Introduction: Fixing a Broken Piece of Roof Drywall - Reno

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About: Addictions Counsellor by trade, 7 years Experiance, new home owner who is looking at flipping it for cash.

So your doing a reno in your house/garage/basement/ all of the above, and your doing everything right, you build frames for your drywall, you put drywall on your roof before anything else below gets done (the old, work down the wall not up) you go to put your frame for a wall up and you notice, this problem, or something like it.

this is a instructable to help you cover that ugly and damaging board up without having to undo hours of work. what you will accomplish during this chore is crating a patch to cover the area that will "float" over the crack, giving it the appearance of perfection, without using a ton of putty to fill it in totally. this is best done on areas that will not see a ton of wear and tear, aka roofs, if it is a normal wall that has damage, see my other instrucable please, it will help!

now my problem was that the people that originally built my house didnt know what the hell they were doing, (see my other instructable where a random hole was cut in the wall for cold air to come in from my furnace) so, this room that this is in is a former storage room that is being converted into a larger bathroom. it is actually kinda smart idea, but not this instrucable.

this piece of drywall was up there already (along with that one beside it that is upside down, (sadly cant flip it cause its the light cut one, would have to replace it, and i am cheap....)

i put up my narrowed entrance and this piece that was not properly installed and damaged, snapped and shattered and rained calcium down on me.

so now i show you how to fix it without replacing everything...

what you will need
0: Basic knowledge on drywall compound aka mudding and taping
1: self adhesive drywall tape
2: knife
3: putty knife
4: paper drywall tape
5: bucket of water
6: patience
7: dry wall compound (i also call it mud)

Step 1: Prep the Area


Step one, Prep the area, Clear away all the crap and such that is hanging around your damage, knock loose any loose drywall that is there, it will just make the corner patch weaker.

i grabbed a brush that i used to use on my cars tires to clean them, and gave it a quick brush, it got rid of everything!

Step 2: Start Patching

cut small strips of the self adhesive drywall tape to create a patch for the area, in total i cut 3 batches of 5, for 15 in all, and applied them all around and over the hole,

i varied the way that they were put on to ensure good coverage, and started to eliminate the slope slowly...

at the end i heated it all with a hair dryer on hot for 15 seconds cause this self adhesive stuff kinda sucks, and i find that heating it melts the glue a little better, might be my imagination... :)

Step 3: Put Some Mud on the Wall,


so now we apply some mud to the wall patch and let it dry for 15-25 min work it into those little grids, this will solidify the patch very well, smooth it out with your putty knife as you would normal tape jobs,

then we get ready to apply the paper tape to the entire joint!


Step 4:

and then we finish up the tapeing job, and smooth it all out, apply the paper tape right over the patch, make sure that your paper tape is wet and workable, which is why i said some general knowledge in mudding and taping,

and then get ready to do some smoothing in your second and third coats of compound.

there you go, no major crack and dent anymore, and not 12 pound of compound on your roof!