media item 47056
View media item 47057
View media item 47058
View media item 47059
View media item 47060
I hit a bit of a snag in the yesterday. After stripping back multiple layers of latex/water paint then removing the terrible condition lining paper I'm back to the original walls and they are not in good shape - someone has stuck things all over the wall (days before blu-tack I think) and I can see about a hundred old badly filled screw holes, it even looks as though someone used a gallon of polyfiller (most of which sits proud ) and wore out a filling knife before putting the lining paper up. No wonder lining paper went up. A big area of plaster above the window is also now down, which was held up by the wooden curtain rail baton and thin air. I think this area was damaged when the double glazing went in over 7 years ago.
I'd like to strip and replace the ceiling, repair the deep damage above the window and get the walls and ceiling made good then decorate (not necessarily in that order).
I figure I will remove the ceiling and strip the room back to a shell as the next step.
So I'm left with questions.
How to remove the ceiling without damaging the tops of the walls that are still holding up - from looking above the fallen window plaster, the ceiling is held to the walls with a grid of hessian like material?
And then there's the order in which to redo - replace the ceiling then sort the walls, or vis-a-versa?
Looking at the walls I guess they will need a skim at the least, but alternatively I could drywall and tape and joint them - thought please? Until now plastering was an art best left to the skilled as I have no previous experience, but I'd like to learn and a small room might just be the place, go on encourage me?
Any other tips and pointers before I leap in?
I am prepared for error. If it get's real bad I'll get help in... Fingers crossed. Thanks for reading. Thanks for your time and advice.[/img]
