Catastrophic Water Break in Attic

Kivaro

Hello Folks.
I'm out foreign at the moment so I have to deal with a disastereous water break in the attic. Don't know how long that the water was pouring out of the burst pipes but according to the assessor, everything has to be taken down internally in a fairly new bungalow house.

The house is timber frame, so my question revolves around putting back the walls and ceilings. After gutting the house, and using dehumidifiers for a couple of weeks; can you put back plasterboard and skim the joints and screws? E.g. in the States, we can install finished sheetrock and paint directly over the sheetrock (after doing the joints and screws). I'm being told that I have to put up the plasterboard and then plaster the whole house (ceilings and walls), which is a big expense.

The plumbing has been fixed and an electrician has made the house safe for the work to be carried out.
Any other advice would be gratefully accepted.
Thanks.

items

Sorry to hear about attic. Its fine to just tape joints and skim over joint & screw, special type compound for it. Maybe the person / persons suggested plaster due to moisture, if you've still got some moisture in house then you might have issues with rust leaving stains @ screw location.

If house is bone dry (woodwork) then by all means just tape and skim, plenty of experienced people out there, most timber frames have no plaster so its not like tape and skim is a new concept.

mossie110

sounds like that someone is trying make money out off you :mad:.
you dont need to plaster the whole room, it is perfectly fine to tape the joints and skim with a good joint compound usual two coat, plaster board has two sides one for full coat plaster and one for just skimming the joints. once your happy that your home is fully dry, slab away and tape and skim the joints and the screws. and then happy sanding
good luck, and sorry for you trouble.
mossie

Kivaro

Thanks for the feedback lads.
Since I'm away from the country, it's hard to organize everything but the only sticking point in my rebuilding plan was the plaster issue.
Is there any special plasterboard required where I can do the tape and skim, or is the generic board sufficient?
Unfortunately, I"m told that the walls in the bathrooms are saturated, which means that the all the tiles (and the walls) will have to be torn down and replaced. I thought that the plasterboard in these rooms would have been waterproofed (and there was no ply board back used).

'Items' made a good point about the possibility of the screws rusting if the house is not completely dried out, so I'll make sure that this is the case.

DublinDilbert

The good thing with this type of flooding is that it will typically only have effected parts of a couple of rooms max and the water is clean. Get a relation to go up and take a few digital photos to get an idea of the damage.

The water will have taken the shortest path out you'll probably get away with cutting out the damp plaster board & patching the ceilings etc after. It may also have run down an internal wall, so if its plaster board just take out the sheet(s) & replace.

I would cut out any damp plaster board and dehumidify and see how it is after a couple of weeks.

Davy

Kivaro wrote: »

Is there any special plasterboard required where I can do the tape and skim, or is the generic board sufficient?
Unfortunately, I"m told that the walls in the bathrooms are saturated, which means that the all the tiles (and the walls) will have to be torn down and replaced. I thought that the plasterboard in these rooms would have been waterproofed (and there was no ply board back used).

The normal stuff is fine ye.

For bathrooms their is a different type, its a moisture board, but it wouldn't withstand running water like this. Its not waterproof.

Kivaro

DublinDilbert wrote: »

The good thing with this type of flooding is that it will typically only have effected parts of a couple of rooms max and the water is clean. Get a relation to go up and take a few digital photos to get an idea of the damage.

The water will have taken the shortest path out you'll probably get away with cutting out the damp plaster board & patching the ceilings etc after. It may also have run down an internal wall, so if its plaster board just take out the sheet(s) & replace.

I would cut out any damp plaster board and dehumidify and see how it is after a couple of weeks.

Oh, I saw the pictures. It ain't pretty. Water was flowing down the hallway and out the electrical sockets. There were multiple breaks in the attic, with some within the insulation itself. I thought that we could 'cut' and 'replace' the damaged board, but apparently the damage is so extensive, everything has to be taken down. I was told that it was not worth the hassle of cutting around the boards that 'might' be dry as more work would be required using this strategy. I tend to agree with that argument.

Davy: that's what I thought about the bathroom. I had a friend make a hole from the room on the other side of the tiled shower and the plasterboard was saturated.