Smoothing out lime plaster wall

[AureliaB]

Morning all,

We have a few walls that's are actially in decent nick, lime plastered but whoever plastered them was clearly not very good. Its all over the place, with grooves, rough areas.

Is there anything i can do to level and smooth it out. Its only roughly 1-2mm grooves. Could i use some nhl 2 lime and water it down to almost limewash and paint it on to smooth it out? If not anything else i can do?

Thanks
AB

 

[Stevers]

For those sorts of small impefections you could do a lot worse than standard powder Polyfilla which at lest one source says is chalk dust with synthetic binders. Have got through boxes of it over the years and no problems with it so far.

A very light skim of Polyfilla makes me the plasterer I am!

 

[fernicarry]

Agree, Toupret fill and skim for me then a light sand with some 180 grit to feather in.

Heavier gauges of lining paper will cover a bit of roughness just fine, just be sure to get the wall well dusted down so that there aren't any gritty bits trapped behind the paper.

 

[Kearn]

Morning all,

We have a few walls that's are actially in decent nick, lime plastered but whoever plastered them was clearly not very good. Its all over the place, with grooves, rough areas.

Is there anything i can do to level and smooth it out. Its only roughly 1-2mm grooves. Could i use some nhl 2 lime and water it down to almost limewash and paint it on to smooth it out? If not anything else i can do?

Thanks
AB

That won’t work, you could use a fine putty mix, but in all honesty, as said, polyfilla in those small doses is easier, cheaper, quicker and won’t do harm. It will however absorb your distemper or limewash differently to the old lime, so will need a bit more attention/coats possibly.

Equally, if you went with a thick hot lime wash, you may manage to fill the scratches in the three coats. Could still work with a cold limewash, just thinner so needs more coats.

 

[AureliaB]

Thank you. Will get some. On a similar note, anybody know what these marks could be, its comes through two coats of lime plaster, assuming from the wood fibre boards

 

[Stevers]

Could be iron oxide particles in the aggregate used.

One of Prinny's 'period' estates near here has a lot of self-coloured cream render walls, and all have deep red coloured streaks down them, and I reckon that's probably iron oxide too.

 

[AureliaB]

The marks were on the wood fibre boards before they went on the wall. So can't be that.

 

[a twig]

Could be something as mundane as staples left behind in the board from a previously attached shipping label?

 

[Flyfisher]

I've used 'Fine Lime Filler' from Anglia Lime (but there are many other similar versions if you search online) and also Toupret fine filler, depending what has been to hand when needed. Both seems to have done a good job with no signs of harm.

 

[Jblakes]

sorry to jump in on this post but my poor attempt at plastering looks like you image above. I have sort of whirls, grooves, holes etc ( yes i am crap at it, i convinced myself it ye olde).

I wonder if anybody has pictures of there attempt at lime plastering and the method used. I'm thinking of either running a sponge or one of them plastic float things on next attempt, but have no clue what it will look like.

 

[fernicarry]

On my first, and so far only, attempt at any sizeable area I ended up with a finish a not unlike that pictured. Rough slightly friable areas interspersed with smoother firmer areas.

The stuff I was using went off and became unworkable fairly quickly (NHL-based, I appreciate now why its not well liked on this forum) so when I went back to polish it with a metal trowel it wasn't having it. Next time I'll try to cut back and forth between troweling it on and polishing it. The bits I got to in time did come up really nicely, much smoother and better compacted. The difference when you get it right is quite obvious. I'm a bit wary of sponging because that tends to make the surface even more gritty but it can be helpful to smooth out tool marks. Polishing it at the right time seems to be the key.

I ended up filling quite a lot of the defects with fine filler and now the lining paper you really wouldn't know. Not as good as the other walls but not that far off either. I think its one of those things that can't really be taught or explained very well, you need to try it and get a feel for it yourself.

 

[Jblakes]

Whats the lining paper to use and how do you stick it to the wall?