Dap with mesh tape. Always prime the Dap. You won’t see a joint even ten years later, go ahead get as close as you like.
When sanding it down close your eyes and feel with your fingers, if you can feel it you will see it.
Wow. Well that is a ringing endorsement for the drywall method! Has anyone here had results this good with any method other than drywall mud? 10, 20, or 30 years without any cracks?
I’m planning to do this once and be done. This will be a permanent layout that -God willing- will last for decades. No plans to build and then tear it out in a decade and do something different.
If I understand from your picture you primed on either side of the joints and then used DAP spackle to fill in? I’m not familiar with the mesh tape (I know what it is but is the tape you used from DAP as well or 3M or someone else?)
I filled the crack to level with Dap (no tape).
When that dried I put Fibatape over the areas where the crack was.
I then proceeded to layer Dap over the Fibatape until covered and sanded so you could not feel any ridges.
Once dry I primed the Dap overlapping onto the hardboard that is why it looks like that.
My good friend taught drywalling at the local trade school and told me that primer adds a lot of strength to the Dap. He was also the guy that told me about closing my eyes to feel how good your sanding job is.
Make sure you fill the crack to level before you add the Fibatape or it will likely crack.
I also added a 4" wide piece of hardboard on the back behind each crack with glue-gun glue.
Well, I attach it to 1X2 verticals or horizontal stringers with ring-shank nails at the top and bottom. The bottom ones will be hidden by scenery, and while the top nails are visible, they’re painted along with the rest of the backdrop and just sort of fade into the sky. If you look closely you can see the heads though.
I’ve got some that have moved with me several times plus sat in unconditioned storerooms, and never had an issue with warpage or waviness. They’re basically immune to humidity and temperature changes (unless you go after them with a torch or soldering iron!).
Ah, you are right. However, and in me own defence, I was thinking about some galvanized chicken wire, or even something finer. The cut ends would be a problem, though…
Thanks Brent, that is good info [:)]
NlI used mesh tape for some joints when drywalling my basement. The rest was done with paper tape. A number of the joints done with mesh cracked. None of the joints done with paper tape crack.
FWIW
I have found that the mesh tape acts more like rebar in that it allows the Dap/mud to go right through it filling any voids that may be in behind it. This gives much-added strength. Nothing wrong with tape, just make sure every bit of it is firmly secured to the wall and not lifting off. With the mesh the Dap goes right through and fixes that problem.
Cracks again and come again and again…never ending story, and no good way to make cracks vanished from the backdrop.
All the layouts we see for the most have a cracks in a place of the backdrop or have had cracks in the backdrop joins
In fact contraction and expansion are normal for any wood structure or wood fiber stuff like masonite or MDF; these materials are not stable and are affected by wheather change or humidity in the air.
Put on these expandable materials some kind of rigid mud will give one day a crack; there are no issue about that and we can’t do nothing against it
Plasterboard panels suffer from the same trouble in time unfortunately.
I use a different method for backdrop, seldom seen in US but in Europe some well know layouts use this technique and is quiet easy to use.
These layouts use a vinyl floor carpet hanged against the walls.
Vinyl floor carpet is easy to paint with latex or acrylics paints.
Course this need some clever trick to hang the vinyl floor to the walls and fix it or glue it on some supports because there is not a lot of background about it, but nothing really more difficult than the construction of a conventional backdrop
The vinyl backdrop can support any curves and there is no crack or join, this is a one piece backdrop since we hang a roll of vinyl floor along the walls of the layout room like a curtains
They are sold in lenght which can go to around 120’ and with a width of around 3 to 5 feet sometimes more.
This is not really expensive beside a full wood structure backdrop
And eureka no more crack in the future which come back
No dust work to prepare and finish the backdrop seams,and no dust on a existing layout when you need to repair cracks.
Fast to make up when support are in place, a friend of mine used it for an HO layout in a room of around 36’ by 12’; this was a one day job to hang and fix the vinyle roll al
Vinyl flooring sounds like a good idea. If I ever build another layout I will look into it. Prep for painting may require some research.
I have read about vinyl flooring in one of my MR books. I can definitely see where there would be advantages to that. But I’m already committed.
Today I found DAP Dynaflex Flexible Spackling. Flexible, sandable, paintable. “Won’t sink, shrink, or crack.” “Repairs drywall, wood, and metal.”
We shall see…