HOW TO Repair Damaged Drywall Tape
Water Damage caused a problem in an angle that I had previously taped with Straight Flex. In this video I show you how to remove the damaged tape and install new Straight Flex.
I am going to use Durabond 5 and make quick work of it.
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Thanks, Dennis
Transcript:
How to Repair Damaged Drywall Tape
So, this is Dennis with Home Rehab Pros. How are you doing today? It's good to have you join us. Well, today I'm in a bathroom where I taped and did some drywall work here a little while back. They had some water damage from a roof leak, and the water came in and damaged some of the angles. Now, you know I use Straight Flex in most of these small projects, so I'm going to show you how we're going to fix this. Here is what the damage looks like.
So, now I'm going to tear some of that out. I think I'm going to put a new piece of Straight Flex in there, and I want to finish this today. I'm going to use Durabond 5. I'm going to use more Straight Flex, and I'm just going to make sure that we've got this covered and repaired so that over the weekend they can paint. They could even paint tonight if they wanted to. It's something that anybody could do. I'm going to step you through one by one on how I'm going to do it. So, let's watch, and if you have a repair like this to do, don't be afraid. Take your time. You might want to use Durabond 20 instead of Durabond 5. And you might want to use regular tape over Straight Flex, but I like Straight Flex and I'll show you why. I've done this in other videos too. But if you have a repair like this, just do it. Let's just muster up the courage to do it and get it done. Let's get started.
So, I'm gonna take... I'm gonna take that strip of old Straight Flex out of there, and as you can see, you know, it compromised the edge of the tape on both sides. They're going to put a bathroom cabinet in here to the corner, so I really don't have to do all the way down to the floor. So, I'm going to show you what I'm going to do. I'm going to use a utility knife, and this is the kind of utility knife I like to use. It's not a retractable knife and it's not one of those sliding knives where you can cut off the blade or knock off the blade and put a new blade on it. This is just a simple utility knife, and as I've drywalled most of my life, this is the kind I like to use when I hang drywall for a variety of reasons. We can talk about that a little bit later, but the first thing I'm going to do is I'm going to cut the bottom of this tape below where the counter is going to be so I can get that tape from here to the ceiling off of the wall. So here it goes.
Let me show you what I did. I just took my knife and I sliced through that Straight Flex, and that's what I did, just slice through Straight Flex on both sides. So now, I can get underneath that Straight Flex. See that's the bottom? I want to get underneath the top part. There we go. Okay, so now I'm ready to tear that tape off of there. So I get right from underneath there, and I can just pull. Okay, so a part of it came off, and I'm gonna get the rest of it off of that as well.
[Applause]
I'm just gonna pull, and there we go. It is off all the way to the ceiling and all the way down where I want to go. So now, my next step is I want to clean that up before I put more tape on it. All right, so now that the tape is off, I'm going to prep this angle, and how I do that is I'm just going to scrape all the loose mud off of it, and I'm going to make sure that the new mud and the new tape will be able to adhere to the wall. So here I go.
So, I want to make sure all the paper from the old tape is off there. Sometimes the back of that will leave a little bit, just a little tiny layer of the paper as I pull it off. So, I'm trying to make sure that's clear, no loose paper behind it, no crumbs of drywall mud behind it, and I'm just going to try to make it as clean as I can so that when I put the next layer of Straight Flex on, it adheres nicely. So here I go again. Okay, so that's about as smooth as I'm gonna get it. Now I can cut my next piece of Straight Flex to fit here, and I'm going to mix a little bit of Durabond 5. We'll install it.
So to cut my Straight Flex, I use a pair of tin snips. You can use scissors, tin snips, a little heavier duty. So, that's what I like to do. And I'm just gonna fold this out a little bit so it gets a little rigid at the top. This is gonna go all the way to the ceiling, so I'm gonna put that all the way up there. And then I'm just gonna bring it down right to where I need to cut it, okay, which is at the top of that existing Straight Flex that's there. The nice thing about Straight Flex is I don't have to coat it all the way into the angle. All I have to do is coat the edge, and I've shown you this before with Straight Flex. There are these perforations here, and all I really have to do is coat enough to cover those perforations and the edge. You'll notice, too, that this is the top. I cut a little 45. Now I'm just going to fold this and I'm going to flatten it just a little bit so that we're not at a complete 45, okay, or 90-degree angle. So, that's ready for me to go. Let me refit it.
