Patching and Plastering - To plaster or just repair and paint.

We have a wall in the kitchen dining room that was papered. I have removed the paper using a commericial grade product to soak the paper and scrape it off. In the process of doing this, there was a coating of paint over the raw wall board. There are several areas where the soaking agent got behind the paint and blistered the paint. It also soaked into some of the wall board and part of the paper covering the wall board plaster has been removed.

What is the best way to handle this? Can I just primer over the exposed areas or do I have to plaster the wall?

I want to be able to paint the wall and put up a chair rail.

At the least you'll have to scrape off the blistered paint and any other loose debris from the wall. My advice would be to just cover all that junk up with drywall, tape, mud, & paint. I do not scrape off old wallpaper, learned that lesson the hard way long ago, cover it & start with new drywall, you can have the walls rehung, taped, & the first fill coat on before you get the old stuff scraped off.

Scrape off any loose material. fill in will drywall mud. let dry. sand smooth. then prime. touch up anything that shows. Spot prime anything you touched up. put on color.

You're probably right Coops, poor Al has already learned that scraping wallpaper is no fun, at this point probably better to just patch & smooth out what he's got left, prime & paint. I might suggest a textured wall to help hide the imperfections, that are bound to be there.

Oh yeah, forgot to welcome Al to the forums! Welcome aboard Al, glad to have ya in the fray. Stick around we got lots of ideas and opinions. ;)

Thanks for the reply. Let's take this a step further.
I have heard advise from another source suggesting that I purchase a product from either Menards / Home Depot / one of those - that is a primer base with a grain substance you mix into the paint prior to use. Supposed to simulate a textured (plaster) surface. Let dry and finish as you desire.

Anyone heard of it? Does it work or am I better off just to mud the imperfections and primer.

Thanks for responses!

I hate mixing sand in with paint. If you have any problems later you will never match it. I would just skim it all smooth. Do you have textured walls anywhere else in your house? If not I would stay consistant with slick. After you prime it you will see what will show or not. That is a good time to touch up. Use a 3/4" nap roller when painting. This will hide some stuff too.

I have removed a ton of wallpaper. The best thing for removal is hot water and vinegar. Wash wall also with vinegar it will cut the paste. If you have any of the sheetrock paper torn off. Prime with 123 before you mud the spots. The reason for this, most of the time when you mud over the torn paper it will bubble. Then you have to cut out re-mud and hope this does not happen again.
I heard zinnzer just came out with a new produt for this very same thing. Have not used it, just their 123
Doyle

Zinsser makes a primer called gaurdz. It works very well on the brown paper. Not so good when it can't penetrate. I did some walls and still had lots of blistering.

There are some good products out there to cover the brown paper that's always left when you scrape wallpaper, but I still think I can cover the junk up with fresh board faster than you can strip it off the wall, when we're talking about a sheetrock wall. And I know I can tape & finish a room of fresh board alot faster than trying to smooth out what's left from scraping. Plaster walls aren't nearly as difficult, my experience is that the wallpaper will usually come right of the stuff, with little to no residue left behind.