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I'm doing a home renovation and spackling is murdering. The process I've currently got is -

Round 1 Spackle the tape, at least 2 hour turn around until it's dry enough to cover

Round 2 Put a full coat with unwatered all purpose, have it be ~10 inches from the tape in all directions (takes a day to dry)

Round 3 For in either left to right, or top / down with heavily watered / runny spackle. Use the 12 inch blade at a 85 to 90 degree angle to get a perfectly flat cut. This 100% levels out everything in either up / down or left / right. (normally takes about 1-4 hours to dry fully)

Round 4 Do the same as round 3 but in the opposite direction. End result is perfectly flat in both up / down and left / right. (normally 30 min - 2 hours to dry)

Round 5 Patch work in the same spirit as 3 / 4. Fill it bubble holes, scraps / accidental gouges etc. Do one last run on the edges for a flawless "feathering" in the approach of 3 / 4. At this point it should truly be flawless and 100% flat. After this do one to two runs across evenly with a orbital sander. End product is near flawlessly flat and feathered.

These are for butt joints, not the joints where both ends are depreciated.

So far this seems like "murderous overkill" for if I need to do ie lowering the whole place's ceiling and putting drywall throughout the whole place. It'll literally take weeks just for the spackling. (I get about 4-5 work hours per day)

To me it seems the main things are - Use quick set on the tape and tape covering rounds to get a day turn around to a few hours. Consider using mesh tape to cut out the tape drying time. 2. Go out less distance from the tape to create less surface area. Less surface area means less spackle to put up for round 3 / 4. Since it's going to be guaranteed flawlessly flat, maybe 8 inches out or even 6 might work? 3. Maybe cut out Round 4 entirely and just make round 3 be against whatever direction the tape covering round was, and essentially make the tape covering round double as the round 4.

I'm doing a home renovation and spackling is murdering. The process I've currently got is - Round 1 Spackle the tape, at least 2 hour turn around until it's dry enough to cover Round 2 Put a full coat with unwatered all purpose, have it be ~10 inches from the tape in all directions (takes a day to dry) Round 3 For in either left to right, or top / down with heavily watered / runny spackle. Use the 12 inch blade at a 85 to 90 degree angle to get a perfectly flat cut. This 100% levels out everything in either up / down or left / right. (normally takes about 1-4 hours to dry fully) Round 4 Do the same as round 3 but in the opposite direction. End result is perfectly flat in both up / down and left / right. (normally 30 min - 2 hours to dry) Round 5 Patch work in the same spirit as 3 / 4. Fill it bubble holes, scraps / accidental gouges etc. Do one last run on the edges for a flawless "feathering" in the approach of 3 / 4. At this point it should truly be flawless and 100% flat. After this do one to two runs across evenly with a orbital sander. End product is near flawlessly flat and feathered. These are for butt joints, not the joints where both ends are depreciated. So far this seems like "murderous overkill" for if I need to do ie lowering the whole place's ceiling and putting drywall throughout the whole place. It'll literally take weeks just for the spackling. (I get about 4-5 work hours per day) To me it seems the main things are - Use quick set on the tape and tape covering rounds to get a day turn around to a few hours. Consider using mesh tape to cut out the tape drying time. 2. Go out less distance from the tape to create less surface area. Less surface area means less spackle to put up for round 3 / 4. Since it's going to be guaranteed flawlessly flat, maybe 8 inches out or even 6 might work? 3. Maybe cut out Round 4 entirely and just make round 3 be against whatever direction the tape covering round was, and essentially make the tape covering round double as the round 4.

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[–] [deleted] • 2 pts

Been having good luck with the fine mesh tape lately.

Mix up some Easy Sand 20/45/90 in your mud pan. Spackle the tape with your 6" blade for the first coat. This is the easy coat. Just get it on there and smooth it out.

2nd coat mix up another batch of Easy Sand. Grab your middle sized blade and start covering the first coat so the spackle is a few inches winder. I slap it on perpendicular to the tape line first to just get some product on their and after I have a couple feet of mud I then smooth it out in the direction of the tape. I try to put pressure on the right or left side of the blade depending on where I am at the moment. I'm anal so I try to make it as clean and straight as possible.

3rd coat I like to use the Dust Control blue lid mud from Home Depot. Same process as 2nd coat but with your biggest blade. Just put a nice smooth coat over in the same fashion and make it nice and wide so it doesn't look like there's a hump where you spackle. The lightweight spackle is more for decoration and is easy to sand.

Then go out and buy $1000 worth of Festool gear. A nice dust extractor and palm sized orbital sander with 220 grit. Sand away while eliminating 98% of the dust.

If you are doing a whole wall buy the purple lid stuff. Mix it up with a heavy drill/paddle and add a little Dawn soap to help eliminate the 'moon craters.' Dip a 1" nap roller cage into the bucket and roll the spackle onto the wall like you are painting. One guy rolls and another guy does the smoothing with the big spackle knife.

Prime everything. Touch up spackle if there are any annoying moon craters. Make sure you have a good mega light to illuminate the room. The Festool one is bright as fuck. You can do 3 coats in one day, put a fan on it, and then come the next day to sand/prime. Prime the whole ceiling even if it's not all spackled. 2nd coat the ceiling with Sherwin Williams pro mar ceiling paint. It's cheap and works well. Paint all your trim and then paint the walls. It's easier to cut a wall into trim than trim into wall.