Patching render advice

Posted on doityourself.com, by the editor of NPA.

Hi, I just wanted to share this tip with everyone. (If you don’t me, I’m A "limey", here in the UK (!!!) but I have a great interest in the usa and wish I lived there instead of England which is awful! anyway.....................)

When repairing an exterior wall that has an existing surface of sand and cement render (I don’t know if you guys call it stucco??) Don’t know if that’s the same thing, answers please??! :)

ANYWAY, LETS SAY YOU HAVE REMOVED AN OLD WINDOW, and you blocked it up, great, that’s all sorted, but you have an awful and uneven patch. Next (and make sure there is a sufficient indent between the new blocks that filled the hole and the existing render (stucco?), lets says about 5 mm.

Then mix up a sand and cement mix to a workable consistency. Mix some pva with some water and paint it on the blocks,.

Then lay up your cement mix with a hawk and trowel (do you call those tools that in the USA) to a skim of about 2.5 mm.

Allow to cure, but not hard, depends on your climate as to how long that will take, and scratch lines gently in the patched up area.

Then allow to dry further, then lay up your topcoat, making sure its all even, and the skim should protrude ever so slightly, about 1mm outside the area, allowing for the concrete/render to shrink as it dries out.

BEFORE it dries, start to smooth it out with a plasterers "float"

(Hey I am having trouble with the terminology!!!!!!! Can anyone there point me in the direction of a dictionary or whatever of tools in the USA as I think we call things different names here (we use the QUEENS English old chap!!!)

So, you now have your hole blocked up, and 2 coats of render on it. Now you have gently smoothed it out using broad circular motions, you need to make sure that when you paint over the wall section (and don’t paint the blocked up bit only, do the whole wall and you wont be able to see it when you stand back and admire it), you need to smooth it out even more, and that’s where the trick comes in.........

Get a household sponge, the sort of thing you would clean your car with.

Wet it, and wring it out, but make sure its not dry, just ever so slightly damp. Then using the same circular motions as mentioned above, gently smooth over the new rendered area, paying attention to the edges where the new , still un-cured, render meets the existing wall surface.

Keep doing that, but ever so gently and you will get a nice smooth finish, with no protruding edges to see.

Then allow to fully dry. Come back a day later, paint a stabilizer onto it, allow to dry. Then paint the whole section of that wall, with 2 coats of good quality paint.

DONT CHOOSE THE CHEAP PAINT

You will then stand back and look at your wall and if you have followed the above, you wont know where your old door or window use to be!

Any problems, see me after school!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Can anyone help me with USA construction terminology????

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