Hi everyone! Guess what! Quick question

JohnnyWardle

New Member
Hi everyone,

I'm a self employed contractor doing internal refurbishment work mostly. I taught myself some plastering the hard way by just having a crack in my own flat. I've got experience in carpentry and plumbing, tiling and decorating, so why not try my hand at plastering.

I made every mistake in the book. Mixed it too thick. Went off in the tub. Mixed it too loose and 60% was slashed onto the floor with me cursing every time the hawk tilted. Wife had to close the kitchen door to the hallway to stop the blast damage. Burned out my Bosch drill mixing. You get the idea.

On bigger jobs I sub out plastering to a crew, but on smaller jobs it's easier if I just do it. And I'm confident enough now that the customer is going to be happy.

Skimming over fresh boards. We all love that, right? It's easy to get a perfect finish. Thin. Two coats or one. No problems. But skimming over masonry, I can get the finish smooth, but it's not flat like on boards. I always do two coats and try to float a thicker first coat onto rougher substrates, but when I run my hand over it after it kinda has waves. I've filled the worst bits out with bonding etc, just wondered if anyone had any tips for getting a really flat coat? Cheers!!
 
Why are you skimming over masonry, you are meant to float it out first using sand and cement or a lightweight backing coat

Thanks guys, when I say masonry, I meant a solid wall rather than a studwork partition. Examples include bonding coat that's had tiles taken off of it. I put bonding back into any big holes. I do have a feather edge but I wouldn't normally use it on skim, I'd use it with bonding to get it flat. Or to check a dry wall. Perhaps a long float would help?

This is not a catastrophic problem I'm having either. I just noticed the difference between fresh boards and solid backgrounds. Any suggestions I really appreciate.
 
Thought that might be the case and there's no easy trick to getting it perfectly flat. It'll always polish smooth but follow the bumps.

So we're saying it's just a case of skill and experience to not force bumps into it when you're trying to flatten it off.
 
Thought that might be the case and there's no easy trick to getting it perfectly flat. It'll always polish smooth but follow the bumps.

So we're saying it's just a case of skill and experience to not force bumps into it when you're trying to flatten it off.

Bond it out first then skim.
 
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