So last night tackled the front of chimney breast of the room I'm renovating...1.3m x 2.7m.
Needed to bring the top right out by 5mm and the top left by about 8mm, so eneded up putting two straight edges up the sides to give me a perfect, vertical level to rule off against. The wall is very old and the bricks are pretty eneven...10mm difference between some...so the render ended up on average 15mm at the bottom and 20ish mm at the top...
Soaked the wall well first with a spray bottle until it looked like it was staying damp and started scratch coat. Went up OK, but I had trouble keeping it flat by eye, say to within 1/8th of an inch...wasn't too worried as it was only the scratch coat, but want to get better. damped down the scratch coat and threw up the next coat...went up and i just ruled it off against the straight edges I put up. Was a lot easier to 'work with' and got it generally flatter, so wonder if the first coat was drying too quickly to be able to easily flatten it..
But...any tips on getitng the render (or plaster when i come to that) flatter without so much ruling off? I'm going to be doing the alcoves and going to be harder to get guides to rule off against....
I know it's just practice, but without anyone there going "not like that, like this..." it's harder to knwo where I'm going wrong..
Cheers,
Virgil..
Needed to bring the top right out by 5mm and the top left by about 8mm, so eneded up putting two straight edges up the sides to give me a perfect, vertical level to rule off against. The wall is very old and the bricks are pretty eneven...10mm difference between some...so the render ended up on average 15mm at the bottom and 20ish mm at the top...
Soaked the wall well first with a spray bottle until it looked like it was staying damp and started scratch coat. Went up OK, but I had trouble keeping it flat by eye, say to within 1/8th of an inch...wasn't too worried as it was only the scratch coat, but want to get better. damped down the scratch coat and threw up the next coat...went up and i just ruled it off against the straight edges I put up. Was a lot easier to 'work with' and got it generally flatter, so wonder if the first coat was drying too quickly to be able to easily flatten it..
But...any tips on getitng the render (or plaster when i come to that) flatter without so much ruling off? I'm going to be doing the alcoves and going to be harder to get guides to rule off against....
I know it's just practice, but without anyone there going "not like that, like this..." it's harder to knwo where I'm going wrong..
Cheers,
Virgil..
