I do believe him, of course it is easier and cheaper to have a fresh canvas to hang new sheetrock. However, I have to factor in the cost of demolition and disposal, as well as resetting depth of electrical boxes and recessed lights that will now protrude outside of the new 1/2" sheetrock, as well as window sills and doors that would be impacted by this. It seems to trade one headache with another. Cost and time aside, the new sheetrock will look better, but the exterior walls will be thinner, and less sound proofing.
I guess another thing is I should have asked the electricians run the wiring in the attic instead of pounding holes wherever they feel like, or at least insist that they cut neat holes instead of using a hammer and pound it out, in some cases all they need is a hole the size of a fist, but they pound and cracked an area 18" wide. The drywall guy says these holes are a pain in the butt.
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Last time I hired a demo crew, after they took down three 18' dumpster full of the marked ceilings and walls, they left me with nails and staples spaced
8-10" apart along every furring, stud on every wall and ceiling. It took myself and a helper 2 days to pull all the nails and staples out afterwards, I had a sore neck for days, so I am not looking forward to it, that's all.
The bottom layer looks like gypsum, it has a paper backing, I can see from the backside of it it is in panels. The layer above it is darker in color and slightly thicker. At first I thought this is another layer of gypsum board, but if you can see, this layer "fills" in the joint between the two panels. So this is applied on top of it. Then there is a layer of white plaster as thin as eggshell on top, under the paint.
Here is another picture, except this one shows the middle coat has the embedded wiremesh. It seems to be more than just at corners, but yes definitely at the joints and corners.
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This stuff is impossible to cut with regular saw blade. The typical recipricating saw's metal blade does nothing to it. A carbide blade will cut better, but dulls after a few cuts. The only thing I can get to cut it is using an angle grinder with a diamond blade, that would chew through the brown coat and mesh good.
| Here is another picture, except this one shows the middle coat has the | embedded wiremesh. It seems to be more than just at corners, but yes | definitely at the joints and corners.
I have the wire mesh over wood on the ceilings; not so much on the walls. I think one wall actually has wood lath. Some walls have a type of board with a shiny metallic covering (vapor barrier?) as the base. This was all done at original construction (~1959) so I think they were experimenting with different materials. I have a collection of core samples from the various holes I've made over the years.
| This stuff is impossible to cut with regular saw blade.
It also chews up hole saws. I get maybe one or two holes per saw with typical bi-metal blades...
We have plaster directly over 1/2" sheetrock. Sometimes a pain, but we love the additional soundproofing you get with the plaster, both from outside noises and from adjacent rooms inside the house.,
Without actually seeing it, of course, it's hard to give an accurate opinion. But I tend to agree that it's probably better to tear the rest out in any areas where there are lots of holes, height mis-matches, etc. Pros can put up new drywall really fast and the material is not that costly. I suggest you spell out that they use screws, not nails to install it, so you don't have to deal with nail pops over the years.
For the sheetrock to be embedded across the top plate, the wall would have had to have been added after the house was built. Either that or very strange construction.
Nobody has used nails to install sheetrock since the invention of the screwgun...LOL...And you still get pops sometimes...Things STILL move...
It is called Plaster Board or Blue Board with Basecoat Plaster and Finish Coat Plaster and it is probably the best you can get...Trying to patch it with plaster is a PITA and VERY expensive and messy...
You should believe him as he is correct..Trying to patch up old plaster walls and ESPECIALLY ceilings almost never ends up looking good and will cost you just as much.I hope you didn't pay the hacks you hired to do your last demo as it includes pulling the nails..Atleast all the demo guys I have hired...HTH...Good luck with your project...
So then he can spend less time asking elementary questions on newsgroups and trying to come up with ways to do manual work with power tools that require flat bars and sledge hammers...
He can spend time doing what home owners should be doing, looking in showrooms at interior finishes for the tradesworkers doing the remodeling to install when the project gets to that point...
So then he won't come back on here complaining about how his neck or his knees hurt... Or how the fancy new power palm nailer he bought wasn't able to nail what he wanted to nail with it...
Its clear that MiamiCuse *thinks* he can act as his own G.C. but he clearly doesn't possess all the skills and physical endurance he needs to do that sort of thing...
It is cheaper for him to stop the nickel and dime games and asking his weird little questions of all the people he calls in for estimates... He needs to either do the work himself or pay the contractors what they quote him...
