Remodeling my home and I currently have what 1 painter called "hard stucco." It's the hard popcorn ceiling. I had the whole house tested for asbestos and there is 3% asbestos (EPA requirement is 1% or less per 1 other contractor) in the popcorn ceiling. The 3 options I have been told are:

1.) Asbestos abatement and paint - Licensed asbestos contractor will ask for me to move out for 2 nights and will scrape the ceilings whilst blowers are expelling any flying debris to the outdoors. Then a painter would come in and patch and paint the ceiling. The walls would need to be repainted too as the asbestos contractor said there is usually marring of the wall paint after they do the work/take down the plastic sheets, etc. I think this may be the most costly and would require me to move out for 2 days.
2.) Drywall and paint - A painter said they would come in and add a half inch drywall to the ceiling and then paint. My boss had this done at his house and over time, the drywall sagged. I shared this with the painter and he painter said it was because it wasn't done very well.
3.) Plaster and paint - A painter said they would come in and plaster over the popcorn. Wait a few days to dry and then come back and re-plaster on top of that and then paint. Another contractor who came to look at the home for other work said it was their suggestion to go plaster over drywall if it were up to them. (By the way, this contractor doesn't do the popcorn ceiling smoothing so I thought this was an honest assessment since they had no skin in the game.)

My buddy said plaster (option 3) could allow for cracks in the ceiling. Is this true? Or is this true regardless of surface (e.g., plaster, drywall, or abatement and paint)? There currently is a ceiling crack in the living room in the ceiling but the popcorn hides it well and you have to really look for it.

So what's the best option? This will be my last home so even if it costs more and takes more time, I want to do it right. However, if it's 6 of 1, half dozen of another, I'd rather go with easier and cheaper.

Thanks in advance.

I'd suck it up and get it removed.

We will be gutting and renovating a 1950's kitchen in the future and I dread what will be found when it comes to asbestos. I think it may be in or under the linoleum floor there.

I’d do #2 or #3.

Either put new drywall up, or skim coat the heck out of it to make it smooth.

There won’t be cracks if you do coat it. The home we moved into has textured wallpaper...everywhere, EVEN THE CEILINGS!

Removing the three layers of paper wasn’t an option without seriously damaging the drywall. So in the rooms where I didn’t want to gut or cover with new drywall, I put a few coats of spackle all over the textured paper, sanded it, and painted it. 5 years later it still looks perfect and has no cracks. I did it myself and it was super dusty, as you could imagine, but it worked.

But honestly, to do it the right way, and the easiest would be to remove the drywall from the ceiling and put up new or just cover it up with new drywall over the existing ceiling.

Did you get a quote for a full ceiling replacement since this is your forever home? You can also add recessed ceiling lights or whatever while you're at it.

Removal of the popcorn, or removal of the ceiling and new drywall are your 2 only good options. If you don't want to do those, have the ceiling sprayed with a good primer/sealer and paint.

They do popcorn removal here, and while messy it's relatively easy and generally it all falls on the floor, not too much dust flying around as it's wet. They spray it with water from pump up spray bottles, and when saturated enough it peels off relatively easy with scrapers. Then they smear a coat of, I forgot the name of it skimcoat (onecoat might be the brand) filler, then primer and paint...….

quote:

Originally posted by ergoproxy:
Did you get a quote for a full ceiling replacement since this is your forever home? You can also add recessed ceiling lights or whatever while you're at it.

This^^^^^

The others are all hacks, IMO. They may be successful hacks, if done correctly, but they'll still be hacks.

Furthermore, as ergoproxy mentioned: Having the existing ceiling ripped-out and replaced gives you the opportunity to upgrade the lighting.

Someday before too long we'll be gutting and modernizing our family room. I'm arguing for a ceiling replacement. I want to add wiring for back channel speakers for 7.1 surround and update the ceiling lighting.

Fortunately my linoleum floors had zero asbestos. I'm remodeling the entire house.

I already had the recessed lights put in a couple weeks ago. So now I want to smooth out the ceiling.

This is good feedback. Thanks folks. I was leaning more towards the plaster and then plaster again after a few days to make it smooth.

And this is "sprayed on acoustic" so it's hard and intact vs. the loose popcorn. So I feel good that it won't be everywhere when they plaster.

My home had spray on "popcorn" ceilings in the bedrooms when I purchased it. When I remodeled it, I wanted to remove the "popcorn". It is a piece of cake!! Soak it with water via a sprayer, and a putty knife will remove it lickey split!! It is soaked with water, and there is nothing airborne. The drywall ceiling is then ready to paint.

If you don't want to do it yourself, then you will have to hire someone.



