Ceiling scraping
To add some additional strain on my shoulder muscles, I add in another project of scraping the ceiling in the living room adjacent to the bathroom I’m already scraping. In this room the ceiling is a mess with blotches of acoustic tile adhesive all over the plaster. There’s also a lot flaking paint and some mold stains from old HVAC ducts that ran along the ceiling.
Chipping away at the old paint and adhesive.
I test the paint for lead and luckily it’s negative. After putting down some cardboard on the floors I start scraping away. A good portion of the paint and adhesive comes off easily. Any paint that is already flaking peels right off along with the adhesive that is attached to the failing paint. For the adhesive that won’t budge, I coat those blotches in a dab of paint stripper. I give it a few minutes and find the stripper loosens adhesive. This loosened adhesive is a mess though with it glopping all over my clothes and shoes. Originally I was thinking of covering the ceiling with canvas or tin, but since the adhesive comes off I may just repair it and replaster it.
Notice a difference after a few hours of scraping?
In the bathroom I try using a new approach to finish stripping the textured paint on the bottom portion of the wall. The Speedheater seems a little too strong for whatever substance the bottom wall is made out of. It’s a black wazy surface that easily gouges when trying to scrape off the paint. Instead I try a wallpaper steamer which works at lower temperature. Using the steamer on the bottom portion of the wall yields good results with the paint coming off without the waxy board not getting damaged.
Most of the textured paint is off the walls. The black splotches are where the scraper cut into the waxy board of unknown origin.
To complete my scraping, I give 1 of the built-in doors another coat of citrus stripper to remove more of that white paint. In the attic I give the built in 1 final coat of shellac and this time I use a traditional brown to avoid any issues with reddish tones. I’ll let that cure and the will buff it down and wax in a few weeks.
Last coat of shellac applied.
The last task for the weekend is installing some molding over the patch made in the wall at the top of the landing. This piece covers up a gap that was visible between the ceiling and wall.
Before
After.
