I’ll give you a little tip, add some dishsoap to the mud it will make it a bit more smooth.
I just finished finishing my basement, not quite as big as yours but I finished off 600sqft, the remainder was laundry, workshop and storage. This thread made me happy I don’t have to go home and finish drywall tonight.
Not to discount anyone else’s mud comments on here but in my experience (and I am not a career drywaller) I use general purpose to avoid the time and aggravation of mixing, when I have job large enough and drying time is not necessarily a concern. I’ve come to appreciate the LaFarge with the green top available at Lowe’s. It’s incredibly smooth and works well. If I were to go with a bag mix product, I would only use 90 minute. I only used 20 for small areas that I needed to set up rapidly.
Thumbs up… makes me want to build stuff. :lol:
Mixing sucks because you’re eventually going to get dry bits that get stuck in the mud and drag thru your compound
The quicker the set, the more it sands like shit if you don’t coat it perfect
We generally use green all purpose or green lightweight if we don’t need to do 2 coats in 1 day. The light weight is nice because the bucket is half the weight lol. And if you do it later in the day it will generally always be ready to sand in the morning
I just used 2 of those Green Top’s from Lowes the other day. Had to mud a room about 16x24 worked great and with 2 of us doing it mudded once, then almost by the time we were done went a 2nd round and boom done
I used a lot of the green stuff from Lowes.
Like, 10 times as much as a professional would have used. Don’t know how many times i filled the shop vac sanding that shit down to get it smooth.
God I suck at drywall mudding. Luckily drywall finishing is one of those things that you can substitute 10x the effort for skill and still come out with a really good looking finish work. I get lots of compliments on the corners and ceiling joints on the bathroom I did. If only they knew how many hours of sanding and pounds of dust came out of that job.
Yes I have a bucket of green top but had a few bags of 20 left over so just using what I had left. It definitely mixed up well but did dry fast, only mixed enough I knew I could use at a time. Once the 20 is gone, cracking the green top.
Learned long ago, less is best with compound…don’t sludge it on.
Yea if you slop it up you’re gonna have a bad time. You’re better off putting a lot of coats on instead of sanding
Usually 2 coats is almost finished and the 3rd coat is just touch up and finish corners
You should have it smooth enough in between coats where you only have to do light sanding and scraping with a knife. A pole sander is much nicer to use for this.
I just did 40 sheets with 2 buckets of green top and 1 bucket of lightweight.
Looking forward to more photos!
This is great man, nice work. One of the better thought out ones i’ve seen.
Back at it…
Took some time off, was out of town for work and my 3 yr old son had pneumonia.
All holes coated twice, all tape is done and first coat applied. Second and skim to go and then onto paint and floor, can’t wait.
I do not envy the stage you’re in now…but it looks great so far!
I’m in this same stage with my project, it sucks lol
Looks good. Double check your coverage at the tapered factory seams (walls and ceilings). Looks a little light. take a 10-12" drywall knife and hold it across the seam at a 90 degree angle and look for any light penetration under the knife edge. If it’s not a new drywall knife, be careful the edge hasn’t been worn to a curve and giving you a false reading. Now’s the time to correct it before paint, if necessary.
Those pics were mid-day on Saturday, all seams now have 12" coverage. Smaller seams you saw were initial tape coverage waiting for 1st coat.
Drywall is definitely an art, I’m good with filling holes and smaller jobs but this is largest by far. My good friend makes it look like a 4 yr old could do it, truly amazing talent when you know what you are doing.
Looking good.
:tup:
x2^
10 bags of durabond, a 5-gallon bucket of premix to skim…add in two good friends and some cases of beer and you get shit done
Drywall done and ready for paint, then onto the flooring.
Nice !
How’s the dust Lol
Pretty much non-existent. Between a perfect skim and that water/sanding system I used, it really cuts 95% of the dust.
Just changed the water a “few” times…lol.