Thread: Architrave 2

Quad.

Ive got many similar problems around my house . I just hope no one notices and I forget about it .
Hey I never said I was a perfectionist .

I've tried four different things to address this problem in the past:

1. Coloured gap filler: Looks OK but hard to get a good colour match. Only good for small gaps.

2. Use a wider bit of arc and scribe cut it to fit: can look a bit funny if there's a big discrepancy.

3. Quad: not a look I like much but does the job. Hard to get quad in the same species. Make your own from a bit of the arc and can look OK.

4. Leave it as is: in two weeks time you'll never notice it.

I agree with Silent's suggestions number 3 and 4. Quad will be easy - leaving it is even easier. I have a similar situation with my front door and the builder just used a bit of quad to cover it up. No problem.

Trav

2. Use a wider bit of arc and scribe cut it to fit: can look a bit funny if there's a big discrepancy.

3. Quad: not a look I like much but does the job. Hard to get quad in the same species. Make your own from a bit of the arc and can look OK.


I'd go with these, both good for me!


Nice call !!!!

what you need to do this is....

1. quad
2. filler
3. paint (oil based covers all sins..with enough coats)
4. something to divert the eyes of visitors...a book on karma sutra for beginners laying on your hall table should do it!

Use quad, if necessary you can also taper the quad a little bit so that the doorway/wall appears even. (use a handplane)
- shock horror - me suggesting dark side tools

Experts don't get in to the situation where they have a gap in the first place.....and quad is for covering mistakes.Looks good in a Jennings house.

Tools

Originally Posted by Tools

Experts don't get in to the situation where they have a gap in the first place...

Depends on your definition of expert. A bloke can be an expert at slapping in premade arc's in record time... and still leave gaps. This doesn't reduce his expertise in what he does, it just means he doesn't fix or allow for other people's ****ups.

An installer who'll go the lengths of scribing in an oversize arc because the plasterers didn't get it right is not necessarily an expert; but they are someone who cares and probably takes pride in their work.

And let's face it, any design which calls for a door to be hardup to the angle in a wall was screwed right from the beginning: at the architects' board! All that's happened is the error has been passed down thru the tradies 'til the end of the line where it has to be fixed, usually in the least satisfactory way. ie. it would have been better to have a 6" return in the first place instead of making it the door installers problem.

"Expert's don't get into that situation in the first place?" HMMMPH!

I stand by what I said.As a qualified carpenter/foreman/builder of 21 years,I think I am well qualified to comment.If you know that you are going to have a door right in the corner (and there is nothing wrong with that ),you take in to account the thickness of the plaster and size of the arc when you fit the door jamb so that you don't have the possibility of such a small gap.Nothing difficult,a little thought is all that is needed.But that is just the difference between a qualified ,skilled and experienced tradesman who has pride in their work and someone who does work for builders like Jennings.But I do agree with you,it boils down to your definition of an expert.

Tools

If you framed it yourself, then yes, you should be able to avoid this situation. You don't always have that luxury.

The last time I had to deal with this problem was in a hallway leading to an entrance door. The hallway was only slightly wider than the door and so there was a gap down either side of the arc. No amount of packing or fiddling with the door jamb was going to eliminate the gap. Besides, the door had to be centered or it would look wrong.

So no matter how much of an expert you are, you sometimes need to know how to handle gaps.

fair call Silentc...so how did you deal with it then? I would suggest ideally to pull the plaster off,straighten the wall,and replaster.Failing that,remove the offending arc,get the next size up for that side,and scribe to the wall.

Tools

Yes I ripped a wider bit. It was only 5mm either side. I thought about making the quirk a bit wider but decided against it because it would have looked odd and was getting close to the width of the jamb edge.

The chippy wanted to use a bit of quad but it looked bad, so I pulled it down and did it again. Quad causes problems down at the skirting level too. You really need to run it right through and scribe the skirting to it but then instead of a nice clean line, you have the skirting merging into the radius of the quad.

Originally Posted by DavidC

I have an architrave problem on my entrance door
The architrave on one side is in the corner where other wall meets. The problem is the corner is not dead straight has a slight curve. This makes a gap of 2 - 5mm appear between the edge of architrave and wall and will be extreamily hard to paint behind. Also my architraves have been stained so guping gap up and painting gap sealant is out of the question. What do the experts do to close this gap.

Scribe the arhitrave to fit.
Write back if you are interested in step by step procedure