Walls and Ceilings - repairing gypsum board

I live in a house built in 1947. The bottom half of my kitchen has what appears to be linoleum glued over gypsum board and painted over and over and over with enamel paint. I had to pull it off as we had a leak and it was buckling due to water damage. So now I have the wall with half paper and half exposed plaster. Is there any way I can resurface it? I really don't want to tear off half the walls as the top half is perfectly intact. The two halfs are seperated by a large chair rail, so the two halves do appear to almost be two installations. Thanks.

In the early 40's house construction began doing away with wood lath as a backer for plaster. A new product called sheetrock was manufactured for that purpose. That being said if your house is original you have plaster over drywall, maybe.

How is the rest of your wall? You said you had water damage. Is it damaged at all? If it is you are going to have to remove that bottom. If it isn't you can repair whats there.

I may be wrong, but this does not resemble sheetrock at all. It is actually a seperate item installed over the gypsum board. (It says gypsum board on the back). You can see the track marks where they glued this stuff over. The water damage is in one corner, and I have already taken it out and replaced it. There is no plaster and lath thank goodness. If it is any help, this is the thinnest stuff I have ever seen, about a quarter of an inch thick. I will probably have to replace it with sheetrock (sigh*), I was hoping to come up with another solution! Thanks for the answer though.

Hi scoutmom, and welcome to the forums. Not positive what you've got there, but I'd say it's an ancestor of present day drywall, sheetrock, gyp board, whatever you wanna call it. I see you having two options here;

First and maybe best, gut the wall to the studs, this will allow you to insulate the wall, which I'm guessing with 40's vintage construction, there is none existing. Also will allow you to shim or plane any badly bowed studs as needed to start off fresh with a straight wall, which is always the best situation. Then come back with new rock, tape & mud, and viola, looks goods as new.

Second option, which is probably cheaper & less mess, fill in where you've torn out your water damage, so you have a relatively flat straight surface, then cover with new drywall, 3/8" or better yet 1/2".

Either way if the wall is less than 12' long,( really 16' but you'll have to go thru a drywall supplier & most likely pick it up to get 14' or 16' board) anyway, you end up with just the 2 inside corners on each end and one long recess joint to tape along with your screw holes.

Post back with the questions that are sure to come up either way. ;)