repainting artex ceiling - cracking & peeling

[acone]

Hello,

I’m just repainting some of my artex ceilings with a fresh coat of Dulux White Vinyl Matt emulsion (the trade stuff). I’ve done the dining and living room ceilings without any problems.

I then painted the hallway, came back after a while and saw cracks in the paint in a few places. I pressed these areas and could feel the paint had also come away. I don’t have any leaks or condensation problems. So I’m guessing the original layer of paint I painted over wasn’t keyed/ bonded to the artex very well (?) so when I painted over this it came loose, sagged and cracked (?) How can I fix this?

I’ve started to strip the paint off down to the artex and was then hoping to prime the artex surface (1 part water 4 parts paint or use some other solution, any recommendations?) and then repaint. However after stripping about 1 square meter, I can see this is going to take near forever to strip all the paint from a rough textured/patterned artex ceiling. Is there an easier way of doing this? Are there any solutions that will help remove the water based emulsion paint but not the layer of artex?

An alternative is to just strip patches of paint where the cracks have appeared and leave other areas which seem relatively sound. However, how would I then repaint/fill these bare artexed patches in so they are level and blend in with the areas I didn’t strip? I don’t think sanding would be an option on a roughly textured artex ceiling.

Also my house was built in 1995, so can I safely assume the artex will not contain asbestos? as with the paint stripping I'm probably digging away at some of the artex too.

Thanks.

 

[Zampa]

Ok..first point, your safe regards the Artex but always a good idea to wear a dust mask and safety specs (not goggles) anyway.

Why the paint is lifting is a mystery..my suspicion is that the artex was a bit underbound and powerdy when the original coat was applied to it ..or the original coat was too thick and didnt absorb into it..it just sat on the surface.

You have come along put another coat on, the water in that coat as penetrated the original coat then started to dry...becasue the air is on the outside, its the outside that will dry first..leaving bubbles behind. They may have actually dried back after a few hours

You appear to know what you are doing of and seems pretty competent..I would suggest you re paint the bare bits, thinning the paint a little first, then paint em again then paint over some of the ceiling that still has the exising stuff on it and leave it for a day after it bubbles and see what happens..

Dont do a big area just a test piece.

 

[Scarum]

Same thing happened to me some years ago in my new house. I had to remove some peeling paint from the kitchen ceiling

I sealed the plaster using an artex sealer and all was fine.

I did discover that the bathroom didn't need sealing but that could be because of the moisture present in the atmosphere and / or that the Dulux moisture resistant paint doesn't need the artex to be sealed beforehand.