EDIT: I see that you live in Calif., so all bets are off!!

quote:

Originally posted by GT-40DOC:
My home had spray on "popcorn" ceilings in the bedrooms when I purchased it. When I remodeled it, I wanted to remove the "popcorn". It is a piece of cake!! Soak it with water via a sprayer, and a putty knife will remove it lickey split!! It is soaked with water, and there is nothing airborne. The drywall ceiling is then ready to paint.

If you don't want to do it yourself, then you will have to hire someone.



EDIT: I see that you live in Calif., so all bets are off!!

We did two rooms ourselves in CA, just as you described. Remove or cover all the furniture, cover the floors/furniture with plastic drop cloth, spray and scrape. Then fold up the drop cloth with all the popcorn, put it in large heavy garbage bags, take it to the local haz-mat location (check with the county first to find their rules on how to bag, how much you can take in a day). Not hard, for us one tenth the cost of hiring people to come in and do it. Do wear a face mask and goggles, maybe disposable painting coveralls.

was it the loose popcorn or was it the hard acoustic spray? cuz the contractors i talked to said this is not a scrape job....except for the asbestos guys...they opted to scrape

quote:

Originally posted by shoupdawg:
was it the loose popcorn or was it the hard acoustic spray? cuz the contractors i talked to said this is not a scrape job....except for the asbestos guys...they opted to scrape

I think prob the loose popcorn, the house was built around 1964. Maybe find a corner, spray it down, use a scraper to see how easily it comes off.

Here is a video I found when I googled acoustic ceiling spray.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ktO8VMdH_04

Being in CA I WOULD NOT DO REMOVAL.

There is a homeowner exemption of doing the work yourself. but you can not hire someone it gets crazy,

There is an exemption that applies only to the legal owner of the single unit family
dwelling (house) who is a permanent resident of this house and is personally
performing this house renovation themselves (not employing a contractor or
laborer, and not being helped by friends, family or anyone else). See Rule 1403
(j)(9)

Almost anyplace else I might give other advice.

My advice is blue board and plaster over it.

It should be the quickest and cheapest way to get it done.

A good blue board and plaster ceiling job should take one to two days at most.

If the blue board is installed correctly it will never sag.

Here is a link to the CA law

http://www.aqmd.gov/docs/defau...-asked-questions.pdf

Had the same issue when taking down some old wooden fixtures attached to the ceiling around the upstairs windows in my house. The ceiling was of a pattern done by creating swirls with a small wisk broom though. I took it all down, rented a indoor drywall hoist and put up a new ceiling. Took a weekend.

Had the same issue when taking down some old wooden fixtures attached to the ceiling around the upstairs windows in my house. The ceiling was of a pattern done by creating swirls with a small wisk broom though and couldn't be repaired or replicated. I took it all down, rented a indoor drywall hoist and put up a new ceiling. Took a weekend.

We inherited my mother in laws house in Kansas City and she had popcorn ceilings. We tried the scrape thing but it was going to take way too long since we could only spend three or four days at a time working on the house. (We live out of state) We finally hired a pro to scrape and it turned out great. I think the total bill was about $2500. Well worth the money IMHO but again, we couldn't spend the time needed for the task.

My kitchen here had it originally. Like others have said it came off super easy with a wide putty knife after a soaking with water via spray bottle. Keep it wet and you won’t get any airborne particles.

This is acoustic plaster, not "popcorn" sprayed over drywall. It won't come off just by spraying a bit of water on it and scraping it off.

This is per one of the painters that came to give me a quote.

So far, I think I'm leaning towards re-plastering it.

I’d have it professionally removed to include the drywall. And I’d add some pot lights while it’s opened up.

quote:

Originally posted by shoupdawg:
This is acoustic plaster, not "popcorn" sprayed over drywall. It won't come off just by spraying a bit of water on it and scraping it off.

This is per one of the painters that came to give me a quote.

Guess what? He lied to you. They do that. It’s the same thing. Do your own research if you don’t believe me.

What is on the back side of the ceiling? Do you have attic insulation? If it bats, or loose blown cellulose or fiberglass. If the latter is the case, it would make a HUGE mess taking the ceiling down and putting new drywall up and you'd have to figure in the cost of re-insulating the ceiling.

If you are 100% sure you are doing something with the popcorn ceiling in the immediate future. Take a $20 1 gallon pump up bottle from lowe's or even an empty windex bottle and put water in it and saturate a small area of the popcorn ceiling really well, let it sit 15 mins and take a sharp putty knife at a 20 degree angle and see how hard the popcorn comes off, my guess is it will fall right off.