Need Drywall Repairs? Call (805) 443-3232

Drywall Repair

JW Home Care Restoration provides drywall repair, drywall hanging and drywall texturing services to all Ventura, Camarillo, Oxnard, Simi Valley, Thousand Oaks, California and surrounding areas. We will do our very best to provide you with finished drywall repairs that look as good as new. That is our commitment to you the homeowner. Plus, we guarantee our work for one full year, if later something happens to the repaired areas that is a result of something we did during the drywall repair process, we will return to inspect the issue and resolve it at no charge.

You’ve gone thru enough of a headache. Having the repairs done by someone less than qualified is no way to go thru this process. Most repairs can be done over the course of two days. Often times, one full day and a partial second day.

Larger jobs can take a third and sometimes fourth day, but that is not the most common size of repairs we have found. Let us take care of you, so that you can relax, knowing that in just a couple of days your water damaged walls will just be a bad memory.

What Exactly Is Drywall Repair?

First of all, if you’re reading this then you probably already have damaged walls or open holes in your ceilings. Perhaps you installed a new sound system and that required cutting holes. Maybe a rambunctious child was too eager to show you his awesome karate kick. Did your bathroom shower spring a leak and wet the surrounding area? Or worse yet did a major leak cause drywall ceiling water damage in the room below?  Then you need professional drywall repair.

Drywall ceiling repair?  Yes, the term “drywall” actually refers to interior surfaces as opposed to exposed exterior surfaces.  So with ceiling water damage you will indeed need “drywall” ceiling repairs.

What Can We Do For You?

Whether a literal hole in the wall or a water damaged drywall ceiling, you want that damage fixed and as soon as possible.  But you also want your drywall repair job done right.  You can find lots of “how to repair drywall” information on the web, but it’s actually difficult to make a drywall patch that doesn’t show up as unevenness for a smooth finish or fail to blend in on a textured finish.  And there’s other things to keep a lookout for in the damaged area.  It’s our job to take care of your drywall repair quickly and properly, and get your home back in shape the way it was before the water damaged drywall or accident occurred.

Hanging Drywall

The process of “hanging drywall” can be complicated at times, and also relatively easy if you have the years of experience that we do. Well, nothing is really “easy”…but our guys make it look that way. We first inspect the framing where the repairs are to be made or where new rooms are being added. Wall studs must be even, level and true to receive our panels of drywall. We have had cases where one stud is further out than the stud next to it, and on down the wall length. This can be caused by a few reasons like previous shrinkage and expansion of the wood from water damage. Or, maybe the wood was just “bad” when it was installed at construction time. Should we not correct this issue now, your drywall panel will lie over these studs in a flowing way, or “wavy”. Not good! We need to even out all of the affected studs by “furring” out the stud. This means adding either thin strips of wood or cardboard strips (specially manufactured for this reason) to bring out a stud too far in, or in extreme cases maybe remove a badly bowed out stud and replacing it with a new stud. Either way, when we apply the drywall panels to your studwork, the walls must be as flat as possible.

Drywall thicknesses vary from 1/4” to 1/2” (most common), and finally 5/8”. The vast majority of usage called for is the 1/2” thickness. This can cover both ceilings and walls. The 5/8” thickness is called for in garage areas and is usually referred to as “type x”, or fire resistant. (Not fire proof, but resistant). Most building codes require type x drywall in garages, especially in walls that connect to inside living areas, including closets. If you find a drywall hanger not using this thicker paneling in garage areas next to inside living spaces, stop him. Inquire about it. Be informed. This is a safety issue for you and your family. The thicker board is rated at about one hour of fire resistance, giving you time to exit in case something catches fire in your garage. We ALWAYS use the correct thickness in paneling for your home. The difference in cost is so minimal that it in no way justifies skimping out to the smaller thicknesses.

Smaller patches are fastened by applying wooden “nailer” boards (pieces of 1”x2” wooden trim board cut to size) behind the existing openings in order to screw in the new piece of drywall. These nailers provide a solid backing to the new patch area, and eliminate any sagging or loosely held areas of drywall which is a critical component to having a superb finished patch.

Larger areas of about 4’ by 8’ will receive whole sheets of drywall applied to your walls. We can attach up to 12’ long panels at a time without any joints in the centers. This saves lots of time in the taping process later on. Once we cut out any electrical outlet holes, light switch holes, or even plumbing line protruding from the walls, it’s time to apply the panels. We do this by using special drywall screws of various lengths and place the screws at certain distances from each other according to local building codes. At one time in the past and even rarely still today, drywall nails were used. But over time, especially in ceilings, nails tend to “pop” or come out. If you look closely at most older homes’ ceilings, (and even some walls), you will almost definitely see nail pops all over the place. This is caused over time by the weight of the drywall hanging from above and of course, settling. Screws grab much, much better and pretty much eliminates the problems of popped nails.

Once the panels are secured using the drywall screws, it’s on to the next step.

