Help with Archetraves please

[escapee]

Hi All

I have recently had my living room reskimmed and decided to remove the archetraves and skirtings before hand and replace with new after skimming. The plasterer finished the job today but the due to the uneveness of the existing plaster the new skim overhangs the edges of the frames by up to 4 or even 5mm in some places, what would be the best plan of action to enable me to fit fairly flush archetraves that are not being pushed out by the plaster behind them, the width of the new archetrave I chose is approx. 8cm (3in) and is the rounded (bullnosed?) egde to one side and straight edged the other side.

A BIG thank you in advance for any feedback on this query.

escapee

 

[big-all]

heeelllooo escapee

a good plasterer would have left most or all of the frame untouched!!!

the purpose of the arcatrave is to give you a good transition between frame and wall

make shure there is no plaster on the front half off the fame as the arcatrave needs to be set back a few mm [about 6mm]

if there is a large difference between the frame and wall you need to keep in mind youll need to do a compound mitre of less than 45%
or a mitre at say 43% then remove the front edge of the mitre tapering back to give a good fit

the actuaL amount depends on the difference but you get the idea


and when you get a good fit pin the arcatrave together through the top

 

[noseall]

if we overskim a wall, we recommend fixing a thin timber "plant" around the existing door casing which will deal with the extra skim thickness.

this problem is exacerbated when a fairly bold pattern of artex needs covering.

 

[escapee]

Thank you both for your feedback , the walls were bad in places but not artexed he just went deep to try to level them up a little. I telephoned a joiner this morning as it was worrying me and he advised me to chisel out the skim back to the edge of where the archetraves would have met. I set about doing this and not long since finished it. The top part of the archetrave will now be recessed approx 7mm into the plaster but it looks ok.

Its not the finish I would have liked but we have to make do of a bad situation, even though the plasterer assured me the skim would only sit 1mm proud of the frames, it ended up being 1cm at one point . I may have a go at sanding the other door frame skim back tomorrow but that wasnt as bad, that was just about 4mm overhanging.

 

[mifty12]

I see this quite a bit from plasterers in refurb jobs, the way I always get around it is to rebate out the back of the archtrave with a power planer to a depth equal to the amount the plaster over hangs the linings. That way your not hacking about at the expensive pllastering you've just had nor will you have to get the filler out and patch up round the lining cos a bit more has broken out than you would have liked.


Justin.

 

[escapee]

Thanks for that Justin, that is the approach I would have preferred but seeing as the overhang was 1cm in places, the back of the archetrave would have only been 0.5cm as the depth of the archetrave I selected is only 1.5cm

 

[noseall]

by rebating the back of the archie out you end up with no "meat" showing beyond the plastered wall.

you might as well have left the archies on in the first place.

 

[big-all]

by rebating the back of the archie out you end up with no "meat" showing beyond the plastered wall.

you might as well have left the archies on in the first place.

also its extremly difficult to plane safely
the easiest way is to take two bits off the same moulding place one bit face side up and slide the other bit over until its level and pin into your worksurface or workmate [youll need an extra support with a workmate]

but not for the faint hearted

 

[noseall]

also the skirting will stand proud of the architraves, a big no-no.

this will mean either having to use skirting blocks at the architrave bottom or bodj-em and round em off.

 

[carpenter les]

i agree with noseall, you should have built out the frame instead of rebating the architrave , so to avoid having to blend in the skirting with it !!