Ok.. so as you may know from my previous posts I am splitting my large main bedroom into 2 smaller bedrooms.. by building a partition wall..
I was planning on getting it built myself and then getting the professionals in to plaster it for me... however, at the weekend, whilst working in the room I noticed that the previous owners had plasterboarded the ceiling (due to the crap ceing above it. The plasterboard they had put on the ceiling hadnt been platered over, just jointed? and painted, the finish is flawless and the only reason I noticed this had been done was because thyy hadint done it inside a built in wardrobe which I ripped out.
So my question is now this... When I have done my partition wall, should I get it plastered or could I get away with doing some jointing/ filling and just painting the plasterboard. Obviously this would save me alot of time and money, but I wouldnt want to do it if the finish would be fragile and prone to easy wear and tear etc..
Dry-lining seems to be the most popular method these days - and providing it's done correctly gives a flawless finish (I'd say better than a skimmed finish since you won't end up with any trowel marks etc.) and isn't any more fragile than having a skim coat added.
And these days a lot of painter/decorators can do the taping - so you can fit the boards yourself and have a decorator do the taping - probably cheaper than having a plasterer do it.
I've used the taping and jointing technique for my cloakroom project and have been able to achieve an excellent finish. I should add that I have occasionally attempted pieces of plastering and skimming and did not achieve acceptable results. I am sure that given training and practice, I could probably do the plastering and skimming, but I don't foresee having enough to do to invest the time and effort in learning, so that would be a job to outsource.
However, with the cloakroom, I bought a book on drywalling and thought I'd give it a go. The plasterboard would need to be joint taped and filled anyway, so in the worst case I would have to have had it skimmed.
There were several things that I found useful while doing the project:
- Plasterboard with tapered edges.
- Framing sturdy and accurate.
- I used drywall screws and not nails, driving them until the heads just go below the surface.
- I used fibreglass mesh tape with adhesive on it. There is paper stuff which I tried but I found the fibreglass easier to use with filler.
- I bought several taping knives - a 100mm joint knife and then 150 and
250 mm taping knives.
- I also bought a rectangular "mud pan". This is much easier to use than a hawk etc. because you can more easily get a small amount of the filler along the whole length of the knife.
- I used a mixing paddle in a drill to mix the filler. Not a great deal is needed but it is important to get it really smooth.
- I bought a hand sander and a roll of 120 grit paper for it. Normally I would tend to use power tools, but the filler sands very easily and it's important to be able to look closely at where one is sanding and to go quite carefully.
Take a look at the Axminster tools web site and use Marshalltown as a search keyword - you will find all these items there.
The technique is to apply the tape to the joints, pushing it into the corners with a taping knife. Do this on the same day or no more than a couple of days before applying filler - the adhesive is deliberately quite weak. Use the 100mm knife first to apply the first layer to the tape. Note that the edges deliberately slope away so that you can tackle inside corners (which is probably the hardest part). Feather the edges to not much wider than the knife. Don't worry if the mesh of the tape is still exposed. Fill screw holes and any plasterboard dings at this stage. This will be the first of two or more fillings of those so no need to make that perfect first time.
Wait for the filler to thoroughly dry or set depending on type. I prefer to wait for the next day. You can buy jointing filler in DIY stores that will remain workable for over an hour depending on the weather. There is faster stuff which I might use another time but I wasn't going to rush the job.
Sand the first filling, going out to the edges and sand off any obvious bumps. A light arranged along the wall that will throw shadows is helpful here.
Repeat the jointing using the 150mm knife with the centre line of the knife running along the centre line of the tape to begin with (obviously it's the edge in corners). Again feather the edges. At this stage, the tape will probably have disappeared into the plaster.
Sand again.
Repeat using the 250mm knife and sand. At this stage I had a few tiny marks left here and there. I filled these using the 100mm knife just locally. Sand off again and good result.
There is a 300mm knife which I believe is the largest. I didn't need to use it as the result was perfectly fine after the 250mm knife.
I found the whole thing pretty easy. Also, if mistakes are made, they can be sanded away and redone. The filler sands easily. Each run of doing the filling doesn't take long - even in a large room it doesn't take very long. Therefore, I would suggest having some other jobs to do and come back on successive days rather than trying to do everything in one hit.
