Madhouse666 your post is just like my situation & spookily my names Colin as well !
My house is nearly 70 years old & I initially went down the smoothover route as I had the whole house to do and the walls were in very good condition apart from a few digs & scrapes as it was a well kept one owner house with only one layer of wall paper & the original ceiling paint underneath.
On my first room a 4x4 bedroom (metre’s not off roader
) After removing the old dried wall paper paste & ceiling paint by a sander I found for smaller area’s the smooth over works very well but still needs sanding as its nigh impossible not to leave tracks/ridges etc etc but as its so easy to sand its not a problem.
I ended up with a really good smooth wall using a 500w halogen light for seeing all the imperfections but I did find though that although I had covered all the digs/dents when it came to painting I had pin holes that I thought would fill with paint but didn’t (tried Polycell base coat & Polycell flexible ceiling paint but they didn’t really make much difference)
I had to bite the bullet & go back with a small blade & fill in all the little holes & then go & sand it all down again, knackerd a Black & Decker third sheet sander along the way but bought a better Bosch variable speed one that seems to be much better although I finish sanding with a 3m rubber hand block.
I had a good look on here for an alternative to smooth over as it was going to end up too expensive to do the whole house this way & I would be just as well getting a Plasterer in to skim the lot. I tried Gyproc joint filler & it seems to be just a good if not better & is far, far cheaper only prob is it is light tan in colour & if touching up a white painted wall/ceiling it is harder to cover with paint so I just now use the white smoothover for the finishing touches
I have moved onto another bedroom now & I will be far fussier it filling all the holes & another thing I’ll do is cover the lot in plaster sealer once filled as although watered down emulsion worked in 95% of the area in the first room I had a few issues with peeling paint which hopefully the sealer will address.
Due to time & dust issues (2 kids to think about) I will probably go to a plasterer for the rest downstairs but it has been an interesting project (apart from the peeling paint bit)
Hope you get on well but if its a near full skim you need then I don't think Smoothover is the most cost/time effective way, small patches yes, full skim no. (that probably goes for easyfill/skim etc unless you have all the right gear & can use it well)
Give us an update as to how you get on.
Cheers,
Co.
