Re: kitchen and bath demo
Posted: Wed Nov 09, 2016 8:31 pm
in my living room I opened the exterior walls to insulate. I used some quite different products. two kinds of soundproof drywall. to stop street noise. one is called quietrock, the other is a similar product. I just try to find used or leftover materials and I have had good luck buying sheets with damaged corners and such . I have to save where I can. its the equivalent of about 7 sheets of drywall for sound blocking but its so pricey. I had a lot of 1/2" drywall and it had ceiling tiles that were kind of 50's dated so I took them out. I had a friend help lift the drywall and we used 12 foot sheets so I'd have less joints but I just covered the plaster on the ceiling. the walls originally had wainscott and they had finished plaster above eye level and below eye level they were rough unfinished plaster. all of that had been leveled out with drywall and mud.
I removed what was on the outside walls. On the exterior walls I wanted soundproofing so used quietrock and it's expensive about 72 bucks a sheet. i used up what I got discounted and that covered most of the louder portions. On the interior walls I used green glue and 1/2 inch drywall. the green glue isn't glue exactly its for soundproofing multi layered drywall. its a bit thicker now but I dont' mind as it helps keep the bedroom quieter and I have pulled all the trim which I will strip and replace. I didn't want ot interfere with the wall thickness where I have windows but on the interior walls it's not noticeible. One interior wall is over an inch think with plaster and drywall layers but it won't be visible when done and all that mass ads to the sound blocking. In some places people layer drywall with the green glue just for the sound characteristics.
on the wall behind the fireplace I wasn't concerned about sound transmission it has a chimney in that wall, and I didnt' really want to deal with removing the wallpaper and I knew It would be the same as other walls with half drywall blended with what was left of the original above eye level original plaster. I hadn't used 1/4" drywall before but on some of the outside wall I used two sheets with the green glue and on the wall behind the fireplace I just sheeted over with the 1/4 inch stuff.
I still have lots of filling and Ill use corner bead in all inside and outside corners. In my case Im not worried about using drywall I know some want to keep the original plaster for various reasons but when I hear of you stripping 7 layers of paint to get to the original plaster, then youll have to fix whatever cracks you find. I'd consider just screwing the 1/4" stuff overtop. I know its the easy way out and you may or may not agree and that's fine, go with what you like . but it is easier, if the 1/4 inch drywall over plaster isn't an issue for you. the way I see it I just want the walls flat and then I can spend more time on details like original trim and refinishing the floor in there.
Ive gone the route of repairing plaster in other rooms but in my case I found it a lot colder and I want the insulation partly for heat and partly because I get a LOT of traffic noise. I tend to not let waviness go and Im happy with flat walls and I know some have a lot more contours in the plaster and want the wavyness.
Ive also been looking at the technique of mixing drywall mud with plaster. I just want to use that to fill any large gaps and level stuff out before I start with the taping and corner bead. I spoke with a professional drywall that uses it it's a way of filling larger voids as of course if you put mud on too thick when filling gaps there is some wait time and cracking and shrinkage. you can use fast setting drywall compound as an alternative but I am going to experiment with it. basicly you make a puddle of mud and carve a hole in the middle then add the plaster( of paris) to the hole and add some water. what I learned and didn't know was that the plaster starts setting not so much when you add water but when you begin stirring it and also cold water helps give more working time. so then you take slices of the "pizza" and mix them as you go and that allows you more working time as you don't mix the whole batch at once. it hardens in about 10 minutes or so and It sandable. when I add glue to the mud it dries really hard and it'svery tough like plaster but it isn't sandable so you really have to watch how you apply it. if I compare the drips after they have hardened with the glue adeed it is a much harder and tougher material than the drips where no glue is added. i use the regular drywall products to skimcoat and generally just take as much time as I need to feel happy about the smoothness. I tend to exceed what I see done commercially but the time I take is also laughable by comparison.
Previously what I do to fill any gaps is mix some carpenters glue into the mud. it creates a very hard mud that isn't sandable . i also bed my tape with mud mixed with some glue and I run the tape through a weakened mix of glue. It really hardens, the tape never peels and I find this way I can put the tape almost flat to the drywall whereas traditionally they usually try not to squeeze out too much of the mud from behind the tape. so the way I do it gets the tape flatter and I use less mud to hide the tape. it also requires more coats my way.
I tried using my taping method on my plaster wall after I had removed all the paint and wallpaper. it had spiderweb cracks all over so I taped each one and then skimcoated. It worked fine but it was twice the work as compared to just going with the 1/4" drywall over the plaster with all the wallpaper and paint. None of the drywall cracks showed any signs of cracking or anything bad after that.
the end result is a flat wall with either method. drywall is generally more flat and some like the character of the waviness in their plaster.
im certainly not saying there isn't merit to repairing or replacing plaster with the traditional lath and plaster materials and methods but I am finding some alternate ways that work better, for me. Everyone's house and how they view their restoration is different and I do respect that.
