What Is This Wall Made Of?

[Lilacsmokestack]

Hi All,

The install of my hearthstone craftsbury is nearly complete (I will post a thread about the whole install with pictures soon). The installers left me with a big hole in the wall to patch. Let me describe how this wall is built:

Interior brick chimney, log wall, painted wood paneling, wire mesh and masonry (grey color) over the wood paneling, then a finishing coat of another masonry material (which is whiter and has a sandy texture), paint over that (through which you can see the orange peel texture of the masonry and some troweling patterns). What are these two masonry materials and what would bond well to them?

I'm planning to patch the hole with a sheet of Durock, but I don't know what kind of patching material I should slather over the joints between the existing wall and the durock. If I wanted something with that inherent granular texture, it seems it'd have to be stucco or mortar (one of the 17 things called mortar that is sold at the home depot, which one I have no idea)? Or I could use something else I suppose and then try to match the texture with one of the things sold in the paint aisle for texturing walls.

Thanks for your thoughts. I cant' wait to get this thing patched and light the first fire!!

 

[skinanbones]

could be just a about anything, but you might be able to use a stucco roller and a thin coat of mud and get a simular effect. Once painted most people would notice the differance

 

[jrems]

How old is the house? That might be button board with a skim coat of plaster. There is wire mesh between the button board and plaster. My house is the same. Usually seen in houses from the late 1940's to mid 50's

 

[Lilacsmokestack]

Thanks for the replies guys.

I'm not sure what button board is. The paneling behind the wire mesh is 1x6 tongue and groove with a bead pattern milled into the surface. Hard to say when the masonry coating was applied over that. The house was started in 1801, but God only knows who layered up what part of the wall in what decade after that. I will also say that it doesn't look like plaster (I think of plaster as having a finer texture than this, and being hard, not crumbly like this stuff).

At the home store I found two different stucco patch mixes in two completely different parts of the store (one in the drywall section, one in the concrete section, and interestingly nothing in the flooring section where they keep the durock). One bucket of stucco patch said not to use it in areas that would experience heat, so I guess that's out. The other didn't mention anything about that. The Durock website recommends "latex-fortified mortar or Type 1 organic adhesive" for making taped joints between pieces of durock. I'm guessing that means some flavor of "thinset mortar". If I can find some thinset that has a similar texture and doesn't have warnings about heat sensitivity, I think I will give that a try.

 

[begreen]

We have something similar in a bedroom we haven't redone. It is 1/2" thick bead board in about 3" width, all doug fir I think. Nowadays it often is made of MDF.
http://www.vintagewoodworks.com/beadboards-item.html

 

[jrems]

The button board is a crumbly concrete board with holes in it. It was a replacement for lath and plaster. It's often use to patch lath type plaster walls since it's still available. A thin layer of plaster is spread over the cement board and it pushes through the holes to hold onto the board and looks like buttons from the back hence its name.