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Painting & Decorating

Adhesive left on walls

Anonymous user 16/03/2024 - 2.46 PM

Stripped wallpaper using wallpaper solvent, filled holes and sanded down. Washed with water and soap and sugar soap to remove any left over residue. Applied white matt emulsion as a base coat. It looked a bit smushy and slippy when drying. What was actually happening was there was still adhesive left and it reactivated when the matt emulsion went on. Now it's dried it looks awful. Have tried to sand it, clean it, wash it - it won't shift. Any remedies to fix this problem? UPDATE: thanks for the suggestions. I didn't want to put lining paper up - I'd stripped the previous one to paint. Nor did I want to spend any more time heating, scraping, priming or sanding as it's taken up most of my weekends since Christmas! Sorry didn't put that in the earlier post. I'm glad I decided to skim coat in the end as even the tradesman had issues with the PVA and plaster drying and setting between coats! A half a day job took him all day so I definitely would have gone around in circles with all the suggested methods. Thanks everyone.

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8 Answers

Brad russell

No reviews yet

Leicester

You could always plaster over the existing wall and repaint rather than trying to clean it down then paint it.

Answered18 March 2022

Perfect Plumbing Solutions

Rating: 5 out of 5

Cardiff

I would try using a heat gun to melt it and scrape it off with a scraper or use hot water and sponge to loosen it up then scrape it off, long process but should work

Answered5 February 2022

Gus Wallpaper Specialist

Rating: 5 out of 5

Hounslow

The easy way to fix that to to install lining paper and painted. To remove the adhesive it will be very difficult and much more longer process

Answered5 February 2022

Harvey Decorators

Rating: 4 out of 5

Haverhill

Hi i would paint the wall parts affected with zinsser bulls eye primer sealer then re paint the walls with your emulsion finishing

Answered6 February 2022

RH Property Services

Rating: 5 out of 5

Ware

Hi, get a wide metal caulker, it’s like a very wide scraper that is quite sharp and scrape at the loose and gooey bits. Go over and over it and you can rub over it with fine to medium glasspaper and then seal it with any oil based sealer or undercoat will work.Then when dry apply the emulsion, the problem is water based emulsion doesn’t like wallpaper paste. Hope this helps

Answered8 February 2022

Shefix London

Rating: 5 out of 5

Finsbury Park, London

There are many ways according to your budget the first is to apply a liner over it. Second to skim the walls, third to use a good quality primer over it such as Zinesser then paint.

Answered11 February 2022

Thomas Daniel Professional Decorators Ltd

Rating: 5 out of 5

Aylesbury

A mixture of answers here, some are correct and some aren't. Forget re-plastering the wall - that will work but it's just not necessary here. Same goes for lining paper. As others have said it sounds like despite all the washing and sanding you did there still remained some wallpaper paste residue on the walls which is reactivating when in contact with water (water-based emulsion paint). 1. Let it dry out fully, give it a proper sand down but don't try and remove any paint or material. I.e. no scraping! 2. Seal with Zinsser Gardz, Zinsser bullseye 123 or any solvent based undercoat (price will vary from high to low in the order I mentioned). All will do the same job. 3. Re-paint with your chosen emulsion and all should be well.

Answered12 February 2022

Classic Interiors

Rating: 5 out of 5

Harpenden

The surface is slightly rough looking now i suspect, when its dry you can sand it back as much as you can to the plaster to remove as much of the paint and adhesive as possible, a mirka sander would make light work of this task, then wash with hot soapy water to get the remainder of any adhesive off. The surface should be smooth enough to repaint. Or sand as flat as you can get it and use a good quality lining paper with a ready mixed adhesive.

Answered27 February 2022