Patchy Painted Plaster

[keef83]

Hi All,
I am re-decorating our spare room at the moment and after deciding to remove the wallpaper as this was coming away in many places I then found that some of the paint was flaky underneath. As a result I have started to remove some of the paint from the plaster, I assume this is the mist cover.

I would like to know as not all of the paint is coming away what is the best thing to do.

1) Do I remove all paint and create a new Mist Layer.

2) Just put a new mist layer in the now rather large holes.

Thanks in advance for your help.

Keith

 

[misterhelpful]

Hello keef,

In theory it shouldn't be the mist coat, as this is usually well absorbed into the plaster and will never peel. It sounds as if the paint was applied directly to the plaster without misting.

Ideally, removing it all would be the way to go, but this can be very time consuming and often annoying. If you would prefer to just remove all the flaky stuff, you can usually get away wth just feathering in the hard paint edges with a fine surface filler, followed by a light sanding and dusting before mist-coating the repaired patches.

However, be aware that if you are not re-papering and only intend painting the walls, the seemingly solid areas will often lift or bubble when upon the application of paint. This is the reason that removal really is the best and most assured solution.

 

[TheDec]

Keef,

When any wallpaper is removed and some of the paintwork decides to follow it on it's journey it is indeed an indication of the lack of adherence, as said the failiure to apply a mist coat. Yet perhaps all is not lost!

Firstly you will need to remove any residue from the paste, as bare plaster skim is now involved the use of either sugar soap or any form detergent should be avoided. You can achieve this useing warm water a sponge and a broad edged scraper, when you are confident that you have removed the majority of the paste wash them down again.

Now to the prep, if you have to hand an electric sander attatch to it some 80 grit and really sand the paintwork whilst avoiding the bare areas of skim, any suspect paintwork will become detatched as you do this. Then useing 120 grit sand the entire area again.

Now to your paint system, again as said there is a possibility that the aplication of a water based product could cause the existing paintwork to bubble, so to counteract this apply to your walls a slightly thinned oil based undercoat. Although a long and tiresome task you will now be ready to apply your emulsion.

Dec

 

[roughcaster]

After cleaning off/sanding etc all the old residue from the wallpaper, if you have any areas where the feathering has not worked very well, you could do , as Mr H suggested, skim over these areas. I use a ready mix joint finish,, (Gyproc ProMix Lite) for this type of fine surface repair, just a very thin coat, and it works great. I've done whole walls and ceilings with it. Let it dry, sand it down with a fine 150 grit sandpaper, and after it's been painted, you'd never know it's been there.

 

[joe-90]

Better off with lining paper. You'll prat about for hours and it'll still look poor.

 

[misterhelpful]

Good point about removing the paste residue guys. Forgot to mention that!

 

[TheDec]

If the op does intend to paint rather than hang wallpaper, the correct approach to sanding can often eliminate the need for face filling, it I admit is often not easy yet it is possible.

Dec