I have stripped wallpaper using my steam stripper loads of times but today I
have been doing a neighbour's room and had to stop after several areas of
the skim coat cracked and bulged forwards. Presumably there was air under
the skim coat and the heat from the steam caused the air to expand and blow
the plaster. The house looks about 30 years old. Was this due to poor
plaster or plastering? I didn't leave the stripper plate on one spot for too
long, and some of the plaster cracked after only a few seconds of steam.

In article ,
"Phil Anthropist" writes:
I have stripped wallpaper using my steam stripper loads of times but today I
have been doing a neighbour's room and had to stop after several areas of
the skim coat cracked and bulged forwards. Presumably there was air under
the skim coat and the heat from the steam caused the air to expand and blow
the plaster. The house looks about 30 years old. Was this due to poor
plaster or plastering? I didn't leave the stripper plate on one spot for too
long, and some of the plaster cracked after only a few seconds of steam.

Was the wall damp? The stripper will cause moisture
in the wall to boil, which might blow the plaster.

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]

"Andrew Gabriel" wrote:

Was the wall damp? The stripper will cause moisture
in the wall to boil, which might blow the plaster.

No, dry as a bone, the lowest areas are at knee height but most of the blown
areas are at chest, shoulders and head height (I am 6'2"), which I assume
would exclude rising damp. The affected walls are internal walls in the
ground floor stairwell and entrance hall which I doubt would be subject to
condensation, and I can't see any evidence of damp from any other source
such as a leaking pipe. The blown areas vary in size from a saucer to a
dinner plate, some larger areas are about the size of 3 or 4 saucers. I got
the impression that the lady who owns this house anticipated there might be
problems; she didn't seem surprised by what happened, and she wasn't in the
least curious as to why. Strange!