Posts for Tag : Residential Painting Contractor

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PART THREE-Removing and Repairing Damage Ceiling Texture

April 4, 2019

Worst case scenario:  Your texture is damaged, your sheetrock is damaged and you need to repair both.  You first need to decide if you need to remove and replace any sheetrock.  If the sheetrock is bowed or sagging, that problem can only be remedied with sheetrock replacement.  Call a contractor, this process will not be explained below.  However, if you have a few holes in your ceiling fist sized or smaller, or the texture is falling off?  No problem, read on! 

First remove any loose texture with a metal putty knife (1.5” – 6”) blades usually work best depending upon the amount of damage and how tight the texture is.  The goal here is to remove loose, soft and or damaged texture until you find tighter or sound texture.  When we say remove we mean that the ceiling will be smooth underneath the texture.  The damaged area will still be dusty or chalky but all the bumps will be gone.  The difficulty here is again due to lack of a primer under the texture and/or no paint on top of the existing texture. It’s hard to know when and where to stop the removal process. You will need to remove all the water damaged texture.  If you just paint over damaged texture it may fall to the floor when you paint.  This can even happen years later.  Once you have removed the damaged texture you will need to bevel back the remaining sound texture at the edges of the damaged area.  You can’t leave a line, edge or ridge at the joint where the texture is sound and the removed area.  We use a stiff putty knife to remove the sound texture.  Yes, you will now be removing the sound texture to create a beveled edge.  This beveled edge must be at least 5” wide.  The idea here is to remove all the texture at the joint and carefully remove less and less texture as you move away from the joint.   (The joint is the spot where you stopped removing the damaged texture and the sound texture begins)  You are trying to create a 5”-10” area that is beveled.  As you move out and away from the joint you will be removing less and less texture. This beveled area is the key to hiding the damaged area.

Patching Holes:   Don’t patch until you prime the damaged area.  Patching compounds will not stick well to dusty and/or chalky areas.  The best primer for something like this is again a clear thin primer like Zinsser-Gardz Problem Surface Sealer from Abbott Paint & Carpet.  Prime the entire area that you have worked on and allow to dry.  When patching, if the hole is smaller than or slightly larger than a standard pencil then you can just use any type of spackle or patching compound.  If the hole is the size of a quarter then Gravity will pull the patch out of the hole to some degree.  Fill the hole first with something.  That something will need to be tightly inserted and can’t stick out of the hole.  That something (Joint tape, a piece of sheetrock, some foam spray etc.) must fit tightly to the sides of the hole.  Then fill as stated above.  Always use at least two coats of patching compound and allow to dry between coats.  For larger holes use a metal mesh patch available at your local paint or hardware stores. Follow the directions on the label for application.  Use at least 2 – 3 coats of joint compound to adhere the metal mesh patch.

Okay!  Damaged texture has been removed, beveled edge installed, damaged area primed, holes patched it’s time to texture.

There are some aerosol textures on the market for small spots.  Read the instructions carefully and be prepared to apply the product 2-3 times.  You must allow the product to dry between coats.  These aerosol texture cans may work very well for small spots.

If you rent a texture machine you will also need a bag of texture, 99% of ceiling texture products are of a medium size (more than likely you will need medium).  Follow the directions on the back of the texture bag.  Talk to the people at the rental store.  This is all trial and error stuff, be patient.  There are three different variables at play when you apply texture.  Airflow or the volume of air, the hole size in the texture gun and or the thickness or thinness of the texture itself.  It’s a super messy process, start small and be prepared to wipe off the texture if it doesn’t look right.  Try, try again don’t worry too much about messing it up you can always call Lake Area Painting & Decorating.

If the damaged area is larger than a soccer ball? Call your local contractor, Lake Area Painting & Decorating or you can rent a texture machine. Or you can do all the work stated above then call Lake Area Painting & Decorating.

If you succeed with the texture the texture is dry, everything looks great.  Then look carefully for water stains.  If you see them then deal with them as explained above using a spray can of spray primer Zinsser B-I-N or Kilz Original. 

