I recently helped a friend put up some drywall in an unfinished bedroom. The walls are about 5' high and then do a 45 to the ceiling. The flat part of the ceiling is about 6' wide. Being complete novices in drywall (except for some other work we've done on our homes), the joints on that 45 didn't come out that great.
My question is about putting up some sort of crown molding along that
45 degree joint. I don't recall every seeing it done. Is it feasible? I was thinking about using some sort of standard crown molding and modifying the bottom edge so it looks right. Any thoughts, suggestions?
I will be doing exactly the same thing with oak crown in our family room (at about 2.50/ft). I started looking into this a few months ago and bought this by Wayne Drake:
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seems to contain every possible configuration you could ever come up with. I have not done it yet but at least I have something to refer to.
Have you read the book yet? I'm not adverse to buying it but I'm not sure if I need it. Did you buy the True Angle tools as well? Looks like a simple plastic _____ (can't remember the name of that tool but I have one) with a dial that has the degrees scribed on it (which is actually a good idea).
I know what needs to be done, but yet everytime I do extensive molding work I screw something up. Does the book talk about walls that are not close to being straight, plum or square?
Incidentally, Amazon has a set of the the tools for $4 less then Quint lists them for on its website.
I just bought the book without anything else. I almost bought it from Amazon, but at the time they were not selling the latest version - and it was actually cheaper through his website.
I have read the part of the book that deals with what we are talking about. In Ch 5, there is an extensive discussion of cathederal/vaulted ceilings. He does stress using the "true angle" device, but I am hoping that I can get the angle measurements I need through a little trial and error (I may regret being so cheap).
I did notice that he uses mostly stock crown with either a 38 or 45 deg "spring angle". In the close-up photos (which are extensive) there is no attempt to have the molding sit flat - there is a small space which is actually barely noticeable.
Anyway, to answer your other question, he does stress that no angles in any house will be true, so each has to be dealt with separately. He also encourages making a mock-ups of the walls that you will be working with.
I have done quite a bit of crown in our house on a horizontal plane and have gotten (?) pretty good at coping etc. This vaulted ceiling will be a challenge because (as I said) it will be stain grade oak all around. What I intend to do is use some MDF crown to do some mock-ups & trial & error - and take my good ole' time!
On Thu, 09 Jun 2005 14:04:34 -0400, loutent wrote:
Crown is cut to run against a 90 degree ceiling. When you run against a vault you have at least one part, either the top or bottom, that does not lay flat against the wall or the ceiling. Most of time you see the bottom laying flat against the wall and the crown is actually running at the same angle as if it was in a normal flat ceiling. Then it's just pushed up to make contact with the vault. This method is fine except that all of the gap will be at the top. Often this is done because you can cope a 45 on one side of the pie shaped piece that turns into the vault and then split the angle of the vault on the other side of the same piece. This leaves a gap all along the wall and since the top of corner of the crown is sort of "hanging" out into the room you will also have a gap showing where the piece coming down the rake turns to meet the piece on the wall. If you can see this either from the floor (if the room is wide enough) or from a balcony you won't be happy with the results. Most guys solve this problem buy splitting the difference and having some gap showing against the wall and some showing at the ceiling. This is probably the lesser of evils. Another way to solve this problem is to reshape the back of the molding so that it lays flat (or at least flatter) at the top and the bottom. Depending on the angle of the vault and the "spring angle" of the back side of the crown, you can take the molding to the joiner and clip the corners on the back of the molding to change the "spring angle" to one that is closer to your vault angle. This will help to lessen the amount of visible gap at the top and bottom. If you choose to modify the crown you need only do it to pieces that run parallel to the floor as the pieces coming down the rake will be in a 90 degree corner and will lay properly. This method does change the angle of the front of the crown as it lays on the wall but as long as you don't modify the front of the crown you can still get the angle for the pie shaped piece needed to turn into the rake.
A lot of good info in that post. Thanks alot. I have 2 long lengths that run parrellel to the floor, so I will try to modify the angle. I was going to try to do that on the TS or the router table with a chamfer bit, but the idea of using the jointer is even better.
If you can hold a scrap piece where you want it and look at the end of the piece where the back hits the wall and the ceiling you can get an idea of what you might need to remove to get the angle you want. You can even scribe on the end of the piece to give yourself a reference. It may take a few passes at the joiner to remove material from both the top and bottom but you can get a better fit. Good luck!
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