How to check the quality of plaster to a person far from this issue

Sometimes unscrupulous plasterers can, taking advantage of insufficient customer experience, hand over poorly performed work. And it will become clear only when it comes to wallpapering or other wall work. It will already be useless to search for the guilty by that time, therefore it is better to check the work immediately, and in the presence of the masters.

You can do this without special knowledge if you know the basic requirements for plastering. The first layer is applied rough plaster, then comes the starting putty, on top of which you can glue the wallpaper. But if you plan to paint the walls, apply decorative plaster or glue thin wallpaper, then you need more finishing putty.

The evenness of the walls

This is the most pressing issue when carrying out repairs. As a rule, in old houses, they are “littered” to one degree or another. Stucco can be done on lighthouses or visually, but the second will not give a guarantee of a flat surface, but only slightly hide the differences. In residential premises, the second method is better not to use.

You can check the quality of work with a level of 2 meters. The level is applied to the walls and vertical deviations are verified with SNiPs. Deviations not exceeding 1 mm per 1 m and not more than 5 mm on the entire wall indicate high-quality work.

Deriving angles

To furniture fits well in the corners, they must be strictly 90 °. But it is not always justified to make absolutely all corners in the apartment straight. As a rule, this value is important for the bathroom, kitchen, as well as rooms with built-in furniture.

The angle value is checked by ordinary tape measure. To do this, remember the school geometry course. Two diagonals of the room should be equal in length. A check with a construction square with a side length of at least 0.5 meters will also be correct. It is necessary to apply the square over the entire height of the corner at regular intervals, leading it continuously from the bottom up.

Wall parallelism

If the walls are not parallel to each other, then the floor boards will also be difficult to lay evenly, and this will become noticeable. It is checked by tape measure. The distance between the parallel walls should be the same along the entire length.

Openings and slopes

Slopes and openings should also be located strictly in horizontal and vertical planes, otherwise the doors and windows will have to be installed crookedly, and this will look ugly.

The plaster is checked by the building level. Deviations from the vertical and horizontal should not be more than 1 mm per 1 m. The slope width cannot deviate from the design calculations by more than 2 mm.

Surface quality

A good wall should not have stains from moisture or dark marks, otherwise mold will form in this place after some time. The absence of stains is checked visually.

The plaster should not come too close to the hinges on the windows, as this will interfere with free opening. It is checked by opening the window sashes.

Special attention areas

It is worthwhile to carefully inspect the areas near sockets, switches, places of abutment to the wall of door platbands, ceiling and floor skirtings. If the walls there are uneven, then the baseboard will not fit snugly, a gap will form.

Experts recommend checking the quality of the putty in the dark with a flashlight. The light is directed parallel to the plane being checked and, if there are irregularities on it, they will immediately give a shadow. In daylight, it is more difficult to identify such shortcomings, since the scattered light will not give a shadow.