Removing texture from drywall

[jeff]

Hello!

I am trying to decide what to do with the walls in my bedroom.

There is a wallpaper border along the top that was painted over by a previous owner that needs to come off. The walls also have a popcorn like texture on them and we want to take that off as well.

Should we:

A - Scrape everything off the walls, apply a thin coat of joint compound, sand and paint.

or

B - Tear it all down and put up new sheetrock.

I discovered that there is no insulation in the exterior walls, so this might be a good time to do it if we have to tear it down anyway. I would rather not tear it down if at all possible.

This is also going to have to be a DIY project due to our budget.

Any advice is appreciated!

Jeff

[Des Perado]

We have removed the spackle finish (popcorn balls) from a couple of ceilings in our house. Did it with a wide blade (4 inches or so) metal scraper. It certainly is not rocket science, but is a fair amount of work and very messy. You will also have nics and gouges in the drywall when you have finished scraping all the popcorn off, so you will have to fill with drywall compound and sand them smooth before refinishing. I think this 'popcorn' finish is used by amateurs to hide a million sins and can't make drywall joints look seamless. Don't know where you live, but no insulation in the exterior walls is a serious problem in a cold climate. I would be inclined to remove the drywall altogether, insulate the wall properly and then apply new drywall. A big job, but doesn't have to be overly expensive if you can do it yourself. You might want to wait until Spring when the temps warm up a bit before you start this project. Best of luck! Des

[cwizard]

I was actually suprised, for $9 worth of drywall and a 12 pack of beer my buddy came over and we tore out an entire wall and re-did it in a couple 2 hour sittings.

Can't beat that!

[RB]

I just had this done to a bathroom ceiling. They sprayed water on the Popcorn texture with a spray bottle, let it set for a while (15 - 20 minutes), re-sprayed and scraped it off with a 6" blade. It looked like a pretty easy job.

RB

jeff wrote:

[jeff]

Thanks for the advice!

We're in Portland, Oregon, so it's pretty temperate. I'm not too worried about no insulation in the walls. I'm not sure the insulation alone would be a good enough reason to tear down the drywall.

When you figure in the labor of scraping and then re-finishing the drywall, along with the absence of insulation, it seems more appealing to rip it all down and start over.

I'm not sure I'm confident enough for that kind of project right now, however...

[MattH]

"jeff" wrote in news:YQ%Hb.3620$ [e-mail]:

Jeff, This probably doesn't help you but maybe someone else. Around here (Austin, TX) they use a lot of knock down textures. Basically something like spackle sputtered on the walls and then flattened a little with the putty knife. Anyway, it's easier to just fill this stuff than it is to try to scrape, sand and repair. If it's not a huge space then I'd probably rip down the walls, insulate, run some more wires if desirable and re-sheetrock. It's pretty cheap and it's likely that you'll end up with a better result. Matt

[Des Perado]

Now, there is a guy who really knows how to get a job done! Des

[AJScott]

Simple choice. Eithr spend 60 hours of your time scraping off the popcorn or 20 hours just simply tearing all that crap you don't like anyway down and putting in some new drywall and mudding, taping and slapping on a new coat of paint.

But then, once you do that, you'll have to repaint the adjoining hallway and the 10 rooms that adjoin that all the way down the line thruout the house.

Forget it. Just bulldoze the whole place and start over. You'll spend less time on it that way ;)

AJS

[Mike]

We have sanded stuff like this down before with good results If they did the gyprock correctly it probably won't need to be tetaped and mudded. I worked for a company years ago where we drilled holes into the exterior of walls and blew in insulation-perhaps this would be an option. You could easily do this on the interior of the house. some used foam but we had a paper like material. I forget the name but it worked well.