In article 9CI2c.1869$re1.1131@newsfe1-win,
"Jon W" writes:

"Michael McNeil" wrote in message
news:66548b8d10458b987c3878bcf2113f0e.45219@mygate .mailgate.org...

What I would suggest for a complete novice is to clear out a room not in
much use or out of the way and practice there with a miture of sand and
lime. A garage wall with interior corners would be ideal.

Use 5 parts brick sand to 1 part lime. You only need one mix to

It's called Training mix, or Student Mix.

play with all day as it can be scraped off and remixed until you are
confident.

It does require the wall to be dry to absorb the moisture from the
training mix. Well, you wet the surface in the usual way, but the
bulk of the wall must be dry as it needs to absorb the moisture from
the training mix to give the effect of it 'going off'. This means you
cannot immediately reuse an area of wall after you scraped off the
training mix. Also, I would not repeatedly do this on modern thermal
blocks -- they expand when they get wet and you might damage the
structure of the wall. Don't leave it on for more than a couple of
days or it really will start setting -- lime does set, but slowly.

(I suggest brick sand to play with, the ideal rendering is
plastering sand. It's not so common in use now with plasterboarding &
etc.)

Keep the floor clean to allow the mess to be picked up sans
big debris. The main trick to get just before starting is to play with
the hawk and trowel for a while. I suggest you mix a shovelful and mess
around with that for a few minutes first. Getting that poised transfer
from hawk to trowel is half the job.

I just recently posted on how to handle plaster between board,
hawk, and trowel. Sand and cement (or sand and lime in this case) is
the same as plaster scratch coat for this purpose.

Cheers Michael,

I'll do as suggested and experiment in the garage. I have tried plastering
before, but I was using a poor quality trowel/float and home made hawk. To

The best trowel is an old one, providing the long edges are straight.
If they have any nicks in them, polish those out on a house brick.
A new trowel is very difficult to use as it will have sharp edges and
very sharp corners, and won't have developed a nice spring yet. Again,
you can grind the edges/corners down a bit on a house brick before you
start. Historically, when a plasterer bought a new trowel, he would
start by lending it to a renderer for a few weeks. Using it with sand
would take off all the new sharp edges/corners and make it much more
suitable for plastering.

say it was a stressful experience would be a huge understatement. However I
am now 5 years older and hopefully a lot wiser/experienced so I'm prepared
to give it another go.

If the old plaster is still well bound to the wall is it ok to pva the walls
and then skim a new top surface,

Yes.

or should I scratch a key and then skim a
new top surface, or worse still do I have to hack the old stuff off?

No.

--
Andrew Gabriel