Has it ever happened to you, while plastering drywall, that you forgot how far you'd gone?
Which joints you've done with the first, second, or third coat of plaster, and accidentally forgotten to redo a joint?
How often does it happen that after plastering, when you need to make repairs, you forget where you made them, and then have to peer and meticulously search the walls and ceilings with a lamp to sand down the repairs so they don't show after painting?
Do you want to be sure that your employees have definitely applied at least 3 coats of plaster, without the need for constant supervision?
Plastering is the most labor-intensive and expensive part of drywall work. At this stage of the process, your performance begins to be evaluated. Quality is put to the test, whether by your direct employer or directly by the investor.
In this article, I will share a small trick on how to optimize and simplify your work. To save effort and shorten operations in preparing perfect walls and ceilings, as well as to have time for more pleasant and important activities for you. You will no longer need to keep track of where plaster has been applied and where it hasn't. With this tactic, you won't have to remember, because our brain is not made to remember, but to think. You won't have to draw with a pencil after every repair, which is another annoying operation.
As you know, when plastering with a single material (especially on a large site with many workers and tight deadlines) it is very difficult to remember and keep track of where plaster has been applied and where repairs have been made. To ensure that the entire area to be plastered has been treated, you can color the plaster for each coat with a different color. You can use latex paint tint.
The use of tint initially leads to better quality control of the finish. You increase your productivity at every step of the way. With colored plaster, you will be able to track every last plastered spot on the wall/ceiling. Easily see where you have worked and which areas still need attention. Being able to quickly see areas for repairs means a better finished surface with less time and effort invested, and this also has a financial reflection, because time is money.
When the colored plaster dries, the color lightens. When sanding, the color of the dust shows where it has been sanded, thus preventing unnecessary sanding or over-sanding. If, during sanding, you switch from one color of plaster to another, it means you have over-sanded and removed all the applied plaster from that particular coat. After sanding, the areas that retain their color indicate where additional repairs are required and where they are not. The use of tint leads to easy contrast between the individual layers (coats) of plaster on the drywall and easily and effortlessly guides the craftsman back to the areas that need to be sanded or redone without the use of special lighting.
Coloring gypsum or polymer-based joint compounds provides extreme visibility, while not affecting priming and painting. For this purpose, I recommend everyone to use quality paints that cover perfectly in 1-2 coats. Yes, they are more expensive, but you don't have to paint 4-5 coats until the paint covers and you achieve the desired color. The time you will waste on additional painting with a few more layers (coats) with cheap paints will far exceed the price difference between quality paints that cover in 2 coats and cheap ones that require 3, 4, and sometimes even 5 layers.
Coloring plaster is used to track the progress of workers and employees, for the final coat, and is a great convenience in work when repairs are needed. Coloring can be done with both dry mixes (Fugenfüller; Uniflot) and ready-mixed ones (Sheetrock).
In America, there is a separate such product, which is special and significantly more expensive compared to a regular tint that does the same job.
The first coat of plaster, also known as plastering level “Q1”, involves jointing and applying the tape. Also, covering the self-tapping screws. For the first coat of plaster, you can work without the need to color the plaster.
If you want to complete this operation 4 times faster, you can do it with the most accessible and convenient tool for quick application of paper/fiberglass tape – Delko Tools drywall banjo, instead of doing it by hand.
After the first coat dries, you can proceed to the second coat, also known as plastering level “Q2”.
For the second coat, you can add a little yellow tint to the mixture and stir well before you start plastering. This way, the yellow plaster will stand out from the white used for the first coat.
If you see an area of the walls and ceilings without yellowish plaster, it means that only the first coat has been applied there. This way, you can easily keep track of where it has been applied without having to remember.
After the second coat dries, you can proceed to the third coat of plaster, known as plastering level “Q3”.
For the third coat, you can color the white plaster by adding a little blue tint. Again, stir well and you get light blue plaster, with which you can continue your work on preparing perfectly finished walls and ceilings. With blue plaster, you will know that you need to go everywhere where you previously went with yellow plaster and only blue color should be visible. If you see any remaining yellow color anywhere, it means that the third coat with blue plaster has not been applied.
If repairs are needed on any of the specific coats, you can do them by using plaster of a different color from the base on which you will apply corrections. This way, you will see blue repairs on a yellow base and there's no way you can miss them.
After the third coat dries and sanding (if necessary), you can proceed to the fourth coat, also known as plastering level “Q4”. According to European standards, this is the highest and highest quality level of plastering and represents complete plastering of the surface. This coat can be done with uncolored - white material, which will cover and erase the previous colors after it dries. After it dries, you can sand, dust, prime and paint.
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