Frugal way to texturize walls?

[Pokeberry Mary]

We have to paint all the walls in our house soon.
Its all fresh dry wall.

It used to be there was an inexpensive silica sand or perlite that you added to the paint and you'd have what's called a 'sand finish'.

I just want something like that.

Nowadays they sell texturizers but the price is like painting again.

We don't want to spray the walls cuz we're doing it a little at a time and don't own the right equipment--at our pace it would be nuts to rent it.

Anyone have a simple solution? A homemade recipe? some way you've finished your dry wall without spending a fortune??

Thanks!:)

[backlash]

I used a texture additive in the paint.
Absolutely the worst thing I have ever done.
The walls came out looking terrible.
Fortunately the house sold and the new owners can deal with my mistake.
I remodeled my current home and I textured the walls correctly.
The texture is just joint compound and Ace hardware rented the sprayer pretty cheap.
You can also buy the texture sprayer for less than $100.
If you have fresh drywall up now you could texture it and paint later.
Do as much at one time as possible.
Cleaning the sprayer is a pain.

[NCLee]

Are you sure that you want to have textured walls?

I used to see the "experts" do them on HGTV. Always wished I could ask them "How do you keep them clean?" "How do you keep the dust bunnies out of all the hiding places?" How often will you have to vacuum the walls? Don't think a simple wipe down with a towel will do the job. (Someone please correct me on that, if I'm wrong.)

While I know it's not the same thing, I HATE the popcorn ceiling that I still have in my home. Can't really dust that stuff. Perhaps one day, I'll get it rest of it scraped off, so I'll have smooth ceilings all over the house.

Further, what do you do if you change your mind in a few years? If you decide that you want to put up wallpaper, when it comes back into style, you'll have to smooth the walls in some manner. Or, you'll have to apply a heavy underliner or textured paper that'll be painted. (Based on what's currently on the market, last time I checked.)

BTW, I'd go ahead and prime those walls with Kilz or whatever primer you want to use. Even though the walls seem to be smooth, the paper will collect dust that has to be removed, if you wait a material length of time before priming.

Just some food for thought this morning.
Lee

[momma_to_seven_chi]

We have to paint all the walls in our house soon.
Its all fresh dry wall.

It used to be there was an inexpensive silica sand or perlite that you added to the paint and you'd have what's called a 'sand finish'.

I just want something like that.

Nowadays they sell texturizers but the price is like painting again.

We don't want to spray the walls cuz we're doing it a little at a time and don't own the right equipment--at our pace it would be nuts to rent it.

Anyone have a simple solution? A homemade recipe? some way you've finished your dry wall without spending a fortune??

Thanks!:)

You can actually just paint on the big five gallon buckets of "spackle" (or whatever you call it) with a paint brush. Then take a sponge and pat it all over the wall to erase clumps. Let it dry. It ends up white, or you can paint over it. The trick is sponging it after it is painted on to even out the finish. You can even mix some paint with the joint spackle and paint it on that way. It just ends up lighter than the original paint. We did it all over the old plaster walls in the attic to even the surface and hide imperfections. We started with a chocolate colored paint, but it dried rose after being mixed with the joint compound. If you want a true color, then you would have to do the spackle first, let it dry, then paint over it. We did that in one of the upstairs bedrooms and it ended up the orginal color.

[backlash]

Textured walls are easy to clean.
The popcorn ceiling you have is different and almost impossible to clean.
With a sprayer you can dial in the amount of texture you want to apply.
Orange peal is about what I went with maybe just a little bit more texture.
Practice on something before you start and then when you do start go to the most out of the way spot.
You will get a lot better fast.
It's really easy to do and it does cover up some of the less than perfect drywall errors.
One thing I learned is after the texture has dried completely take a wide putty knife and scrape off any big blobs of texture then paint.
It's pretty hard to screw it up.
I have seen the texture guns for sell cheap on Craigslist or you could put a wanted ad on Craigslist.
I would bet someone as one they used once and it's been in the garage ever since.
You do need an air compressor so that could be a problem.
I would suggest you talk to your local hardware person. You might get to use the sprayer and compressor free if you but the texture from them.

[Builder Ken]

Backlash is right the texture gun is the way to go. You can also do it by hand it's called "skip trowel" kind of a old world Italy look I have done this on houses and if you pay a professional to do it it is exspensive. It is easy to do, take a 6" knife or a 4" if it fits your hand better and start by just loading up the knife and dragging it across the drywall. Try not to get more that a 1/8" build up go in different directions leaving some drywall uncovered. It's fun and the kids can even help if I knew how to post pics I would show you my house. PS the texture gun is faster. Ken

[ldsparamedic]

When my wife and I tape and textured over our vinal wall board in our mobile home we used the sprayer in our bedroom. It came out OK. A friend of mine told me try another way for our living room:

Mix joint compound (mud) with water until you have a pancake batter consistency. Get the thickest roller, such as one for painting brick, etc, and load it up with the mud. Roll on the wall in straight, overlapping lines and it comes out beautiful. It looked a whole lot better than the sprayed texturing. It was nice and even, and not hard to clean, even with a toddler.

[Mom5farmboys]

I live in an old farmhouse and my walls are (used to be--we are currently remodeling) the old lathe and plaster. When they put on the final coat of plaster it was rough, and a plain coat of paint looked terrible, especially the ceilings. I wallpapered some of it but that got pricey.

My solution was to paint the wall or ceiling one color like white, then I took a sea sponge and sponge painted over that one or two shades darker white, (or beige or tan or whatever color your working with) when I was done, it not only covered all the imperfections in the wall but it looked texured, from almost every angle, if you were close and really scrutinizing the wall it was obvious that it wasn't texured, but I found that I was the only one looking at it that closely!

[MooseToo]

It was nice and even, and not hard to clean, even with a toddler.

isn't that child abuse ?

[canuck]

I'm sure you've painting your walls already...but I picked up this giant bucket of texture paint...plain white from Home Depot...very cheap...like maybe $20 or around that...it's very thick. I didn't even notice it and just happened upon it at the back of the store....you roll it on either using a regular roller or a special textured one...if using the regular roller use a sponge and dab at the paint....I did one coat...some spots two...then just painted right on top. It's really good...the walls here were really bad and you can't see the defects now. Also it appears to make a stronger bond with the paint...like loads of pets running around it's held up better than the regular painted walls..you can wipe it...did doesn't seem to peel or come off as easy. I'm planning on using the rest of the bucket as there is enough on two other areas...again going to just paint on top of it.

[Junie]

isn't that child abuse ?

:sarcastic::sarcastic::sarcastic:

[12vman]

Mix some coarse ground corn meal in the paint and roll it on.. ;)

[AzLoneRider]

I know this is an old thread however:
1. Buy a box of premixed dry wall mud.
2. Take it home put some in another container
3. Water it down so a texturizing roller will roll it on the wall
4. Roll it on the wall and let it dry.
5. Take a drywall knife or wide putty knife and knock off the high points.

You may have to make some practice runs in a closet or other less noticeable area however you can get a pretty good finish with this method. It will take longer than a drywall gun but if you take your time it can come out pretty nice.

..... and I just read what LDSParamedic wrote... I guess I should read the whole thread before replying.