Wallpapering

[Steve]

Just moved into a marvellous house - only downside is that it's entirely decorated in woodchip, which we hate. We like the look of anaglypta and intend to use that and paint it - it's just the woodchip we can't abide.

Now for the question, and just so you know, I might as well be wearing a Stetson, spurs and sitting on a horse while I ask this :o)

Do we *really* need to strip off all the woodchip? Apparently it's been on for years and years and has about 7 different coats of paint on it. It'll be a complete nightmare and take WEEKS to get all this off - can we not just re-paper over it with the anaglypta?

Steve.

[Owain]

I think you need to do *something*, or you'll end up with lumpy anaglypta. It might be easier to use that miracle wipe-it-over makes-rough-walls-smooth goo that's advertised on telly underneath the 'glypta. You win't need a perfect result, just smooth enough to avoid the "my wall has acne" appearance.

If you haven't moved all your furniture in yet, I'd suggest a small fire with considerable smoke damage to the wallpaper, and a good insurance policy :-)

Owain

[Chris Bacon]

No, you can't. You may well find that the "woodchip" comes off quite easily. De-nib it, wet it (add detergent aND METHS. to the wet, wait, wet it, wait and see. It may come off really really easily (if you're reasonably lucky).

[Warwick]

Or they could be in a place like my last place. 1951 build. Dunno when the woodchip went on but it was glued on hard. Add on at least 20 coats of paint and one of them was a gloss base.

The initial investigastion on stripping the damn stuff off took ages. The usual stuff failed to have any effect. Dampening it down had no effect due to the extreme thickness of the paint. We went through the ranks of steamers that you can hire and 6 weeks into the project of stripping the walls had about 2 square metres cleared at a huge cost in renting stuff and trying various things.

I then bought a device that I believe was made by Plas (of plasplugs) but I can't find on their site.

It is a plastic thing that resembles a plane. At the back there is a wheel. At the front there is a stripping blade (it comes out and we didn't use it). Where you would normally see the blade on a plane there is a toothed blade designed to score multiple lines. A small amount of experimenting to get the right pressure (really small compared to the weeks of trying) and the rest of the house was stripped of woodchip in about 3 evenings.

I wouldn't use it on a single layer of paper or on a painted surface, but it did for old painted woodchip without much damage to the plaster.

Warwick

[Cicero]

========================= Yes you do need to remove the woodchip if you want a proper finish for your new paper.

The secret of removing woodchip is patience. Scrape off the 'knibs' using either a conventional scraper or a wheeled scoring tool (available as 3 wheel type from 'Focus'). This exposes part of the underlying paper. Wet the walls using either a wet cloth or preferably a water spray and then leave to soak. Repeat the wetting process several times and periodically test the paper with a scraper. Eventually the water will have soaked in through the de-knibbed paper and it will come off easily.

Cic.

[Mark]

Use one of these

then one of these.

[Steve]

> and then one of these.

Thanks to all who have replied - guess I'll just have to get on with it then :o(

Cheers,

Steve

[Ian_m]

In my last house I had great success getting woodchip off using a rotary wall paper scorer and chemical wallpaper remover. The chemical causes the paste "to fail" meaning the paper just peels off. Can do the same with water and/or steamer but takes a lot longer. When we had the walls skimmed the plasterer just used loads of water to get the remaining woodchip off, apply loads of water, have cup of tea, apply loads of water, have cup of tea, apply loads of water, have cup of tea etc etc so by late morning the paper had turned to mush and just scraped off.

The state of the wall in my downstairs meant it has to be skimmed, the wood chip covered up a very damaged/scraped wall but upstairs wood chip peeled off fine, leaving a flat wall which I lining papered and painted.

[Tim Hardisty]

Having just stripped the hall, stairs and landing of our 1930's property (wood chip probably dates from 1950s) I can confirm what Cicero says.

Do not miss out the step of removing the top surface - I used a 4" scraper with a sharp blade, but am sure that the scoring tool works well.

You should take "leave to soak" to mean: "have a cup of tea, then mow the grass, and reward yourself with another cup of tea", and I would definately use a water sprayer - I used a pump-up one designed for garden pesticides that holds about 10l of water, with a good dollop of cheap washing up liquid to act as a wetting agent.

I then used a steamer as well, with all the doors and windows closed. Build up a good fug - your clothes will be dripping wet by the end but the additional water vapour in the air really really helps. And you get a free skin cleanse into the bargain ;-)

I found I rarely needed to use the steamer for more than a few seconds on each piece, apart from really stubborn bits, and made sure I held it close to the wall all the time to continually keep it wet and steamy.

[JimP]

This worked for me. Get a thin blade stainless steel scraper. The thin blade can be pushed under the painted surface and begin to pry the paper off. All those coatings of paint cause it to flake away in ever larger pieces. Keep sliding the scraper under it and develope a fairly straight line and wet the edge. It gets easier as you go and only leaves the original paper backing which a spray of water will take off.

[Chris Bacon]

'Kinell. Who said the Google posting defaults have changed, or is this person being deliberately bone-headed? Sheesh.

[JimP]

.Nice one Crispy Bacon. What's your problem.

[Chris Bacon]

I've no idea what you are talking about. Are you really that bone-headed?

BTW "They call me *Mr* Bacon"[1].

[1] "In the Heat of the Night"

[Owain]

But what do they call you in the cold grey light of a sober dawn ...

Owain

[Steve Firth]

That would have to be a hot night to get crispy bacon. Although pavement fried egg is possible in the Heat of the Day.