Popcorn Ceiling Repair

Popcorn ceiling repair is one of those things that DIYers and Handymen alike have a hard time with. Youtube and the internet can be very encouraging and motivating to take matters into your own hands.

Unfortunately, sometimes this leaves you with a bit of a disaster. Not to mention the frustration and need to find someone to fix the ceiling propely.

Jump Links
Stipple In A Can From Home Depot
How Does PatchBoyz Repair Popcorn Ceilings?
Why Do Popcorn Ceilings Exist?
Who Invented Popcorn Ceilings?

Stipple In A Can From Home Depot

You may have seen that you can buy popcorn ceiling spray, or stipple ceiling spray in a can at home-depot and tackle this yourself. Don't do it! Or, do it and keep our number handy. This would be the equivalent or worse than an auto body shop trying to match your car paint with a can of spray paint from the dollar store. Not only does the can give you very little control over the dispersement and range of the spray, it also doesn't offer different nozzles as a regular spraying machine would. I can speak for all Ottawa Drywallers when I say, we don't use it.

We've done hundreds of these repairs and on about 40% of them we have to scrape the home-owners attempt. and restart. While there's nothing wrong with giving things a try, if you value your time and don't enjoy doing this kind of thing, we suggest you save yourself a little frustration and spend that time with your family instead. Not to mention the additional time and money we must charge to scrape the initial attempt.

How Does PatchBoyz Repair Popcorn Ceilings?

Being in Ottawa, Toronto and other cities, we have to have our process down-pat to consistently deliver results that people are happy with. So here we are.

Popcorn Ceiling Repair Steps

1. Setup floor protection
2. Setup containment
3. Scrape stipple perimeter of the damage by 1-3ft (yes, that much)
4. Repair the drywall (if needed)
   1. Install backing
   2. Cut the drywall opening square
   3. Install a new square of drywall using Drywall screws (important)
5. Tape all seams
6. Apply 2- 3 coats of mud
7. Sand (if necessary) using dust extractor
8. Apply primer
9. Mix paint and stipple in hopper & gun
10. Select proper spray nozzle
11. Spray the mixture onto the ceiling to Complete the Popcorn Ceiling Patch
12. Inspect for quality then clean up

Our clients are often shocked by the amount of equipment that is bought in for "a simple patch". We can be caught lugging in air movers, lights, dehumidifiers, mudding tools, dust extractors, electric sanders, ladders, mixing buckets, mixing drills, protective equipment for the home and our person, soap to mix into the mud, water… The list goes on. This has turned into quite a science in order to execute this efficiently and eliminate deficiencies.

Why Do Popcorn Ceilings Exist?

Good question! They enable the builder to save money by skipping steps and hiding poor workmanship.

While we have a full article about that, we'll give you the quick and dirty summary of it all. Mudding or Taping as it is also called, is very imperfect and requires many coats and sanding to get a nice finish product. It's all about how the light hits the wall or ceiling and which direction shadows are cast. In the morning, the shadows in a home are cast in a certain direction, in the evening, yep, you guessed it. They are cast a different way. Not necessarily the exact opposite because the earth rotates around the sun but also spins on its own axis. Not only this, but you may not have windows in the exact same shape, size and position at the other end of your house. This is why tapers or painters do "Prime-Checks". Essentially, a light is held close to the freshly prime drywall to cast shadows from different directions, to make sure that a good job was done independent of where the sun and artificial lighting will come from.

Who Invented Popcorn Ceilings?

Home Builders invented them.

They got tired of home-owners calling them back about deficiencies and having to try and get the taping company to fix its mistakes. That's when the application of stipple ceilings or popcorn ceilings came to surface. They could now tape the seams, apply one coat of mud, and if they were good enough, they could skip the extra coats and even sometimes the sanding, and instead just spray the ceiling.

Even though taping companies do their best to deliver a perfect product, they can't come back at every hour of the day to see it to see how it looks in the 6AM, 12PM and 5PM light. Also things can be missed during prime check. Can you imagine staring at white walls all day? You'd be likely to miss things too.

Not only that, but because companies like Minto, Mattamy and Cardel homes understand how much people hate popcorn ceilings (YES, HATE!), they can charge a premium to deliver a home with flat ceilings. We've seen the sticker price on this up-sell for a typical 2000 square foot home to be an extra $25,000.00

The additional cost to them is likely to be around $1,700. So this is a big money maker for them, of course.

Now that you're an expert on Popcorn ceilings and how to remove them… We invite you to give us a call to see if we can help you repair your popcorn ceilings or fix some cracks in them caused by the setting of the foundation, over time.