Tape job blew out in a rental unit, guy blamed my mud mix

Last month I finished a ceiling patch in a duplex over in Fresno, used the same 90 minute mud I always run. Two weeks later the tenant calls saying the tape is peeling right down the center seam. I go check it and the paper tape lifted clean off, but the mud underneath was still soft. Turns out the guy who framed that closet put the vents right above the seam and that ceiling gets direct sun through a skylight all afternoon. The heat cooked the joint before it ever cured right. I had to cut out 14 feet of tape, re-mud with setting compound, and run a fan up there for two days. The owner still tried to say I mixed it too thin. Anyone else run into tape failures that were really a framing or vent problem, not a mud problem?

2 comments

2 Comments

the_brian3d ago

Had the same thing happen last year in a unit near Bakersfield, AC vent was dumping right on a hallway joint and the tape bubbled up like popcorn. Owner swore I used bad mud until we cut it open and the paper was bone dry but the compound underneath was still tacky, all heat soak, no airflow.

logan_gonzalez2d ago

Wait till you check the return air side. That cold air gets pulled back through the wall cavity and can hit the back of the drywall on the opposite side of that joint. The paper might look fine but the core gets chilled and sweats when humid air hits it. Seen a hallway where the return was right above a door header and the tape blistered every summer like clockwork. Cut the wall open and there was standing water in the insulation, not from a leak but straight condensation. That setup's worse than the supply vent because you can't feel it happening.