Any plasterers on here? quick Q if you don't mind.

[Black Sheep]

I've been stripping wallpaper off the walls and wood chip off the ceiling ready to have a skim of plaster applied, when peeling the wood chip from the ceiling it's brought a fair bit of plaster skim with it, the base plaster behind that moves a bit when pressed firmly, but this could just be the lattice between ceiling joists moving?

my main question is, what state does the room need to be in to hand over to the plasterer? does every trace of paper need to be removed or can some embedded into corners and sized 1/8th of a postage stamp remain?

Just wanting to keep the job nice and quick for the plasterer and save him a bit of prep work.

also, anyone a plasterer in north manchester / bury want to give me a quote?

 

[Over The Hill]

I think you need the paper off as it will swell up or change between wet and dry.

Main thing is rather than being flat (platering cures this) it does need to be firm and solid. So what you are attaching to needs to be good enough to take the plaster.

If it is bendy then need to sort out why, Normal walls do have some movement.
If it is dusty or lose then best stuff is watered down PVA glue to basically stick it together. You can get 5L of it from screwfix for £10 and it is a good way of improving a wall.

There is a mesh tape that is about 2" wide that is good to put over cracks and joins to hold it together and stop it all caracking.

Dont know plasterers in your area - but there is a good local one here called Flat Boy Skim.

 

[Maz]

From experience, try to get every bit of paper off the ceiling - I used a steamer which can be a bit dangerous with drops of hot water falling on to you. The surface does need to be sound and solid, so you might need to remove the old plaster. This can be soul-destroying because sometime you end up ripping down half the ceiling's old skim - hopefully not as bad as that in your case.

 

[twentysix by twentyfive]

I have a related skill. Getting plastered...................

Apols - couldn't resist

 

[jonny jeez]

if its moving or sounds hollow when you tap it (good old wall knockers) then its likely blown and should be hacked off, rendered (or filled with Carlite Bonding...like plaster but with cork pellets) or possibly a scratch coat and then primed for plaster.

Problem is, the more you remove the more you'll need/want to remove.

Lath and plaster ceilings do flex a little and I'm afraid its often worth removing them. Failing that just add an additional board under the old ceiling (taking care to fix to the joists not the laths), tape the joints and await the arrival of the plasterer. Its a two man job but is surprisingly fast and gives a very satisfactory clean line to plater to. You just need a Stanley blade a power driver, a pair of steps and a bunch of screws. The time consuming bit is cutting the boards to fit first.

Be sure to fit the boards the correct way round for a taped joint. From memory I think they have two ways to sit one side is slightly tapered to allow for a tape joint to end up sitting flush.

plaster will generally not fix well to paper (small patches are acceptable) but as mentioned above, thick paper will expand and stuff up the finish.

PS, if you want to mark out joists, drill a few pilot holes then, once you find two, just measure out the rest, checking now and again with pilots to be sure your are right, then mark the walls at the end of the joists and use a chalk line to mark where to fix the boards on the joists one they are held up in place (using the marks on the walls as the guide).

 

[Maz]

Not everyone's cup of tea, but how about ceiling boards instead of plastering? They come in long strips and fit tongue/groove style. They can cover up a multitude of sins.

 

[Black Sheep]

wooden cladding boards?

we have them in the kitchen, they make me nervous.

 

[Black Sheep]

if its moving or sounds hollow when you tap it (good old wall knockers) then its likely blown and should be hacked off, rendered (or filled with Carlite Bonding...like plaster but with cork pellets) or possibly a scratch coat and then primed for plaster.

Problem is, the more you remove the more you'll need/want to remove.

Lath and plaster ceilings do flex a little and I'm afraid its often worth removing them. Failing that just add an additional board under the old ceiling (taking care to fix to the joists not the laths), tape the joints and await the arrival of the plasterer. Its a two man job but is surprisingly fast and gives a very satisfactory clean line to plater to. You just need a Stanley blade a power driver, a pair of steps and a bunch of screws. The time consuming bit is cutting the boards to fit first.

Be sure to fit the boards the correct way round for a taped joint. From memory I think they have two ways to sit one side is slightly tapered to allow for a tape joint to end up sitting flush.

plaster will generally not fix well to paper (small patches are acceptable) but as mentioned above, thick paper will expand and stuff up the finish.

PS, if you want to mark out joists, drill a few pilot holes then, once you find two, just measure out the rest, checking now and again with pilots to be sure your are right, then mark the walls at the end of the joists and use a chalk line to mark where to fix the boards on the joists one they are held up in place (using the marks on the walls as the guide).

Like plaster boarding?

 

[Night Train]

You have a PM.

 

[Arch]

You have a PM.

Plastering Masterclass?

 

[Maz]

wooden cladding boards?

we have them in the kitchen, they make me nervous.

The ones I was thinking of are uPVC cladding. As I say, not everyone's cup of tea.

 

[Night Train]

Plastering Masterclass?

Not from me, plastering is a dark art that only the select few are allowed to understand through the process of telekinesis and incantations followed by much waving of the magic trowels.

However, I have a phone number of one who is a master of such dark arts....

 

[slowmotion]

We had a builder who skimmed an iffy lath and plaster ceiling. It looked great.
A month later, in the middle of the night, there was an incredible crash in the room below our bedroom. The entire base coat had detached itself from the timber laths over about 60% of the ceiling. A century of coal soot came down with it. We prized off the laths and stuck up plasterboard.
BTW, people use woodchip for a reason......papering over cracks...

 

[slowmotion]

[QUOTE 2125831, member: 9609"]

You can not take down an old lath and plaster ceiling in ahouse that is lived in - the mess is unbelievable. .[/quote]

Yes you can, and yes it is. If you use feather-edge plasterboard, there is no need to skim it. Just tape the joints with 50mm glassfibre tape and run a 12" wide plasterboard knife down it with some joint filler. Put some joint filler in the fixing screw heads after you have slightly recessed them below the paper surface of the plasterboard. Sand down the joint and then give all the plasterboard a couple of 1:5 PVA/water primer coats. Then paint it. It's not that difficult.

The mess of removing the old stuff is a bit daunting, and you will have to replace the cornices, but it's not impossible, even for an amateur.

 

[slowmotion]

Shims
Actually, I used shims and counterbattens. I was a bit more of a perfectionist than I am now.