DRYWALL PATCH without Drywall

Patching a hole in the wall without Drywall. It's not hard you just have to know what to do. Using MESH tape, Durabond Easy Sand and a Dryer I was able to patch a Drywall hole without any wood or drywall at all.

Transcript:

Drywall Patch Without Drywall

So, I have a problem. I have a patch. I don't have any drywall. I do have mesh tape. Let's see if I can make this work with mesh tape and Durabond. The first thing I'm going to do is cut some mesh tape a little bit longer than this hole, and I'm going to show you what I'm going to do.

Okay, so we're going to cut several pieces about the same length. Clean that edge off a little bit. I hope you can see what I'm doing. Okay, there we go. Now, what I'm going to do is take these off, and one at a time, I'm going to put them in like this. I don't know if you can see it; I'll show you in a couple of minutes. I'm putting it inside the hole.

Okay, let me show you exactly what I'm talking about. As you can see, I've indented that mesh tape. So, what that's going to do is support the Durabond as I put it in there, so it doesn't fall out. It's going to create a backer. I'm going to use Durabond 20, and I'm going to let it set. I'm probably going to accelerate it with a hair dryer, but I'm also going to cut these ends off a little bit. They don't need to be that long; I just wanted them long enough so I could get my inset correct. So now, let me cut those off, and let me get my Durabond mixed, and I'll show you the next step.

Okay, so I have my Durabond mixed up. It didn't take me long; it's Durabond 20, and I just mixed it in my pan. So, let's pack this with Durabond now. I don't have a lot; I have just enough to pack in that hole. Okay, that's all I want to do.

Okay, let me give you a close-up picture of that, and you'll see exactly what I'm doing. Then, what I'll do is I'll scrape that down and level that off a little bit when it dries. I am going to use a hairdryer to accelerate that a little bit, but let's take a closer look. Yes, you can smooth that out a little bit. Smooth it out a little bit as it works. Okay, but it doesn't have to be perfect because we're just going to recoat it. We're going to actually put more mesh tape on that after that dries. So, let's get it accelerated and get it finished.

Okay, this is set enough, and we're going to kind of sculpt it a little bit and scrape it down a little bit, making sure there are no high spots. Then we're going to put more mesh on it, and I'll show you how we're going to do that too.

Just kind of, any high spot that might be on there. You can see that there's a little bit of mud coming off of there. So, that's okay. So, we're good. Now, I'm going to change the direction of my mesh tape. I'm going to go up and down with it, and I'm going to overlap it by about a quarter of an inch. Okay, and I'll put one more there just to finish this up. Okay, very nice.

So, I am ready to mix up some more Durabond 20, and we're going to coat that bad boy and see how it turns out. Let me give you a close-up on how I do this. So, I'm going to spread my mud up. I'll start in the middle. I only need to do three spans of the knife. Okay, there you go. So, I got all my mud on there. Now I'm going to clean the edges up a little bit. Remember, I don't want any ridges because those will make it hard for me to finish. So, now I'm going to try to leave a nice amount of this mud on there. I don't want to scrape it all off. I may need to work out a few tool marks after it sets, but that's okay.

In fact, I think I'm just going to leave it like that. Okay, so I'm going to leave it like that. I'm going to put my blow dryer back on it; we're going to fast-set it. Then we're going to mold it out a little bit or sculpt it with the tool marks, and then we're going to put a skim coat on it. So, it'll be ready to sand.

Alright, now that it's dry and I did use a hair dryer again to accelerate that, it took about 15 minutes. So, I'm going to scrape it down. We're just going to kind of sculpt it, get rid of any tool marks, get rid of any high marks, check to see if there are any little pieces of mesh coming out that we can embed in and then coat over. But, this looks pretty good. I'm pretty happy with the way that turned out.

So now, I'm going to do a really tight skim coat. That skim coat will dry, and we'll be able to sand it in about 20 minutes. What I'm going to do is go the opposite direction of what I went on that last coat, and I'm going to put it down just to cover all the stuff that I've already coated. Maybe even go a little bit lower, and then I'm going to wipe all of that off. A nice tight coat, making sure the scratches aren't in there. I'll do it again if it doesn't look right.

So, I think I'll come up this way. So, I'm going to do this twice, actually, on this one. Then, I'm going to just do a nice tight coat. Nice and tight. It's running a little bit, which means I'm kind of working it a little too much, but that's alright. That'll sand out and touch up. Now, I'm going to blow that dry again, and in a few minutes, we'll sand it.

Okay, it's dry and it's feeling pretty good. So, I'm going to sand it just a little bit. It's not going to take much. All I'm after is getting the ridges off and a little bit of the tool marks.

Alright, so that feels pretty good. Get the dust off of there. There is a little bit of touch-up I'd like to do just because there are a couple of little, I'll call them stretch marks. We'll get all that cleaned up really nice.

Alright, so there you have it, and then we're good to go on this. We can sand those little touch-ups if we want. We can prime it and paint.