Perfect. All right, so now with that, I'm ready to mix my Durabond 5, and I'll show you how to do that too. So here's my Durabond 5. It's just a little bag. I can use this on a lot of little repairs like this. This bag will last for quite some time. I got it at Home Depot. I always carry one in my car, so we're just going to open this up, and it's got a resealable bag, which is nice. If I can get it open, let me get my utility knife. So I just opened it with my utility knife. Evidently, there's a little problem with this bag, so I'm going to just pour a little bit in my pan. I don't need a lot, okay, so that's all I need, just a little bit, not a lot. And I put the powder in the pan first with this Durabond 5. That's all I want to do. I'm not gonna get fancy with it. Put the water in and the powder. All I need to do is just because I'm just gonna mix this quickly, and I'm gonna use my 4-inch knife to do it. It just works a little bit better in the pan. So I'm just gonna throw a little bit of water, not a lot, just a little bit, and I'm gonna start mixing this. And if I need to, I'll put a little more water or just a little more powder. But I generally like to add a little bit of water at a time. See, it mixes up rather quickly. Make sure all the powder is wet. And this is just a little bit thick, so I'm just going to add a little bit more water to it, not much, just a little bit, and I'm going to mix that in, because I'm using it to tape. I don't want it real thick. Okay, and because this is Durabond 5, it is going to move rather rapidly.
So, there you go. So, I'm ready to use it. I'm just going to use my 4-inch knife to spread them, just a little bit on the edge, and I'm just going to spread it like that. All I'm going to do is just need to put mud in a little area where the tape came out, and I'm just going to put it right back in that corner, and we're going to make sure it's seated. See how I do that? Just make sure it's seated in there nice, and then I'm going to wipe it out, just a little pressure on the inside of the knife for that, okay? So, see, I put a little pressure right there, make sure it's coated, take off any ridges.
I actually have enough to kind of skim out that side, so that's what I'm going to do, and I have another video that shows you how to do this, how to make sure you just put a nice little skim on it.
Okay, so now that it's taped, we're going to let that set for a few minutes, because it's Durabond 5. It won't take long, and we'll be able to put another coat on it, just the edge of the tape, just the edge. I'll show you what I mean.
So, as you can see, there are these perforations, and we've got kind of a little skim coat on there already on that side just because I had some mud that I could use to do that. So I'm going to create that type of look here, and I'm just going to cover that corner, that edge, I should say, and the perforation, and then I'm just going to... I'm not going to wipe it all off. I'm going to wipe... I'm going to wipe quite a bit of it off, not all. Make sure I don't leave any edges. Okay, so that's what I'm going to do. So, I'll do that up here, and the biggest thing is not allowing ridges to form, because you don't want to have to sand those ridges. So, I'm just going to leave a nice coat there. We go. Okay, come all the way down. Nice coat, cover that.
And there's a couple of spots because it was a repair. I'm going to have to give a little more attention, but then I can do that on this side. Yeah, that's looking nice. You don't have to go into the angle. Okay, so I'm going to get up on my horse or my bench, and I'm going to do the top, okay? Make sure I get all the ridges off here so I don't have much sand, and that's looking good. I'm going to leave that that way, okay? And I'm going to let that set up, and I'll do a little another coat on it, and then we'll be able to let that same. I might even dry it with a hairdryer, but if not, that Durabond 5 dries pretty fast, so we'll see how it goes, and I should be done with this in about a half an hour from now.
So, many of you who've watched some of my videos realize that I like to use a hairdryer with my Durabond. It just sets it up faster, gets me ready to sand it, and so here I go. I'm going to do this on these angles too because I just want to get done, and I've got another job in about 45 minutes. So here I go.