TAPING AND MUDDING

Now comes the interesting part. Our experienced tradesmen begin the intricate and sometimes delicate part of repairing your damaged drywall and ceilings. We do this by applying several coats (layers) of drywall compound after sealing up all of the joints with fiberglass mesh tape. A joint is any area of the repair where two sheets of drywall butt up next to each other and are screwed into the studwork. The fiberglass tape is used because it allows the compound to breathe and to dry correctly and is also water resistant. At this point your walls look pretty ugly to be truthful. Rest assured, we will get that final finished look back for you and your family in no time.

It takes years of experience to get the desired finished look of a smooth wall, and this effect is accomplished by our expert tapers at this point in the process. Right now in the process is when your desired look is created and achieved. Mistakes made by less than experienced tapers can result in pretty bad walls and ceilings. Continuous inspection as we work along the repair areas lets us know what area needs more attention, more mud, more coats of compound, etc. To achieve professional looking finishes, a taper needs years of experience and we take the extra time to make sure the process is being done to industry standards. Our work speaks for itself. Your walls will look like new when we close your door behind us.

Expertly applying several coats of compound will close up your joints and solidify those walls to look like one, seamless wall space. Drying time between coats can depend on several factors such as climate and humidity. Drying times in many instances dictates how long your drywall repair work will ultimately take.

SANDING

One of the final two steps in achieving a great finished look is the sanding process. Keep calm…although this part of the process can get quite dusty, it’s almost at the end! All of those joints that we’ve just taped now need to be smoothed down to a flat appearance by lightly sanding those areas. Sanding with various grits of sandpaper is another process that needs to be done by someone who knows what they’re doing. One shouldn’t just grab a piece of sandpaper and start randomly sanding away at the covered joints. Too much sanding will remove too much of the dried compound, creating dips and valleys and an uneven look. Conversely, not enough sanding can create unattractive rises or ridges in the walls and ceiling.

This becomes a problem when the owner plans to use semi gloss types of paints which will magnify those mistakes and uneven surfaces.

Sanding in several steps works well, but sometimes if the drywall tapers are expert in their craft, they can almost eliminate most sanding because back in the taping and mudding process, their joints were done so well and evenly that sanding is really just a touch up process. But generally speaking, one should sand joints in stages. Optimally, light sanding between coats is fine, but a good taper can eliminate that part and still achieve desirable results. It’s all in their level of talent. Expert tapers can achieve that almost perfect look that will stand up to any bright light or painting highlights with very minimal sanding at all. Our tapers will sand areas only when it’s needed, thus keeping this dust laden process down to a minimum. Only after checking all joints for a consistent smoothness do we move onto the next step.

Complete Drywall Services Call (805) 443-3232

Texturing VS. Smooth Finishes

The final stage in the process of drywall repair is the texturing process. There are a couple of common types of finishes…or “final look” to your walls.

One is the smooth finish which is exactly what the name implies. Your walls will be left flat and smooth with no additional texturing added. This is normally accomplished by adding a final, very thin, “skim coat” of compound to all the repair sites as well as several feet around the damaged areas in order to achieve a uniform and ‘feathered” look. A skim coat is simply a thin layer of compound smoothed over the affected areas and removed. It can sometimes be repeated several times until the look is “just right”. This creates the look of the repaired areas to seamlessly blend in with the rest of the area surrounding it. Again, experience counts here. Great looking walls and ceilings comes with experienced tapers.

The other style of finish is the textured look. During this process we use special compressed-air driven sprayers to “shoot” soupy compound onto your walls and ceilings in order to leave a “bumpy”, or textured look. This process can get messy because we are actively spraying wet compound onto your wall and ceiling areas. Covering affected surrounding areas with plastic lining is a must in order not to overspray areas that are not part of the repaired walls. The texturing compound is wet and thick, and whatever it hits will eventually dry in place. So we will not hit non-repaired areas, but “feather”, or blend, the finish into other parts of the walls to where the look is seamless to the naked eye.

There are a few different styles of texture, but the most common are the “orange peel” look and the other is called “knockdown”. Orange peel textured finishes gets its name from guess what?…orange peels. The look resembles that fruit’s skin and is probably the most common look because it is quite subtle. Most homes of today have the orange peel texture. Take a look at your walls. Orange peel is subtle and has just a slight rise to it.

The other common finish of knockdown is a little different. More amounts of texture is sprayed and in larger sizes, then “knocked down” with a taper’s blade by flattening it against the walls. This causes the lumpy pieces of wet compound to flatten and create a sort of streaked look once dry. Homes with this look offer a fatter, thicker look to their texture and looks great. But for the most part, the specific style of texture is governed by the existing texture on the walls near the repair areas. The specific finish chosen by the homeowner totally depends on the already existing wall finish. The normal procedure is to match whichever finish is previously on the water damaged repairs. Otherwise, selecting a different finish than the existing areas will not look right.