As I've been noting up and down these forums, I've got to quickly turn this fixer-upper that I've been working on for years into something to sell. This means that I'm having to finish-up some projects that I have underway, hire contractors to do others and in this case, I have an experienced guy doing the bulk of the work and I possibly might come around behind him to do the finishing touches.

The experienced guy is laminating my ceilings with sheetrock. He seemed kind of surprised that I wanted him to run tape around the edges, so there'd be an unbroken connection to the walls.

Theoretically, I could go behind him and put molding over this tape, but my initial plan was to shoot the ceilings with one pattern using my hopper gun and the walls with another.

My hopper gun is still in the box. I've never gotten around to using it and it sounds like my sheetrock guy has always used some kind of patterned stick that he turns to keep from repeating the same pattern. He may actually have a hopper of his own, but he seems to really like the patterned stick method and might not know a lot about the Marshalltown SprayMate.

Nevertheless, I'm willing to hop my own to save money or let him use my hopper to save time, if my impression that it's more efficient than a patterned stick holds true.


Anyway... after that long preamble...


There are place on my walls, where the previous owners obviously patched something by spreading a little joint compound over the plaster and we started by scraping some of the kinda ugly spots and a few new ones, then "buttering" with a smooth coat of joint compound.

1) Is this necessary or will the bare spots get sufficiently covered by the hopper? Also, should I actually clean the walls before he "butters", if that's the way to go?

2) I probably could find this answer, but since I'm here and if you don't mind... Do you apply primer (Kilz?) before hitting it with the hopper, after, or both?

3) Right now, my walls have a "knockdown" pattern and my plan has been to just go back over all of the repaired walls with another coating of "knockdown"; Part of me kind of likes "orange peel", but I don't want to have to sand every wall, so does anyone think an "orange peel" could go over "knockdown" and still look good? Am I wrong to think that a "knockdown" can go over "knockdown"?

4) And finally, the guy putting up my drywall seemed surprised that I didn't have a problem with shooting all the walls and his attitude made me think that it might be more work than I had anticipated. Again, I don't know his experience with hoppers, but am I wrong in thinking that it'd be relatively easy and pretty cost-effective to just go over everything, balance the patterns and hide all the flaws?


Thanks in Advance


PS) If anyone has any good pointers toward info that'll cover this and other questions, please point the way.

 

If your walls already have knockdown, you can generally repair the "repaired" areas without having to do the entire wall, if the remaining wall knockdown is in good shape. Not sure why the drywaller was surprised that you wanted to tape the ceiling-to-wall joint. What was he going to do there? Is he a pro, or a friend of a brother in law?
Your hopper is still in the box. Does it have it's own air supply or do you have a large 20 gallon or better compressor? Gotta have VOLUME. If you have bare sheetrock, it is best to prime the sheetrock prior to any other coating.
If the guy is a pro, he probably has more experience at doing knockdown that you do, since you have never done it. It ain't easy, and very time consuming. I wouldn't recommend it as a diy project.

 

The smoother the drywall is prior to texture - the better the texture will look. The heavier the texture, the more it will hide but texture won't hide it all!

"sounds like my sheetrock guy has always used some kind of patterned stick that he turns to keep from repeating the same pattern" - would this be a stomp texture?

IMO a stomp texture is a little more work to apply but it isn't as messy. When you spray texture, it goes everywhere!!

If you tape the ceiling to the wall, the wall texture will need to be applied to those areas. If you don't tape it, most any crown moulding will coverthe gap - maybe that's what your contractor is thinking. Even if you retexture the whole wall, the slick areas would need texture first, so all the mew texture would be consistent. Orange peel over knockdown would soften the knockdown but wouldn't eliminate it or give an orange peel finish.

There are those [mostly drywall guys] who say you should prime the drywall before texture and while this will allow the texture to dry at a constant rate, I've never seen a need for it. The texture does need to be primed before painting. Kilz isn't the best primer for texture. Latex kilz has been reported to have adhession issues! Your local paint store [not big box] will have a selection of latex primers that will be suitable for whichever top coat you intend to use.

 

Chandler - I'm currently living in a small town in the middle of nowhere. The "sheetrock guy" helping me is a licensed contractor, but because there's not a lot out here, he also has a fulltime job. When he first walked-up, he tried to talk me into taking down the plaster ceilings because he had never laminated and felt that the mess of a teardown might be easier, plus he voiced all of the usual concerns. IOW: He's a "sheetrock and tile guy" with at least 20 years experience, but there's not a lot of experience around.

My hopper gun requires a compressor, which I have one that I use for every other tool, but it's only a 12gal. I actually acquired a hopper gun by a somewhat different method, but I got it because I've always planned to DIY this job. The timetable has just moved-up and suddenly, I'm needing help.


marksr - Because some of my walls wouldn't need any repair, we have discussed maybe running the tape flat on the ceiling, flat up against the the top of the wall. I'm not sure how that would look or whether it'd require moulding, so I'm interested in yours or other's opinions. All of my exterior walls are block and they're mostly the ones which would need no repair. Right now, I'm thinking that if I have to put moulding on these walls, I might have to glue it down and to be honest, I'd prefer not to have to put moulding everywhere, if I can get away with it. Not to mention that I'd also like it, if I were to put moulding that if the new owners were to take it up, they wouldn't be facing an 1/8" gap. IOW: What would you recommend?

