removing stucco on bedroom wall?

[Stormlady]

One wall in the master bedroom of my house has stucco on it, and it's horribly ugly. I'm just wondering what the best way to get rid of it is. I know I could just put a fake wall over it, but there's only about an inch of space right now between the door frame and the wall, so I don't really want to do that as we'd also like to replace the doors and get some nicer (probably wider) trim for the doors.

We were thinking that it might be easier to just remove the stucco/gyproc wall and replace it with new gyproc as opposed to trying to sand off the existing stucco? Any suggestions? Is that a reasonable way to tackle it, or would we be better off just sanding off the stucco?

Thanks Heather

[dadiOH]

Stucco is a cement product. It is normally close to 3/4 thick. Is that what you have? if so (I doubt it) you aren't about to sand it off.

Since you are talking about an inside wall, I'm guessing you have a dry wall that has been textured with drywall mud. That sands easily but it is likely the paint on it won't. If there is no paint, you can remove it with a wet sponge as long as it is the kind that dried rather than setting.

You also maybe able to just plaster over it with more drywall mud to create a smoother surface.

[Stormlady]

It's probably not stucco, but that's all I've ever heard it referred to around here. It's an ugly spiky textured wall that I want to go away :-)

It's been painted, and I have no idea what type it is. We just bought the house a month ago and right now it's painted kind of a brown color. It actually looks like a nice color on the regular walls, but on this wall it looks like a shiny disaster. It actually doesn't look shiny on the other walls, I guess it's something about this wall and the way it takes the paint.

That'll probably still cost us about 1/3 inch of space behind the door, that's about how far the longest spikes stick out.

[Mike Paulsen]

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It sounds like you have a stipple finish.

Unless the wall used to be an exterior wall, the texture is most likely drywall compound rather than stucco.

It'll be some work, but skim coat is probably the best way to get to a smooth wall. You want to knock off as much of the texture as possible before you start skimming. Any plaster/stucco supply should carry a plaster plane. It isn't made for texture removal, but it works reasonably well.

[dadiOH]

Take a broadknife and knock them off.