Old Plaster Cracking - can it be rescued?

[ecartmon]

Hi guys,

I've searched (not extensively) on this forum so hope I'm not repeating old questions but...

I've recently moved into a semi-detached house built in 1956. The entire house had wallpaper up and on removal I found that the plaster underneath had plenty of 'spidering' cracks in it. By knocking on the wall it seems some areas are better than others, but as one of the attached pictures show, there are bits where the plaster just comes away from the wall.

So my question is - is it worth trying to recover whats left and just patch the worst bits and skim over the rest? Or will this just get worse and it would be better to dry line the whole lot?

The original plaster appears to have been applied directly to hollow red (clay?) blocks, with ridges on them if that helps at all.

Thanks in advance for any advice.

Andy

 

[johniosaif]

Depends on severity, if a large percentage has blown I would remove it all, low percentage I would patch, pva a couple of times, then skim with embedded mesh.

 

[lucius]

Hard to remove plaster from clay pots you just end up putting holes in them.

 

[Nisus]

Did you use a steam stripper?

 

[ecartmon]

Did you use a steam stripper?

Yes we did. Is that going to exacerbate the problem? The plaster upstairs still has cracks and areas where it just comes away from the wall but it's certainly not as bad and we didn't use a steam stripper.

 

[ecartmon]

Thanks for the replies so far guys. I might try and salvage where I can.
@lucius - this plaster pretty much falls off with very little encouragement. In fact I've been putting holes in then blocks for socket boxes which requires a decent few blows with a hammer. The plaster is long gone by that point so I guess that's a plus!

 

[lucius]

If its coming of easy its poor quality better to have it all of

 

[stuart23]

Take it all off mate because you will regret it in the future when the cracks come back and youve spent money on decoration and carpets.

 

[JamieMac]

Hi guys,

I've searched (not extensively) on this forum so hope I'm not repeating old questions but...

I've recently moved into a semi-detached house built in 1956. The entire house had wallpaper up and on removal I found that the plaster underneath had plenty of 'spidering' cracks in it. By knocking on the wall it seems some areas are better than others, but as one of the attached pictures show, there are bits where the plaster just comes away from the wall.

So my question is - is it worth trying to recover whats left and just patch the worst bits and skim over the rest? Or will this just get worse and it would be better to dry line the whole lot?

The original plaster appears to have been applied directly to hollow red (clay?) blocks, with ridges on them if that helps at all.

Thanks in advance for any advice.

Andy

better to strip all the old plaster off.you could dry line it.you will need gyprock any way for the lath wall in the pic.

 

[ecartmon]

Thanks to you all for the replies - the majority is blown so I'll take it all off and dry line.

Much appreciated!

Andy