plaster or fill?

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I am in the process of removing painted on woodchip from my bedroom. The plaster underneath seems fairly sound, but not 100% flat - dints etc. I am unsure whether to get the whole room skimmed or spend a lot of time filling/sanding which I would prefer but would I get good results? :?: There is also a patch of artex on an external wall painted to match and am not sure why?
:?: :?:
 
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Its hard to say without seeing it, but if you just have some marks on the walls you could fill and sand and get a pretty good finish.

When I did my hall the walls had quite a few marks and i filled and did a lot of sanding. The results were ok and much better than if I hadn't bothered but still not perfect. I'm planning on learning to plaster and once I've done the other rooms I'll probably do the halls again to get it perfect.

Its up to you though!
 
thanks for that - have come to the chimney breast which deff needs plastering so I'm thinking may as well get the whole thing done!
 
Hi

It is obviously up to you, but if you are going to wallpaper the room i would just fill the dents and small holes. If the holes are small you could mix some finishing plaster and fill with that. It would save sanding as the finish is smooth anyway.

If you are painting the room then small dents and holes not smoothed properly will show up more.

When i first started out decorating i always used to wallpaper to hide my bad filling in!! :D

A bit better now. I even plaster walls!! Try some skimming yourself. It is hard to start but you'll always use proper plaster once you know how.

Good luck!! :)
 
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I have plaster walls in my building.

I use a base coat plaster and drywall joint compound to repair them. Depending on how badly damaged they are, you can most often just get away with using drywall joint compound to repair surface dents and such.

You should be aware that there are different kinds of drywall joint compounds, and some will have more glue added to them than others. Joint compounds that are called "Regular", or "Taping" will have a lot of glue added to them so they stick better, but also dry much harder and therefore are more difficult to sand smooth. Joint compounds called "Finish" or "Topping" have the least glue added to them and sand smooth the easiest. "All Purpose" joint compounds are half way between the first two, and are a good choice if you only want to buy one product and use it for everything.

Where the damage to the plaster walls is deeper than just the white "gauging" coat on the surface of the plaster, you might need to use a base coat plaster. These will have powdered glue added to them to make them stick better, and they'll also most often have crushed Perlite in them to give them a lot of bulk without a lot of weight.

Probably the single biggest thing that will improve the results of the plastering work you do is to work with a bright light next to the wall or ceiling to exagerate the roughness of the surface you're working on. If you do your repairs under such critical lighting, then once the repair looks OK to you when viewed under critical lighting, it will look perfect when viewed under normal lighting conditions.

If you do decide to skim coat, here's an easy way for a rank amateur to achieve a uniformly thin coat of plaster over a wall or ceiling:

1. Use a "V" notched adhesive trowel to spread a uniform amount of joint compound onto your wall.
2. Mist that joint compound with a spray bottle to keep it wet and flatten the "V" shaped trowel ridges of joint compound down with a regular plastering trowel until reasonably smooth.
3. Allow to dry and lightly sand to improve smoothness.

Basically, you do a few square feet of wall surface at a time this way until you do the whole wall.

But, repairing plaster is not very difficult, and if you're house has plaster walls, it might be wise to learn how to repair them properly right from the start. Where I live, no one uses real lime putty based plaster any more to repair plaster walls. Nowadays, everyone just uses a base coat plaster (as described above) with perlite in it and drywall joint compounds. I've tried using real lime based plaster (with and without sand in it) to repair my plaster walls, but I found I could get superior results using a modern base coat plaster and drywall joint compounds.
 
I have plaster walls in my building.

I use a base coat plaster and drywall joint compound to repair them. Depending on how badly damaged they are, you can most often just get away with using drywall joint compound to repair surface dents and such.

You should be aware that there are different kinds of drywall joint compounds, and some will have more glue added to them than others. Joint compounds that are called "Regular", or "Taping" will have a lot of glue added to them so they stick better, but also dry much harder and therefore are more difficult to sand smooth. Joint compounds called "Finish" or "Topping" have the least glue added to them and sand smooth the easiest. "All Purpose" joint compounds are half way between the first two, and are a good choice if you only want to buy one product and use it for everything.

Where the damage to the plaster walls is deeper than just the white "gauging" coat on the surface of the plaster, you might need to use a base coat plaster. These will have powdered glue added to them to make them stick better, and they'll also most often have crushed Perlite in them to give them a lot of bulk without a lot of weight.

Probably the single biggest thing that will improve the results of the plastering work you do is to work with a bright light next to the wall or ceiling to exagerate the roughness of the surface you're working on. If you do your repairs under such critical lighting, then once the repair looks OK to you when viewed under critical lighting, it will look perfect when viewed under normal lighting conditions. I can't emphasize enough how doing your work under critical lighting conditions will improve the results you ultimately achieve. Working under critical lighting will give you a far enhanced ability to judge where to add plaster and how much to add and where to sand and how much to sand to achieve a smoother surface.

Also, contrary to popular belief, walls and ceilings aren't flat. They are smooth, and because there's no bend in them sharp enough to notice, your brain presumes they're also flat. Just hold a bright light next to any of the walls in your house, and you might be surprised by how "un-flat" they actually are.

If you do decide to skim coat, here's an easy way for a rank amateur to achieve a uniformly thin coat of plaster over a wall or ceiling:

1. Use a "V" notched adhesive trowel to spread a uniform amount of joint compound onto your wall.
2. Mist that joint compound with a spray bottle to keep it wet and flatten the "V" shaped trowel ridges of joint compound down with a regular plastering trowel until reasonably smooth.
3. Allow to dry and lightly sand to improve smoothness.

I've been told you can also allow the V shaped trowel ridges of joint compound to dry, and then simply fill them in with more joint compound using the un-notched edge of the adhesive trowel to get a much thicker skim coat, but people who have done this tell me that it's easier to get good results by misting and troweling the ridges down flat.

Hope this helps.
 
Probably the single biggest thing that will improve the results of the plastering work you do is to work with a bright light next to the wall or ceiling to exagerate the roughness of the surface you're working on. If you do your repairs under such critical lighting, then once the repair looks OK to you when viewed under critical lighting, it will look perfect when viewed under normal lighting conditions. I can't emphasize enough how doing your work under critical lighting conditions will improve the results you ultimately achieve. Working under critical lighting will give you a far enhanced ability to judge where to add plaster and how much to add and where to sand and how much to sand to achieve a smoother surface.

Also, contrary to popular belief, walls and ceilings aren't flat. They are smooth, and because there's no bend in them sharp enough to notice, your brain presumes they're also flat. Just hold a bright light next to any of the walls in your house, and you might be surprised by how "un-flat" they actually are.

If you do decide to skim coat, here's an easy way for a rank amateur to achieve a uniformly thin coat of plaster over a wall or ceiling:

1. Use a "V" notched adhesive trowel to spread a uniform amount of joint compound onto your wall.
2. Mist that joint compound with a spray bottle to keep it wet and flatten the "V" shaped trowel ridges of joint compound down with a regular plastering trowel until reasonably smooth.
3. Allow to dry and lightly sand to improve smoothness.

I've been told you can also allow the V shaped trowel ridges of joint compound to dry, and then simply fill them in with more joint compound using the un-notched edge of the adhesive trowel to get a much thicker skim coat, but people who have done this tell me that it's easier to get good results by misting and troweling the ridges down flat.

Hope this helps.
 
:oops:

Sorry. I kept getting error messages when I clicked on "submit", and I didn't realize that I was re-posting the same text over and over again every time I tried to submit it.

Apparantly, I can't delete my posts on this board either. (So that didn't help.)

:oops:
 

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