As you can see, the Durabond turns white when it gets dry, so that gives me a good indication that I can then do a light sand and put my finish coat on. And then I'll do this again on my finish coat, and then I'll be able to sand it, and they can paint it this afternoon. So let me finish up here.
Okay, so I think I'm ready to put a second coat on this, so I'm gonna do some dirt. I'm gonna scrape this down first, just kind of make sure there's no ridges or no little crumbs on there, and then I'm gonna put a second coat on it, repeat, and then sand it off. Okay, and I think the way I'm going to scrape it down is I'm going to use a sanding sponge. So, I'll show you how I do that.
So, here's my sanding sponge. Just simply, you can buy them at Home Depot. They're not hard. They're easy to find, and it gives me a nice sharp edge to put into the corners. So, I'm just going to sand this very lightly but make sure there's... I'm getting rid of any ridge or any... any crumb that might be there or any perforation bubble so that I have a nice smooth area to finish coat. Pay attention to the inside here so that I get rid of any ridge that might have been there, and to the outside edge to make sure there's no ridge there as well, so that, you know, it doesn't show through the paint.
Okay, so now I'm ready to mix another batch of Durabond 5 and put a finish coat on that. Okay, so my Durabond's mixed up. Now I'm going to put one more coat on this, and it should suffice. Remember, I stay out of the very center of the angle, because I don't... I don't need to coat that. That's paintable already. Okay, so now I'll get the top, and then we'll let it set with our hairdryer, and then we'll get it sanded, touched up, and be done.
Okay, so we'll set that up with our hairdryer. We'll sand it up really nice. I'll have a few touch-ups on it just to make sure we're good, so let's get that all dried out.
So, here we are. Now it's basically dry. I'm going to show you a couple of things. You can see, if we can get that into focus, you can see there's a little ridge right here. Now, I didn't put any mud on the inside. Don't need to. That's paintable. But now, I'm going to sand that little ridge and make sure that the whole and the whole length up and down, okay, there is no edge or ridge in there.
And down here, you can see... You see it? See that little ridge? It's almost like a little tool mark, but it's a ridge. I want to sand that out as well, and if it doesn't stand out, I'll skim it real tight.
Okay, and I'll make sure that there's no ridge there when we sand it. So, let me get my sanding block out and let's go for it.
See how I put some pressure on that inside? I want to get that little ridge out of there. And let me feel it. Oh, yeah, that's nice. The ridge is gone. You can feel it with your fingers, so I know there's a ridge there, but I'm going to sand it all here, and I'm going to sand over here, and then I'll get up higher on my bench, and we'll sand the top.
And I want to just make sure I sand out all the ridges. I'm going to take my time, be patient, feel it through because I want the best job possible. That feels really nice.
See, I got rid of that ridge that was there. I got rid of the ridge that was in there. Now, I'm going to sand the top, okay, and we'll get that done too.
Okay, that sounds... feels good. That feels really good. I've got... I feel no ridges. It's nice and smooth, and it's ready to paint. I might do a little bit of touch-up, but then that touch-up is insignificant. It turned out really nice. So, there you go. So, Straight Flex can make it nice and fast and easy. And use it with Durabond 5. If you didn't like Durabond 5 because it's too fast, use Durabond 20 or Durabond 45. Accelerate with a hairdryer, and you can get this project done relatively quickly. Just make sure you don't leave big lumps of mud or ridges or edges somewhere, and it'll paint nice, and then you'll have a nice job done all on your own.
So, this is Dennis with Home Rehab Pros. Thanks for watching. We hope we gave you some good content, and that perhaps you learned something. If you don't agree with how we did this, just let me know in the comments. We can certainly learn how to do things differently as well, but hopefully, if you're a homeowner and you need to fix an angle for yourself just like this, whether it's been regular paper tape or Straight Flex that's on there already or anything else, you can tear that off, re-tape it with Straight Flex the way we did today. We hope we helped you.
So, if this proved beneficial or you found it entertaining or educational at all, just please hit that like button. And if you haven't subscribed yet, we'd really appreciate it if you did that too. So, if you have a project like that, muster up the courage and just do it. You know what? We'll see you in the next video.