Hi, I have a house that is about 40 years old. I have two cracks in the living room that go diagonally from the top corners of the fireplace to the ceiling. I assume that it's the fireplace causing this with the extreme temperature changes from summer to winter. The crackes are biggest in the winter. I have dug them out and tapped and mudded them about 3 times and the cracks come back. I have also wallpapered with a textured wallpaper and the cracks are very visible. My husband and I just don't know what to do next. He thinks we should put up paneling, but I don't want to. Do you have any suggestions.
Any ideas would be appreciated.
Thank you for your time.
Elisenda
PS: Some or all of the walls in this house seem to have two layers of sheetrock and them a thin layer of plaster.

 

Do you have a solid masonry fireplace or is it a metal insert and metal chimney with a masonry face?

If you have a heavy masinry fireplace, the odds are that the wood frame house moving more than the fireplace. The coefficient of expansion per foot for a masonry fireplace would be much much less than the movement you would get in the frame house. In other words, the house is moving around the fireplace.

If you have a lightweight fireplace it is hard to tell where the maximum movement is. The metal boxes can expand and move a lot.

I am not an expert in replairing sheetrock, but I know that cracks in any material will continue to telegraph through until someting is changed or a cover of some sort is used.

Dick

 

Thank you for you reply concretemasonry. I'm pretty sure that it's a solid masonry and that the house is moving around the fireplace.