Cracked skim on Victorian plaster - best way to fix?

[danr86]

Hi

Currently doing up an old Victoria terrace house and in the upstairs bedroom there are some large cracks in the skimmed wall which have previously been filled but you can hear the plaster is blown. In the middle of the wall there used to be a chimney breast and the cracks are running down the edges of where it used to be. It seems that either side of the chimney breast the old lime and horsehair plaster has been left and where the breast was sand and cement has been used with a skim across the whole wall.
In the picture the sand and cement behind the skim is on the right hand side of the picture.

Untitled

• danr86
• 8 Jan 2012
• 1

Should I:
1. Leave the wall as it is and just dot and dab plasterboard straight over it
2. Remove all the lime plaster then put fresh plaster to get it to the same level as the sand and cement
3. Remove everything back to brick
4. Or something else

Thanks in advance.

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[ImperialCompleteSolutions]

If the plaster has blown Its best to take off plaster, I would not dot and dab it as it will add more weight to the already blown plaster.
alternatively you could batten out wall (making sure screws fix into bricks and not plaster) and then overboard it and skim !

 

[tim00]

My two cents worth would be to knock off to brick and see what you've got.
Be alert for soot residue, it always, eventually, comes thro.
Re-render in 1L:1C:4S and skim in board finish.

Or, select and drop plumb lines on either side of the old c/breast.
Undercut the lines with a utilty knife ( it gives you clean lines to work to ) and only hack off and make good the c/breast patch.

Is it wallpaper, imprint residue, or am i seeing wallpaper left in-situ?

 

[Possel]

Or remove it all back to the brick and replaster with lime mortar (no cement!) as per original.

 

[danr86]

Thanks for the replies - it is wallpaper imprint you can see in the plaster.
I've ended up taking off all the old plaster either side of the chimney breast and I'll get in a plasterer to patch either side and then reskim the whole wall.