making good a woodchip wallpaper covered ceiling in old house

[brianos]

Hello again! We have an old cottage with a living room ceiling covered in woodchip wallpaper. Command and control tells me that she really can't live with it. I really dont know whats underneath the paper. Its either going to be lovely plasterboard (wishfull thinking), or Im going to break into lath (I think thats what someone called it), and that lath will likely collapse on my head along with a hundred years or so of crap, and I will wish I hadnt started the job.
We had a plasterer come round to give a quote and he mentioned that best approach may be to nail up new plasterboard straight on top of the woodchip and then skim it.

There is some slight sagging in the middle where the current (whatever is underneath there has come away from the joists) and he reckons he would screw straight through that and onto joists.

The ceiling does seem to be fairly uniform (aside from the sagging), and when tapping, it sounds relatively 'sound' so I suspect it could be reasonable plasterboard there.

My current plan is to strip the paper and hope for the best.

Thoughts.

Best
Brian

ps. I will get some pics tomorrow if needed

 

[paulc]

Woodchip paper is probably hiding some big ugly cracks. Had both on my hallway ceiling.
Nailing plasterboard is well old school, and comes with problems. If you are lucky, the nails may go in to the joists assuming they are long enough. But jump around on the floor above, and the nails will "pop". Long straight cracks will appear along the joins between each sheet of plasterboard as a consequence. Using screws is much more preferable, but it is still hit & miss to get them in to the joists. Much better to take the whole lot down, and then you know exactly where the joists are.
If the bulk of the ceiling is in good repair, filling the cracks would be just as effective. Any loose lumps of plaster can be replaced.

 

[malcolm]

Most of my lime ceilings and walls were woodchipped. My wood chip wallpaper was very easy to remove - a scraper seems to split it where the wood bits are embedded and that takes the surface and the waterproof paints off. After that and a good water spray soak the rest comes off. Zinsser DIF also works well if it is stubborn.

Lime on lath is really easy to spot repair. All you need to do is carefully remove any loose stuff and fill in with new lime plaster that comes in a bag and you just mix with water.

Plasterboard does not sound like a good solution. And yes do post pics - we like them.

 

[Toby Newell]

Hello again! We have an old cottage with a living room ceiling covered in woodchip wallpaper. Command and control tells me that she really can't live with it. I really dont know whats underneath the paper. Its either going to be lovely plasterboard (wishfull thinking), or Im going to break into lath (I think thats what someone called it), and that lath will likely collapse on my head along with a hundred years or so of crap, and I will wish I hadnt started the job.
We had a plasterer come round to give a quote and he mentioned that best approach may be to nail up new plasterboard straight on top of the woodchip and then skim it.

There is some slight sagging in the middle where the current (whatever is underneath there has come away from the joists) and he reckons he would screw straight through that and onto joists.

The ceiling does seem to be fairly uniform (aside from the sagging), and when tapping, it sounds relatively 'sound' so I suspect it could be reasonable plasterboard there.

My current plan is to strip the paper and hope for the best.

Thoughts.

Best
Brian

ps. I will get some pics tomorrow if needed

It's very common to board over old sagging plaster ceilings, it's done all the time. Nothing wrong with it from a structural standpoint. No idea why you would nail it, that sounds especially foolish if you suspect lime and lath underneath. It's normally fairly easy to find the joists and screw to that. Never seen a problem with it. Stripping the paper can either be easy or utter nightmare.

Taking a lath ceiling down can create biblical amounts of dust which may contain both soot and asbestos depending on how lucky you are, hence the propensity of trades to simply board over.

The downside of course, is that your ceiling will be less breathable, if that is a concern.

Why not try a small area first? It might be ok if the plaster is sound.

 

[brianos]

Thanks all, really helpful guidance.

 

[brianos]

Some pictures for your delight. The picture of the reception room (2nd pic) shows where I;ve peeled off the woodchip paper. To my untrained eye, it looks 'ok', surely it would be relatively easy to put that fibreglass mesh tape over the cracks and just skim over it? Again, the plaster said that ceiling was no good and that I'd wasted my time scraping it, and recommended screwing new plasterboard to that ceiling also?! Whilst I appreciate its easier, isn't it a bit of a cop out. The new ceiling depth created from adding new plasterboard layer will create challenges for me for how it now butts up (is that the term?!) to the wood of the staircase in that room.

meh

 

[malcolm]

Has it already been plaster boarded over with tell tale cracks about 1.2m apart running the full length of the ceiling? Shame if it is plasterboard as it's easy to take the paper off when redecorating but if you can get around that just fill and redecorate with lining paper if needed.

 

[Toby Newell]

Has it already been plaster boarded over with tell tale cracks about 1.2m apart running the full length of the ceiling? Shame if it is plasterboard as it's easy to take the paper off when redecorating but if you can get around that just fill and redecorate with lining paper if needed.

+1 is it me or can I see feint lines c. 1.2m to left and right of big crack? Have a poke and see if it's pink gypsum.

 

[brianos]

+1 is it me or can I see feint lines c. 1.2m to left and right of big crack? Have a poke and see if it's pink gypsum.

Malcom, Toby - I'm not understanding what you chaps are pointing out to me. Are you thinking that previous plasterboard has been laid over plasterboard, resulting in the long hairlines (I'd need to go and take another look and some pics perhaps).

 

[brianos]

more pics!!