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The wonder of modern drywall

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Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#31

Post by littlestymaar »

aaronbrethorst wrote: post #9

Picture rails are a kitschy and twee feature that few people today even know their purpose, but anyone who tells you that they’re just as good for hanging things on are committing perjury In my humble opinion, they are significantly better than pounding a nail into drywall. Of course, I also have an absurdly large collection of framed photographs and other art, all of varying sizes, and I love swapping frames around…

And the author completely misses the point thinking it's somehow mandatory in plaster walls, when it's just a convenience thing that avoids making holes in the plaster…

Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#32

Post by globular-toast »

esseph wrote: post #6
grebc wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cheaper than building them behind concrete or brick.

I think the question is: why are they behind anything to begin with? Conduit all the things and paint to match?

People prefer how it looks and it's also more convenient to have a square room and no irregular protrusions stopping you pushing furniture up against the wall.

In the UK it used to be common for pipework to be exposed and painted. Electrical conduit is pretty common in "industrial" places like garages but the number of sockets people expect now would mean you'd barely have a flat wall anywhere.

The current preference is definitely for clean looking, square rooms. When pipes don't fit in the walls themselves, like soil pipes or around boilers, they are boxed in or hidden away in a cupboard.

Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#33

Post by asdff »

> It’s impossible to mount even lightweight items such as picture frames onto the wall, because even the tiniest hole from nails or the like would crumble and erode into dust.

The trick for this is to just find the stud. Same thing you'd have to do in drywall. For light stuff like photos, you can get away with putting a nail right into the lathe without having to find a stud. If you miss the lathe (you can tell) just move the nail up a half inch.

Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#34

Post by asdff »

kmoser wrote: post #28
MarkMarine wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Drywall is trivial to remove and repair, I have no issue cutting walls with a circular saw or vibrating cutter to get access then patching it. I have seen another method for making walls that were accessible though, from a homesteader/ hand tool woodworker and carpenter. His walls were 24” thick with huge areas for piping and electrical and had 4x4’ removable wood panels. https://youtu.be/8fdm9R1Cbm0?si=9SRXgcdutos-h…

I wouldn't call it trivial. First you have to determine where to cut it; if you cut the wrong area you have to cut again. All the steps in repairing it either take time, are messy, or require some skill, and the time adds up (e.g. waiting for the patch to dry before you can sand; waiting for the primer to dry before you can paint; etc.). And then you have to match the surrounding paint, which is all but impossible si…

The thing is you might not need to access your electric or plumbing for like 100 years. You do get a panel where access is presumably on a more regular schedule: usually the shower hookups are accessible from a closet.

Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#35

Post by asdff »

enobrev wrote: post #19
accrual wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't call it easy, but it's conceptually simple to cut a square hole in some drywall to access behind it, and then pop the piece back in with screws, mud, and tape, then paint.

For sure. I've wired my old house with speakers in every ceiling, and cat-6 in every room. I've had a small pipe burst and a couple leaks behind a bathroom. I've patched quite a bit of drywall, and I'm about mediocre at it. But it seems so silly and unnecessary to me. Everything else in this world that requires maintenance comes with access panels and other means of easy access. In our living spaces, some of which sh…

If you think the drywall access situation is bad, don't start working on your cars.

Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#36

Post by mlyle »

XorNot wrote: post #17
mlyle wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the alternative, though? Removable panels will be more expensive, and troublesome in various ways. Drywall is not too bad to deal with. And 99% of the wall surface doesn't need to be opened for a -long- time.

Mass production should be able to make this standard. Walls don't vary that much. Personally I've been printing snap in access panels whenever I have to get into a wall these days - in white PETG they pretty much disappear into the wall for me.

Odds are you are compromising the fire safety of your residence by doing this.

Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#37

Post by asdff »

MarkMarine wrote: post #22

I think this misses the beauty of a plaster wall. Level 5 drywall has nothing on a skilled artisan with plaster, and yeah you can’t hang things through it but it also lasts hundreds of years. My walls are 120 years old and robust, the kids haven’t damaged them and they’ve more than held up.

You can hang things through it just as easy as drywall too. Light stuff just put it right into the lathe. Heavy stuff, with both types of walls you are going to want to anchor into a stud.

Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#38

Post by asdff »

valleyer wrote: post #23
dathanb82 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And do what? Leave the ducting, pipes, and electrical lines exposed for the one time in 20 years you need to do something with them? In addition to being much more attractive than exposed infrastructure, drywall and the insulation that gets put behind it help make your house much more energy efficient.

No -- use doors.

So a bunch of doors everywhere you don't open for potentially 100 years?

Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#39

Post by epcoa »

enobrev wrote: post #3

I will never understand why we fill our walls with mechanical and electrical infrastructure and then wrap them in a paper and plaster, which then needs to be torn, broken, and repaired in order to maintain said infrastructure. Pipes will fail. Wires will fail. Ducts will fail. Maybe not in 5 years, but over the span of 20, they will. Why make them so frustratingly inaccessible?

Rarely do pipes, wires, or ducts just outright fail even in 50 years. Usual case for tearing out drywall is for voluntary renovations. Shit behind the wall just doesn't "fail" if it is left undisturbed or you were unlucky like those that got defective PEX or similar installed.

Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#40

Post by aidos »

asdff wrote: post #33

> It’s impossible to mount even lightweight items such as picture frames onto the wall, because even the tiniest hole from nails or the like would crumble and erode into dust. The trick for this is to just find the stud. Same thing you'd have to do in drywall. For light stuff like photos, you can get away with putting a nail right into the lathe without having to find a stud. If you miss the lathe (you can tell) just…

Ha! If I even look at my lath and plaster walls the wrong way a little bit crumbles away.
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