In the article, you can familiarize yourself with the features of finishing the ceiling with a comb, its preparation, the rules for leveling and creating a finished coating are considered. The content of the article:
- Ceiling preparation
- Surface leveling
- Applying a textured coating
- Coloring features
One of the budget options for finishing the ceiling is decorating it using a notched trowel - a comb. This method allows you to save money as much as possible due to low requirements for surface preparation and low cost of finishing materials for the ceiling covering.
Preparing the ceiling for finishing with a comb
Ceilings of new buildings and those that have already been repaired need to be prepared before finishing. In the process of work, it is necessary to remove the old coating from the ceiling surface and treat it with a penetrating primer.
Whitewash or old plaster can be removed easily. They just need to be wetted, and when the moisture is absorbed, the damp coating can be removed without leaving a spatula. Old paint on the ceiling is more difficult to remove, as in some places it is quite tight.
This can be done in two ways: remove the paint with scrapers or sand the surface in order to erase the edges of the peeled coating. The second option is applicable if the old paint adheres well to the ceiling throughout its entire area, and the size of the exfoliated areas is insignificant.
After cleaning the surface, it must be treated with a penetrating primer to ensure the adhesion of the base to the putty layer. For this process, you will need a paint ditch, a roller attached to a long handle, and a brush. The primer can be taken with the usual ANSERGLOB type, intended for the treatment of flat ceilings in dry rooms.
Priming should be started from the corner of the ceiling, gently brushing its joints with a brush. A continuous surface must be primed with a roller, applying the material to the surface in even stripes, avoiding gaps. After applying a thin even layer of primer over the entire area of the ceiling, allow it to dry.
Leveling the ceiling surface before combing
When finishing the ceiling with a comb, its perfect alignment is not required, since the finish coating will have a textured structure that will easily cover minor flaws in the preparatory work. Therefore, a coarse-grained gypsum starting filler can be used for the leveling layer.
It is diluted with water in the proportions indicated on the packaging of the material. The dry mixture must be poured into a suitable container, and, gradually adding liquid, mix until a homogeneous plastic state using a mixer clamped into a drill or perforator chuck.
To putty the ceiling, you will need two trowels. One of them should be more than 200 mm wide, the other narrow. With a narrow ceiling trowel, it is convenient to pick up putty from a bucket, and then transfer it to a wide tool, evenly distributing the material along its working edge.
The application of the putty on the ceiling should be done evenly, in a circular motion with a wide trowel. After leveling the entire surface of the ceiling, the starting layer of putty should dry well. After polymerization of the material, the ceiling must be once again coated with a primer and wait for it to dry.
Applying a textured coating to the ceiling with a comb
To apply a textured second layer, you will need not a starting, but a finishing fine-grained putty. To create a checkerboard pattern on the ceiling, you will need two tools - spatulas with even and serrated working edges.
This work requires batch mixes of the putty, since a large amount of it can dry out in the container during the application of the texture to the ceiling. After preparing the required amount of gypsum mortar, part of the mixture should be taken on a wide spatula and applied to the ceiling. After that, using a toothed tool (comb), the putty must be distributed over the surface area by 20 cm to any of the desired sides.
Then the ceiling comb should be turned 90 degrees relative to the stretched strip and repeated in the opposite direction with the tool. The result of all the work should be relief lines located in short sections in a checkerboard pattern.
The entire ceiling should be filled with such squares with side dimensions of 20 cm. If, after applying the texture, pieces of the mixture left after passing with a comb will hang from the ceiling, there is nothing to worry about - after the ceiling has dried, they can be easily removed with a spatula or an ordinary household broom.
In this way, in a few hours of work, you can make a beautiful and original ceiling. In this case, there is a significant savings in the purchase of plasterboard sheets, profiles, tension sheets or other materials used in the creation of expensive suspended structures. Moreover, the textured processing of the ceiling surface practically does not reduce the height of the room.
The cost of such a finish comes down to the purchase of a primer, a couple of bags of plaster mix and two spatulas.
Features of painting the ceiling after finishing with a comb
After the textured ceiling has dried, you can start painting it. It is necessary to protect the finishing layer of the putty from external influences and to give the entire surface a finished look.
For painting, you can use the acrylic enamel "Snezhka", and if necessary add any pigment to it. It will give the material the desired shade. The paint should be applied to the ceiling with a wool or velor roller.
For its impregnation, a paint ditch with a ribbed surface is usually used to remove excess paint and varnish material from the instrument. For high-quality painting on the ceiling, it is enough to apply two layers of "Snowball", placing them in mutually perpendicular directions.
When creating a ceiling texture using a comb, you can experiment by choosing notched trowels with sparse or densely spaced teeth. In this case, you can get lines of various sizes on the ceiling. In addition, it is not necessary to perform a "checkerboard" structure of the ceiling: the lines can be applied solid across or along its surface. Watch a video about the textured finishing of the ceiling with putty:
Ceiling trim with a comb can be used in the living room, kitchen or hallway. A similar pattern will also look good on the ceiling of a garage or private house.
