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When I was in high school, my parents hired some contractors to put an addition on the family home and do some improvements in most of the rooms. So the most a

When I was in high school, my parents hired some contractors to put an addition on the family home and do some improvements in most of the rooms. So the most arduous part of the whole job appeared to be the demolition to start with. They started pounding into the thick plaster walls, and revealed a thick mesh of solid steel reinforcement. Of course, that took ages to take out, wherever they had to deal with such a wall. And you know what? I was absolutely appalled by the chintzy material that went in to replace it. They just brought this drywall, you know, and I got to touch it and examine it, and I couldn't believe how flimsy it was, when compared to the reinforced plaster they'd just taken out. I mean, like, there were cost and time considerations, but it seemed like a travesty to me. Like we were sacrificing half of our solid, valuable home for a mere facsimile in the other parts. Today, the WiFi is fairly bad. My dad only has the one router in a distant corner of the den. I don't know how reception is directly upstairs, where his bedroom is, but the downstairs bedroom can barely keep a signal going at the best of times. That home renovation was happening around 1988, so possibly too early to really think of putting Ethernet in every room, but my dad would've been the dad to do it.

vel0city 3y ago
Sure, the drywall is flimsier than the plaster walls you had before but they are way easier to work with, make modifications to, and repair. And for normal usage, they're plenty reliable. The walls themselves shouldn't be a part of what makes the house "solid", that's the job of the framing behind the plaster or drywall.
- samus 3y ago
  > The walls themselves shouldn't be a part of what makes the house "solid", that's the job of the framing behind the plaster or drywall. It's actually a fairly recent trend to not build load-bearing walls anymore and instead really on a skeleton. Walks can very well be constructed to be load-bearing. But, as you indicate, the resulting building would be more difficult to modify.
- SkyPuncher 3y ago
  It's also, typically, nailed into studs 16" apart. Just not a lot of room for flex in that case.
throw0101c 3y ago
> They just brought this drywall, you know, and I got to touch it and examine it, and I couldn't believe how flimsy it was, when compared to the reinforced plaster they'd just taken out. Exactly what are you getting by having the 'less flimsy' plaster and what are you losing with the 'flimsy' drywall? (I ask this as someone with three uncles that work in construction/renos.)
- kenhwang 3y ago
  The biggest benefit I've noticed with plaster walls is the soundproofing. There's more layers of much denser material. My walls are 1 inch of plaster with metal lath (vs the typical 1/2 thickness for drywall), on top of traditional wood slat lath, then insulation and studs. Typically if you have construction old enough for lath and plaster walls, they might also have independent studs per side, further isolating sound transfer. It's also less porous and doesn't hold water like drywall, making it quite mold resistant.

vel0city 3y ago

Sure, the drywall is flimsier than the plaster walls you had before but they are way easier to work with, make modifications to, and repair. And for normal usage, they're plenty reliable. The walls themselves shouldn't be a part of what makes the house "solid", that's the job of the framing behind the plaster or drywall.

samus 3y ago
> The walls themselves shouldn't be a part of what makes the house "solid", that's the job of the framing behind the plaster or drywall. It's actually a fairly recent trend to not build load-bearing walls anymore and instead really on a skeleton. Walks can very well be constructed to be load-bearing. But, as you indicate, the resulting building would be more difficult to modify.
SkyPuncher 3y ago
It's also, typically, nailed into studs 16" apart. Just not a lot of room for flex in that case.

throw0101c 3y ago

> They just brought this drywall, you know, and I got to touch it and examine it, and I couldn't believe how flimsy it was, when compared to the reinforced plaster they'd just taken out. Exactly what are you getting by having the 'less flimsy' plaster and what are you losing with the 'flimsy' drywall? (I ask this as someone with three uncles that work in construction/renos.)

kenhwang 3y ago
The biggest benefit I've noticed with plaster walls is the soundproofing. There's more layers of much denser material. My walls are 1 inch of plaster with metal lath (vs the typical 1/2 thickness for drywall), on top of traditional wood slat lath, then insulation and studs. Typically if you have construction old enough for lath and plaster walls, they might also have independent studs per side, further isolating sound transfer. It's also less porous and doesn't hold water like drywall, making it quite mold resistant.