No, don't leave a gap - butt the tapered edges hard together. The taper is about 1.5" at the edge of the board, so this leaves a 3" valley to be filled at each joint.
Not really. Also, you can paint pretty much immediately after the last sanding if you want to do so.
If you are going to paper, then some plasterboard primer is a good idea. It will reduce the possibility of the surface paper being ripped off later.
No. You can butt the edges together. Note that the taper is only on the long edges. When cutting, it's better to arrange things so that non tapered edges go into inside corners so that you have the most tapered edges in the middle of the wall. You can tape and feather non tapered joins but that is a bit more fiddly than where there are tapers. It's less noticable to have these in the corners.
Cutting is easy. You need a large flat and firm surface, a long steel or aluminium rule (a metre one really) and a utility knife. Mark out and then score firmly through the paper into the plaster on one side. Then with steady firm pressure pull the sheet down so that the score tends to open. The board will crack. Fold the sheet to mark the paper on the other side. Turn the board over and run the knife along the fold. The paper does not have to be perfect.
If you want to get a book on all the techniques, including framing correctly for plasterboard, fitting and all the little tips and tricks, I can recommend Complete Drywall published by Stanley. Amazon carries it.
True about the taper. However, that's there to accomodate the tape and the first 1-2 layers of filler. It should not be regarded as the only space to fill - it's very important to feather the filler out each side quite some way or the tapered region will be very obvious.
================================== Plasterboard usually has a grey side and a white side. The grey side is for skimming, the white side is for the tape and joint finish you describe. There may be some indication of this printed on the board.
I disagree, I think the taper should be made flush with the rest of the board so that the wall looks completely flat rather than having a slight hump at every join.
No, that's the whole point. You feather out wider and wider at each application using a wider knife each time.
I found that 250mm was enough, although there are 300mm knives as well.
Together with sanding, the effect at the very edges is that there isn't a ridge that one can see.
With a joint that is between two untapered edges, the tape will normally be proud of the surface. There is a way around that involving using packers with the framing to effectively create a slight hollow, but I didn't find it necessary. I suppose it might be if one has to do non tapered joints in the middle of the wall - e.g. if the ceiling is high and therefore the board is not long enough.
On this subject, there is nothing that says that the boards have to go vertically. There are cases where it's better and easier to run them horizontally. For example, in my cloakroom project, I have done this and ended up needing to accurately joint and feather fewer joints because some will be under the tiles.
On flat joints, one has to feather out further to make the high point less obvious.
If you do it properly by feathering the edges, you won't have a slight hump at every join on tapered boards. If you attempt to fill only the tapered area, you will be able to see the lines of the taper much more easily. Of course the tapered area should be filled to level with the board, but not ended precisely at the edges of the taper.
on the feathering issue... is it not possible to fill to just above borad level and then crefullt sand the fill back down to board level so not to egt any humps, no matter how slight.. The ceiling that has been done in my house appears to have no slight hump at all, but a perfectly flat finish?
Once it is sanded there will be no hump, however it helps if there is a very fine layer of filler over the transition from taper to flat. That way when you sand, you remove most of this, but it aids making an invisible transition.
That certainly used to be the case, but is no always true any longer (depending on make of plasterboard). Many are intended to be finished on the light side only. Instructions are normally printed on each board.
================================== Thanks for that follow-up, although I'm not myself planning on using any in the near future. The information should be useful to the OP when he's finalised the question of bumps or no bumps on the joints.
yes the point is not to try to stop the filler precisely along the edges of the taper. These are slightly curved anyway.
You won't get a slight hump at all if you feather the edges out. It will be flat. The key is to use very little filling material - most is taken off with the knife. Anything more is sanded anyway.
It is much better to have multiple really thin coats, mainly taken away with the knife than to slap the filler on and try and sand back. That would be making unnecessary work and dust. That's why a number of coats (typically 3) with ever wider knives are used.
the only case where you would get a slight hump is if you joint flat edged boards together. Then you need t feather wider so that it's a very gentle change that is imperceptible from flat.
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