Plaster ceiling water damaged, cracked, sagging
#1
Plaster ceiling water damaged, cracked, sagging
I have a stucco house in San Diego, built in 1958. Basically, it's in pretty good condition. The interior walls, at least, appear to be plaster over some kind of paperboard-backed, steel mesh-reinforced, stucco-coated base material. I'm assuming that this is a form of 'sheetrock'. Anyway, the roof leaked, and the living room ceiling has some water damage. Besides a 'fairy ring' under the leak point, there are cracks running around which appear to follow the outlines of the sheetrock. In some places, the ceiling appears to be sagging a bit, as if one sheetrock panel has drooped slightly, while the one next to it is ok. Another problem is that the ceiling overall appears to be sagging. The center looks like it might be as much as 2" lower than the edges. I looked in the attic through the trapdoor, which is at the end of a long hall. The roof pitch is about 3', and if I was a 8-year old, crawling down to inspect the ceiling from above and see if anything can be done about the sag might be practical, but I don't think I can hack it. The ceiling joists I could see looked pretty good. It's tempting to consider removing the entire ceiling and replacing it with drywall. How practical would that be? There would be the problem of lining up the new ceiling with the ceiling in the hallway. I would not be happy if there was any obvious misalignment. I've never done any drywall work, but I'm a pretty handy guy. Or, perhaps I could prepare the ceiling and hire somebody to do the drywall?
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Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: NE Pennsylvania
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plaster ceiling
While in process of remodeling a home and found water (from leak in now new roof) had damaged the plaster ceiling in one bedroom. Additionally the joists were inadequate (which prevented me from simply sheetrocking over the entire ceiling). I removed ceiling plaster & lathe (11 x 16) in about 3.5 hour (remove, bag haul it out of the room). It didn't have wire mesh which made it fairly easy.
We sistered joists to existing from below and sheetrocked ceiling.
I've removed walls with mesh and it is much harder/more work.
Although I installed the sheetrock, I was fortunate in finding someone to "finish" the sheetrock at a reasonable cost, as I don't have the expertise nor patience to "get it right".
I do quite a lot of remodeling (this is fourth unit) and have saved thousands by doing the "grunt work" myself. I've also saved time & aggravation by paying others to do what I can't do well.
We sistered joists to existing from below and sheetrocked ceiling.
I've removed walls with mesh and it is much harder/more work.
Although I installed the sheetrock, I was fortunate in finding someone to "finish" the sheetrock at a reasonable cost, as I don't have the expertise nor patience to "get it right".
I do quite a lot of remodeling (this is fourth unit) and have saved thousands by doing the "grunt work" myself. I've also saved time & aggravation by paying others to do what I can't do well.