How to Patch Small Holes in Walls | Ask This Old House

[Music] it looks like it's a freshly painted rug we've some patching to do as you'll see yeah we have this new window that we had put in over here yeah the former owners had replaced the windows about 20 years ago but they really weren't efficient at all so we just had them redone and unfortunately the contractor left us with a little bit of a mess down here Oh big hole here and then a little couch right in the middle of the wall I can't believe they left it like that I have no idea how to patch plaster so that's why we called you all right well I think that's a pretty easy fix I have some things in the truck and if you want to learn I'm gonna show you absolutely all right let me go get myself guide all right Allison I brought a couple of samples of some walls so I can show you what's going on with different techniques great now the way this home was originally plastered was this system right here this is actually called a plaster and lath system these wooden strips are about a quarter of an inch thick maybe an inch and a quarter inch and a half wide with a space on him were actually applied to the entire wall over the structure and then they would mix up a base coat plaster and go over the wooden lath and force it in between the joints the plaster going through the joints would sag down and create a key that would lock the plaster to the wall okay they then skim over that with a finish coat called the skim coat but what you have is something different what you have is actually a gypsum wallboard no laughs but you have the skim coat on top of it now lots of times you're going to see a product like this this is a gypsum wallboard also known as drywall it has a paper on it that's finished and the drywall actually goes over the studs you don't skim coat this part of the wall you tape the joint and go over that with a joint compound sand it and paint the wall surface it doesn't matter which method you have in your house to patch those holes are all the same great all right the first patch we're gonna do is right here this little patch right here it's not gonna need any reinforcement also if you have a picture on the wall you move it you want to patch that hole somebody dents it with a doorknob all the time yeah piece of furniture this is actually a patching spackle okay so we'll take the cover off I'm gonna give you this knife okay and I want you to dig out a little bit put it on your trial and then force it right into the crack all right yeah load it up good all right now take it and force it right onto the crack push it hard right in there there you go all right now you're gonna stop and put a little more right in there and just lightly do it now all right now take the knife and come up turn it this way and drag it down just like that there you go all right that's done don't play with it anymore okay once said stri you may want to stand a little bit and paint it that's it that's it oh great now the other hole we're going to use something a little bit different now it's a pretty deep hole yeah we don't want all the compound to go into the hole so what we're gonna do is we're actually gonna take this metal patch right here and you can see this mesh tape around the perimeter it's stuck to it and on the back it's sticky so it'll stick to the wall okay now the idea of is it cover the entire hole like that and then use compound right over it but I don't want to use all of this metal so I'm gonna make this patch a little bit smaller all right now that I've cut the strip I'm just gonna stick it right on the wall over the hole okay just like that now you're gonna do the joint compound I'll take the cover off for you okay and what I want you to do is first of all feel the difference in weight of that yeah yeah it's a lot heavier all right so now what I want you to use the narrow trial to dig it out of the bucket get plenty on there there you go perfect all right now just drag it right across the metal any way you want right into the wall right across they push right in that there you go you take any excess let's would you don't let us pill a day I get it right in now okay a little more work it around yeah perfect now let's take this 4-inch trowel okay and what I want you to do is lightly drag it across the wall like that okay you don't want to take it all off but I want you to lightly bring it across there to try to make it as flat as you can okay now what I want you also do is keep this side of the trowel tight to the wall bring the top out about 1/16 to 1/8 of an inch and you're gonna drag it right across okay okay all right go right up tight to the underside of the windows that's right now drag it right across and don't stop perfect don't touch it now do the same thing here only this time you're gonna keep this side tight to the wall in this side up about 1/16 to 1/8 of an inch all right you good yep that's it for now it seems kind of thin well it is thin and I like to put on light coats and build it up okay a lot of people think that they should put it on real thick and then sand it it's a lot more work to do that way and it's really messy okay so what I want you to do is wait till tomorrow this will dry put a couple more thin coats on once that's dry you may have to sand it lightly put a primer on it paint it and send me a picture of it okay I will I think it looks better already all right I'm gonna leave you that compound so you'll have plenty to do well tell me you're a good teacher but you know what I think she's got the touch she sure does I could use her on the jobsite so these patches are great I mean not only they may come in different sizes but as we saw there you can cut them to the size you want it doesn't you know what they fill that hole right if you fill that hole with a lot of drywall you'd have to wait a lot longer for it to dry it will also crack and then you have to use the tape anyways yeah so these are great although I've seen you patch drywall not with these patches but by actually cutting a piece of drywall for the pageant's exactly well let me show you right here if you have a wall like this and you have a hole in it well there isn't a little bit so you have a hole in the wall now you want to patch it so you have to cut a patch to fit that hole yes well that could be really tricky all right irregular that is so now what I want to do is I actually want to cut a piece of drywall a little bigger than the hole that's in the wall now I'm gonna take that piece and I'm gonna hold it up to the wall I want to mock the orientation so it's over the hole trace it now I cut around the lines with a jab saw making the hole just a little bit bigger than the patch that I want to use this piece of wood I put in here is a backer to screw my patch to the wall once the patch is in the hole I need to tape around the perimeter of the crack then I cover the tape with the joint compound and you just want to keep it nice and thin and build it up after it dries right another good patch tell me you definitely have the touch [Music]

Channel: This Old House

Views: 762,211

Rating: 4.8599243 out of 5

Keywords: This Old House, Ask This Old House, DIY, Home Improvement, DIY Ideas, Renovation, Renovation Ideas, How To Fix, How To Install, How To Build, Episode, TV Show, Tom Silva, wall patch, walls, homeowner, putty knife, drill, driver, jab saw, tom silva this old house, tom silva house, tom silva construction, tom silva tools, tommy silva, home renovation ideas on a budget

Id: qbupCzSPW9o

Length: 7min 58sec (478 seconds)

Published: Mon Nov 07 2016