I may replace the wainscot at some point but my goal right now is to finish the walls and ceiling and replace all the trim which I have mostly striped already. then I will have a look a the floor and maybe sand it. I'm looking forward to getting my living room back and some of the other work like scraping all the paint off the windows and repairing those can be done with the room at least partly furnished. for now I had to cram the rest of the house to empty it.
anyway I guess my point was maybe consider the 1/4" drywall. I hadn't seen it before but it seems to be getting more available here. I don't mind using it if its just to cover whats there now. once it's on its just a matter of taping and filling with regular modern methods. Lots faster than scraping but if you are happy with the way you are doing it of course go ahead.
Phil
I removed what was on the outside walls. On the exterior walls I wanted soundproofing so used quietrock and it's expensive about 72 bucks a sheet. i used up what I got discounted and that covered most of the louder portions. On the interior walls I used green glue and 1/2 inch drywall. the green glue isn't glue exactly its for soundproofing multi layered drywall. its a bit thicker now but I dont' mind as it helps keep the bedroom quieter and I have pulled all the trim which I will strip and replace. I didn't want ot interfere with the wall thickness where I have windows but on the interior walls it's not noticeible. One interior wall is over an inch think with plaster and drywall layers but it won't be visible when done and all that mass ads to the sound blocking. In some places people layer drywall with the green glue just for the sound characteristics.
on the wall behind the fireplace I wasn't concerned about sound transmission it has a chimney in that wall, and I didnt' really want to deal with removing the wallpaper and I knew It would be the same as other walls with half drywall blended with what was left of the original above eye level original plaster. I hadn't used 1/4" drywall before but on some of the outside wall I used two sheets with the green glue and on the wall behind the fireplace I just sheeted over with the 1/4 inch stuff.
I still have lots of filling and Ill use corner bead in all inside and outside corners. In my case Im not worried about using drywall I know some want to keep the original plaster for various reasons but when I hear of you stripping 7 layers of paint to get to the original plaster, then youll have to fix whatever cracks you find. I'd consider just screwing the 1/4" stuff overtop. I know its the easy way out and you may or may not agree and that's fine, go with what you like . but it is easier, if the 1/4 inch drywall over plaster isn't an issue for you. the way I see it I just want the walls flat and then I can spend more time on details like original trim and refinishing the floor in there.
Ive gone the route of repairing plaster in other rooms but in my case I found it a lot colder and I want the insulation partly for heat and partly because I get a LOT of traffic noise. I tend to not let waviness go and Im happy with flat walls and I know some have a lot more contours in the plaster and want the wavyness.
Ive also been looking at the technique of mixing drywall mud with plaster. I just want to use that to fill any large gaps and level stuff out before I start with the taping and corner bead. I spoke with a professional drywall that uses it it's a way of filling larger voids as of course if you put mud on too thick when filling gaps there is some wait time and cracking and shrinkage. you can use fast setting drywall compound as an alternative but I am going to experiment with it. basicly you make a puddle of mud and carve a hole in the middle then add the plaster( of paris) to the hole and add some water. what I learned and didn't know was that the plaster starts setting not so much when you add water but when you begin stirring it and also cold water helps give more working time. so then you take slices of the "pizza" and mix them as you go and that allows you more working time as you don't mix the whole batch at once. it hardens in about 10 minutes or so and It sandable. when I add glue to the mud it dries really hard and it'svery tough like plaster but it isn't sandable so you really have to watch how you apply it. if I compare the drips after they have hardened with the glue adeed it is a much harder and tougher material than the drips where no glue is added. i use the regular drywall products to skimcoat and generally just take as much time as I need to feel happy about the smoothness. I tend to exceed what I see done commercially but the time I take is also laughable by comparison.
Previously what I do to fill any gaps is mix some carpenters glue into the mud. it creates a very hard mud that isn't sandable . i also bed my tape with mud mixed with some glue and I run the tape through a weakened mix of glue. It really hardens, the tape never peels and I find this way I can put the tape almost flat to the drywall whereas traditionally they usually try not to squeeze out too much of the mud from behind the tape. so the way I do it gets the tape flatter and I use less mud to hide the tape. it also requires more coats my way.
I tried using my taping method on my plaster wall after I had removed all the paint and wallpaper. it had spiderweb cracks all over so I taped each one and then skimcoated. It worked fine but it was twice the work as compared to just going with the 1/4" drywall over the plaster with all the wallpaper and paint. None of the drywall cracks showed any signs of cracking or anything bad after that.
the end result is a flat wall with either method. drywall is generally more flat and some like the character of the waviness in their plaster.
im certainly not saying there isn't merit to repairing or replacing plaster with the traditional lath and plaster materials and methods but I am finding some alternate ways that work better, for me. Everyone's house and how they view their restoration is different and I do respect that.
I may replace the wainscot at some point but my goal right now is to finish the walls and ceiling and replace all the trim which I have mostly striped already. then I will have a look a the floor and maybe sand it. I'm looking forward to getting my living room back and some of the other work like scraping all the paint off the windows and repairing those can be done with the room at least partly furnished. for now I had to cram the rest of the house to empty it.
anyway I guess my point was maybe consider the 1/4" drywall. I hadn't seen it before but it seems to be getting more available here. I don't mind using it if its just to cover whats there now. once it's on its just a matter of taping and filling with regular modern methods. Lots faster than scraping but if you are happy with the way you are doing it of course go ahead.
Phil