Dennis Pierce

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Last of the Plastering

This weekend my goal is to finish up all of the plastering and let that cure in preparation for painting the ceiling and wallpapering the walls. But before I do the plastering, I do one final coat of shellac on the woodwork. This involves sanding down with fine synthetic steel wool and then wiping off the dust with mineral spirits. After that dries I apply the last coat of shellac. Next up is switching over to Waterlox for the final coats.

With the woodwork protected with shellac, I do the final plastering work. On the ceiling I do some spot fixes to fill up any gashes or little divots. I use the extra fine Master of Plaster and also mix in a bit of water to get it to spread as thin as possible. For the walls, most of them are in pretty good shape, but the wall with that had the large hole repaired could use one more coat to even things out a little more. For this I do a 3rd coat of Master of Plaster, but at the regular grade because eventually the wall will get wallpaper.

Applying a 3rd coat on just this wall.

Plastering.

The wall where there was a large hole.

Still a little bump where the stove was, but good enough.

With the wall done, I then mix in some extra fine plaster and do some spot fixes on the other 3 walls where there are any imperfections. The plastering is done and on to the doors. I left last week with a coat of boiled linseed oil on the main door. I start with using some wood filler to get some of the final holes and gashes in the wood. I let this dry and then sand the repairs down. Then I do a hand touch-up of the caulked crack to try and hide the white line.

Covering up the white caulked crack before applying stain.

I use burnt umber linseed oil paint for these touch-ups and while I have the paint open, I also hit some of the lighter epoxy repairs.

Touching up the epoxy repairs.

Caulked line covered up with paint.

After the touch-up paint dries, I then apply my custom stain. Let it sit for about 15 minutes and then wipe it off with paper towels.

Stained door after wiping down.

Stained door before wiping down.

Of course I notice some issues with one side of the door. Some spots of the door are not absorbing the stain correctly. I think it’s from the wood filler I used. It may have smeared over the wood building a barrier to the stain. Looks like I’ll need to resand this side of the door and try again. Never easy with these doors.

Uneven absorbson of stain.