A DIY'er is one thing -- but this project is clearly more than that...
To ask silly questions about how to attach this or that to the wall or describing the asinine way he is experimenting to work around not having to swing a hammer and pry bar to do the demo work himself is enough... You don't need to re-invent the wheel...
Yup... And oddly enough there is this little thing called a search function and I have read most of his posts... The ones I am most familiar with were from the alt.locksmithing newsgroup where he came to ask rather insane questions about some door locks he wasn't familiar with where he first explained the odd ways he has with contractors and tradespeople...
Well, if you add up all the questions he has ever asked on UseNet about everything he has ever asked he really isn't...
I don't give any quarter to people who get in over their heads and then expect other people to help them out for free, especially when MiamiCuse clearly has the means to afford hiring contractors to do the work he either doesn't know how to practically do or doesn't want to have a sore neck/back/knees after doing...
To hear him whine and moan about the cost of a construction dumpster to remove additional debris and many of his other issues is amusing... He made his choice to get into this project, when he comes running here asking for what amounts to step by step directions to deal with his latest oversight, he gets what he gets... Its like when the electrician or plumber sends their new apprentice to the supply store to get a wire or pipe extender tool... Ask stupid repetitive questions that demonstrate a clear trend and you invite backlash...
He is an engineer who thinks that because he can see how everything relates to each other in the system of a house that he will be able to figure out the techniques to do the actual work required of a given project...
He also has demonstrated a clear tendency to want the cheapest possible solutions at every turn... Well you either pay with your wallet or with your blood, sweat and tears in construction... There is no cheap way to do home improvement work other than to not do it or somehow magically get free building materials to do your project with...
Thank you, the ceiling has a texture now, not popcorn but a circular sweeping brush finish which I do not like, so that's another benefit I guess is I get to have new smooth looking ceiling.
I have demoed many a plaster wall and gone back with drywall. One need only fur out the studs or joists to achieve the proper finished height. You can buy 4x8 sheets of 1/4, 3/16, 3/8, 7/16 or 5/8 plywood or osb and run them through a table saw to create a furring strip of the proper height. This is just no big deal. They install really fast using a nail gun as they only need to be tacked into place. The 1-5/8 drywall screw will go all the way through to the stud behind.
The cost of the wood is far less than moving all the boxes and modifying the jambs.
Good points. The studs will have to be shimmed to reproduce the old plaster depth. I had an adjuster fix my house after a fire, came home from work, and found the kitchen drywalled and doors and windows cased. The casings had a 1/4" gap to the drywall. Made them tear it all out and shim. That was a nightmare, but any good drywaller can shim easily enough. Doesn't add much to cost. I won't even mention how I had to show the adjuster's "carpenter" how to cut stair stringers. It was a "learning experience" for everybody. You want to avoid that by getting the right people.
I am witness to a 5 ft tall 100 lb girl tearing out all the lathe and plaster in her old farm house she bought and replace it with drywall. She had never done anything like this but was determined to have her own house. She shimed everthing that needed shiming and got it as true as any pro could have. The only thing she hired out was the mud work. She could have done that but it was getting to be a bit much for her physically.After the walls were finished she painted the walls and refinished the wood floors herself. Old concrete swimming pool had a crack all the way across it, everyone told her to fill it in. She chiseled out the crack by hand and patched it with hydraulic concrete. She did eventually fill it in because she relized it was a saftey hazard and liability when her niece got hurt in it..I believe with determination and patience a DIYer can often do as well as the pros.
Thanks. My plastered ceiling was already furred out with 3/4" strips, the then "three ply plaster" was nailed/stapled to them. So in order to match I need to either add a fur on top of a fur or remove the old fur and put in a deeper fur right?
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If I do install new fur under the original fur it's best to have it done perpendicular to them? Which would make them run in the same direction as the joists?
I'd think that starting over would be better because the thicker furring strips would be stronger than two layers of thin strips, but that is just a guess.
I'd get some shims, because you want the furring strips to be precise if you are going back with drywall, because drywall is a lot less forgiving than plaster of wavy framing.
Based on the photo you posted I would just add another layer to the existing strips. When the drywall is installed be sure to use screws long enough to completely penetrate both layers.
BTW I had to make some for a small project I have going on. I needed them
3/8 thick. One sheet of cdx plywood yielded 30 1.5" wide strips. Material only cost equal 45 cents each. It took me about 45 minutes to rip those working by myself.
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