And, if I'm reading correctly, you're saying that we should continue buttering the "bad spots" with mud, then shoot the slick parts with the hopper, when we're done.

Would you (or anyone else) advise against shooting the entire wall, instead just focus on the repair spots? One of my concerns about putting a whole other coat of texture over the old is that it might be too busy, which is why I was considering changing texture. Because I've always planned to use the gun, I've assumed that it'd be hard to match the new texture with the old, especially since the old doesn't seem very uniform and was probably put on by different people at different times over the past 60 years, so I thought that by going over everything, I might be able to create the illusion of uniformity.


And finally (for this round), say you have a 12'x20' room with 8' ceilings; How long should it take to shoot the ceilings and the walls? I've been thinking that we're talking the neighborhood of an hour or two to do both, but the way my sheetrock guy reacted, you'd think it'd take all day.

When all is said and done, everything will have to be painted, so it's not like I'm planning to leave a lot of the house, the way it is now.


Thanks again for all of the help.
I really appreciate it and couldn't have done what I've done without it.

 

Flat taping to an existing wall or [if I understand correctly] to a block wall is acceptable. You will probably need to caulk the edge of the tape to the wall once the tape and mud is dry - sand first.

Knockdown is probably a little harder to touch up than most textures [because you can't feather it in/out] but touch up texture is still better than retexture. The best way to change the texture on a wall/ceiling is to first skim coat it so you have a smooth surface to start with - I doubt you want to go thru that much work. You could touch up the repairs with knockdown and then spray orange peel or splatter coat over the entire walls to soften the texture some.

Spraying the texture is only a small part of work. If the ceilings get a different texture than the walls, you first shoot the ceiling and then while the texture is still wet, use a wide drywall knife to scrape the excess texture off of the walls. When the walls are dry, sand them and then shoot the walls. What gets on the ceiling usually doesn't show too bad. You also need to protect the other rooms and windows from the texture - spraying texture tends to be messy, the only good thing is wet or dry, it cleans up with water.

 

Thanks for the quick response and just to clarify...


So, the idea of laying the tape flat on the ceiling, bumping the wall with just the edge of the tape will be fine and the mud on the tape, plus maybe a little caulk should "harden it up" enough for an 1/8" gap or so?



So, you're suggesting that I shoot the repairs or let the sheetrock guy do it the old-fashioned method, then if they still stand out as obvious repairs, then I could shoot everything with orange peel and kind of lose the repairs into the hybrid texture?

And if you don't mind...

You've said a couple of times that orange peel will "soften" knockdown, so I'm assuming that this combo might actually be used sometimes for this very purpose. (To disguise repairs and because a lot of the walls will have 60 yr old knockdown, some might have 30 year old stomp-like something and the new stuff will be new)


Once again, thanks or all of the help and I appreciate your patience.
---

Edited to Ask: BTW: Would you glue moulding to a block wall instead of using nails?

 

Whenever new drywall is hung to an existing wall and for whatever reason you don't want to fold the tape and finish the joint conventionally - flat tape is used to make an even line/finish on the edge of the ceiling. This usually results in no crack but should be caulked because it will crack sooner or later.

If you don't first blend the repairs in with the rest of the wall and texture the entire wall, the repair will show. Once the repairs are textured and you aren't happy how they look, adding texture over all the wall will help to fill in some of the descrepancies. It isn't a common practice but it has been done on occasion.

I've never attempted to install crown on a masonary wall... Chandler may have though

 

OK, maybe I missed it, but I re-read the OP and didn't see any mention of block walls. In that case, yes installing the flat tape is good and caulking. But it will crack, eventually.
I would not go with big crown. You can install 1 1/4" crown and the room won't look too small, and the crack will be covered. Not sure how your rooms are constructed, but you should be able to reach the top plate with a 2 1/2" 15 gauge nailer. In that case you can install the smaller crown and shoot your nails at a 45 degree angle through the middle of the molding, so the nail hits the plate. Caulk the edges, wipe with a damp sponge, prime and paint.

 

Sorry... the exterior walls are block and most are in good to great shape. There are a couple of places that needs repaired along the block (worn away plaster, or previously-patched worn away plaster) and in fact the room we started with has two block walls and both were "buttered" in a couple of good-sized places.


Thanks. This makes sense and it looks like it'd work.


The "whatever" is that I'm in kind of a Catch-22; I don't particularly want to put crown everywhere, but I guess there's no reason to shoot all of the walls. My guy is supposed to be here in a few minutes for this evening's shift. I'll talk to him about it and see what he has to say, but it looks like it may be an either/or kind of deal: either I commit to crown throughout most of the house (for consistency) or I shoot all of the walls.


Thanks again for all of the help; Of course I'm paying this guy by the hour, so though it didn't end up being straight DIY, this part will certainly end up being do-what-I-can.

Thanks.