Quote:
Originally Posted by William
I know, and then there is the whole thing about going down the street to the horse farm and getting some hair. I mean, how much do you mix in and what's the best way to get enough without getting kicked or shot at with rock salt???
T&G is looking better right now...
William |
Modern plaster isn't quite the horsehair story any longer. Synthetic based plasters don't crack like the old stuff (the horsehair was just to keep the ceiling from showering down bits of plaster on you all the time as it crazed. And they are much more adhesive as well (traditional plaster pretty much stuck by virtue of whatever you put on the surface such as chicken wire that created a keyhole locking effect.
You probably don't want to do anything on your ceiling. T&G (having done it a number of times) will drive you nuts as well. Even if you acclimatize the boards perfectly, precoat them, and then trim boards to fit, you'll still have gaps develop almost immediately. And unless you go with big T&G boards (not the small stuff they often call wainscoting), you'll basically be face-nailing it so it'll crack and do other weird stuff on you. If you do T&G and paint it dark it won't show most of the problems, but it'll never be as pretty as it looks in the Martha Stewart magazine on your coffee table. You have a house that's .. what? ... 250 years old? go authentic. I'd consider doing something like shiplap cypress boards. Face nail them and clear coat them before installing. The boards will darken a bit naturally and the fairly intense grain will obscure any issues. Or buy a couple router bits or a dado blade and shiplap a bunch of 4/4 cherry. Install it completely unfinished. It'll age and acquire a patina as well, and won't look like Laura Ashley designed the room. You could get the boards roughsawn as well and install them that way -- cheaper and still get that beautiful patinated look pretty quickly.
You do have a pneumatic or cordless finish nailer, don't you?