Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The wonder of modern drywall

worksinprogress.news

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 277 posts

Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#91

Post by andwur »

KevinMS wrote: post #57

> Because drywall is a dense and uniform mixture, hanging anything off the wall (from pictures to heavier items like shelves, TVs, or even cabinetry) is a trivial exercise, either a simple nail for a small frame, plaster anchors for medium loads, or toggle bolts for the real heavy hitters. yikes

That's inaccurate for standard thickness drywall sheet, which is usually a 20kg maximum parallel load (e.g. vertical for a wall) regardless of fixing method. Orthogonal load is even less. You might be able to attach a TV or cabinet but it would definitely not be safe, any additional weight or dynamic load would quite likely rip it off the wall with no warning.

The recommended approach for anything with moderate weight or above is to anchor to the studs and never rely on the drywall itself for retention.

Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#92

Post by joeblubaugh »

xnx wrote: post #47
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…

Do picture rails work for gallery walls (clusters of frames)?

Yes - you can hang multiple hooks per line. You can use more lines.

I was at the Rijksmuseum recently and they use a wire system like this for all manner of configurations

Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#93

Post by BadBadJellyBean »

rootusrootus wrote: post #69
BadBadJellyBean wrote: post #67

As a German I always found North American houses and their drywall and wood constructions incredibly odd. It always felt flimsy to me. From my experience we just started using drywall for some interior walls on some newly built homes. But throughout my life I was used to very massive walls. I recently saw some house building videos and it is somehow fascinating how different the building materials and methodologies a…

I think it's just what you get used to. Every method has ups and downs. And different regions are going to gravitate to different materials based on availability (for example, my Indian coworkers just cannot fathom why we would ever build houses from trees instead of reinforced concrete; doesn't it rot?!!). I don't think of the walls as especially flimsy, though. Built correctly, they are totally fine. Yes you can pu…

> Yes you can punch a hole in one if you are sufficiently motivated

This is what I meant with "flimsy". If I hit my wall my hand breaks. But as I said It seems to work. I am just used to the massive nature of our houses and I admit a part of me prefers it that way but I don't think it's the one true way.

Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#94

Post by lostlogin »

rootusrootus wrote: post #69
BadBadJellyBean wrote: post #67

As a German I always found North American houses and their drywall and wood constructions incredibly odd. It always felt flimsy to me. From my experience we just started using drywall for some interior walls on some newly built homes. But throughout my life I was used to very massive walls. I recently saw some house building videos and it is somehow fascinating how different the building materials and methodologies a…

I think it's just what you get used to. Every method has ups and downs. And different regions are going to gravitate to different materials based on availability (for example, my Indian coworkers just cannot fathom why we would ever build houses from trees instead of reinforced concrete; doesn't it rot?!!). I don't think of the walls as especially flimsy, though. Built correctly, they are totally fine. Yes you can pu…

> why we would ever build houses from trees instead of reinforced concrete

Earthquakes are a factor where we are, but also, if NZ can find a way to do something cheaper, we will always do it. Quality be damned.

Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#95

Post by MisterTea »

jf___ wrote: post #41

A huge share of the gypsum used in drywall is *synthetic gypsum* — a byproduct of flue-gas desulfurization (FGD) at coal-fired power plants. When SO₂ is scrubbed from exhaust using limestone, the reaction produces calcium sulfate dihydrate, chemically identical to mined gypsum. In the US, FGD gypsum has accounted for roughly half of all gypsum consumed by the wallboard industry at its peak. The "cheap, uniform, and f…

> the "wonder" of drywall is entangled with the fossil fuel economy in a way that makes earth-based construction methods look increasingly attractive as that supply chain unwinds.

I keep thinking of that scene in Brazil where the hero, Harry Tuttle, opens a modular wall panel in Sam's apartment.

We standardized on 16 inch stud spacing here in the US a long time ago when we likely still used cement with a plaster skim coat on wood lath. Cutting up a board of nearly the same stuff feels primitive. You have to break open the wall to fix things.

To me the next logical step is a standard for modular walls that are laid out on a grid structure. I get that no one wants exposed screw holes but I can think of ways to hide them or make them part of a decorative pattern to blend them in. The coverings would be made to be cut to size as well. Wall panels would have to be environmentally friendly so wood is a first choice in natural and/or composite forms.