Paint your ceiling as stated in a previous blog post or again call Lake Area Painting & Decorating Inc. Thank you for taking the time to read our blogs!

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PART TWO-Painting a Textured Ceiling

March 1, 2019

This process in and of itself has caused many people problems, pain and cost.  You see the dirty little secret is that 95% of textured ceilings are installed incorrectly when the house is built.  All manufacturers of sheetrock, joint or patching compound and texture recommend that new sheetrock is primed prior to installing texture.  This step is usually skipped.  In modern home building, ceilings are very seldom primed prior to applying texture.  This practice creates major problems when you want to paint a textured ceiling.  Ceilings textures are water soluble and due to lack of a primer, they have very little adhesion to the new sheetrock.   Latex paints and primers are primarily water.  When the texture gets wet with the paint or primer the texture can fall off of the ceiling.  This is not pretty and can cause you to have to re-texture the complete ceiling.

Make sure all walls, flooring, furniture and all ceiling hardware such as lights are covered.  The most difficult items to cover are the walls.  We use 1.5” OR 2” Low adhesive masking tape by the 3M Company.  The tape must be installed very carefully at the wall ceiling joint. Line the tape up with the texture and firmly press the tape onto the wall.  We use a narrow 1.5” putty knife to secure the top edge of the tape to the wall at the ceiling line.  We leave the bottom edge of the tape loose if possible in order to tuck the plastic under that edge.  We use 12’ wide plastic on a 400’ roll to cover all the walls.  Again you tape the wall at the ceiling line then tuck the edge of the plastic under the bottom edge of the tape.  You then unfold the plastic to cover the walls all the way down to the floor.
Ready to paint?  First and foremost, test the existing texture to see if it has ever been painted, there are many ways to do this.  Try a putty knife edge first, gently scrape at the popcorn texture.  If it has never been painted it will fall off easily, almost like a powder.  You can even scrape it off with your fingernails.  If the texture seams soft like it has never been painted make a 2nd test.  Get a wet sponge and carefully gently wash a very small part of the ceiling.  If it turns to mud and or washes off immediately you have now confirmed that the texture has not been painted.  You must prime the ceiling first before painting it and you should spray the ceiling with an AIRLESS SPRAYER.  You can rent one of these at your local rental store.  You really should hire a contractor at this point.   If the ceilings have been painted before then most of the danger described above is passed. You may only need one coat of paint and you can roll the new paint onto the ceiling.  Use a heavy nap roller ¾”-1” nap.  Take your time don’t miss any spots.

Priming and Painting an unpainted textured ceiling.  Call your local contractor Lake Area Painting & Decorating or rent that sprayer and learn how to use it.  Suffice it to say in untrained hands you can create many more headaches than just water damage.  The process and technique for rolling and/or spraying will not be discussed here.

The safest primer to use in terms of your textured ceiling not falling down is an oil based or alcohol based primer/sealer.  However, if you don’t have a full face respirator you will be overcome by the fumes from the solvents.  We have found in careful hands we can use a quick drying primer like (Zinsser Bulls Eye 1-2-3) or a slow drying Penetrating primer like (Zinsser-Gardz Problem Surface Sealer).  When you apply these primers DO NOT OVER APPLY!  If you saturate the popcorn texture it may fall.  You may want to test a small area first and let it dry.  This will ensure you have no problems.  You want to apply a very even uniform coat.  Once the primer has dried you can apply the finish paint.  You don’t need expensive paint for this.  Actually the cheaper the better, but make sure the color is what you want.  A good product for this is Super Hide from Benjamin Moore.  You can get this product at Abbott Paint and Carpet located in White Bear Lake.

Your best solution for painting your textured ceiling is to call your 5-star local painting company that has been in your neighborhood for almost 70 years, Lake Area Painting & Decorating.

Check back soon for our last blog post in the series – Removing and repairing damaged ceiling texture.

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