If you think this will look boxy then look up the passive house and notes on home building. Homes with a winding structure are difficult to seal reliably and roof so a boxy home is actually more economically friendly in terms of insulation to reduce HVAC energy consumption.

Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#96

Post by BadBadJellyBean »

woodpanel wrote: post #89
BadBadJellyBean wrote: post #67

As a German I always found North American houses and their drywall and wood constructions incredibly odd. It always felt flimsy to me. From my experience we just started using drywall for some interior walls on some newly built homes. But throughout my life I was used to very massive walls. I recently saw some house building videos and it is somehow fascinating how different the building materials and methodologies a…

As a German I have to admit we are culturally odd with this. Our houses are way too over constructed and the dry-wall stigma here is just one aspect of it, wood construction stigma is another. It thus is no wonder that Americans have way more affordable housing. Those stigmas are also odd for most of our heritage-like old towns that are full of still-intact "Fachwerk"-Wooden-Constructions - which basically use the sa…

Stein auf Stein, Brick on Brick. It's what makes the German feel safe. It will last forever. I will break everything but the walls if I hit them. I need heavy machinery to put a screw into the wall. It feels right for the German. Wooden houses are for eccentric people with too much money for a disposable house.

As much as I don't want to be a stereotypical German thick walls feel right to me. But I honestly don't think that our building style is the true one. It is just what I am used to.

Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#97

Post by amluto »

nkurz wrote: post #72
rootusrootus wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably 99% of all drywall in the US is not painted directly, either. It is textured [0]. I'll go out on a limb and say that a substantial majority these days are orange peel texture on the walls and knockdown on the ceiling, made primarily with drywall mud (Artex seems to be essentially the same thing). I'm not sure I would want a plaster skim in any case. I grew up in a house built in 1914 that had lath & plaster,…

> Probably 99% of all drywall in the US is not painted directly, either. I'm not sure about the exact numbers, but I'm pretty certain this is a vast overestimate. I've painted a more than average number of interior walls in the US (both personally and professionally) and except for a few that were wood, adobe, or lath and plaster, all the rest involved painting directly on drywall. Sometimes the base paint was applie…

“Level 5” drywall has a skim coat of plaster over it. It’s very common.

Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#98

Post by trollbridge »

driscoll42 wrote: post #85
jf___ wrote: post #41

A huge share of the gypsum used in drywall is *synthetic gypsum* — a byproduct of flue-gas desulfurization (FGD) at coal-fired power plants. When SO₂ is scrubbed from exhaust using limestone, the reaction produces calcium sulfate dihydrate, chemically identical to mined gypsum. In the US, FGD gypsum has accounted for roughly half of all gypsum consumed by the wallboard industry at its peak. The "cheap, uniform, and f…

I used to work for a drywall manufacturer who still owned their own mines despite efforts to divest from them by some. They always viewed it as a structural advantage to still own them and not be wholly dependent on the coal plants (which effectively have conveyor belts going from the coal plants to the wallboard plants). I imagine as time goes on it'll become even more of an advantage for them to still own those min…

Or AI’s thirst for power will bring coal back.

Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#99

Post by willis936 »

jf___ wrote: post #41

A huge share of the gypsum used in drywall is *synthetic gypsum* — a byproduct of flue-gas desulfurization (FGD) at coal-fired power plants. When SO₂ is scrubbed from exhaust using limestone, the reaction produces calcium sulfate dihydrate, chemically identical to mined gypsum. In the US, FGD gypsum has accounted for roughly half of all gypsum consumed by the wallboard industry at its peak. The "cheap, uniform, and f…

This reminds me a bit of Hank Green's recent video on why we don't recycle plastic. The answer is we frack a lot of methane for electricity and ethane is a byporoduct of that. You can flare it off or use it as a negative cost ingredient for polyethane / many other plastics. As long as we're using lots of fossil fuels the byproducts will be cheap. Anyone who has played gregtech or factorio or similar already has an intuition for this. The answer then becomes simple: if you want less plastic you must use less fossil fuel. They are one and the same.

https://youtu.be/325HdQe4WM4

Re: The wonder of modern drywall

#100

Post by amluto »

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #62
franktankbank wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you find yourself a lath? Try once if it doesn't hit then move up/down a 3/4 inch.

You can see it on a thermal camera with a high resolution sensor from China (not the ITAR limited US tech).

Got a link? This sounds handy.
Post reply on HN