How to First Coat Your Drywall Flats

Well now we can begin to first coat your drywall flats ,at this point you should have everything covered with tape. Do a walk around your job and double check everything you have taped and make sure all your corner bead,flats,corners,screw holes are all coated even the smallest pieces so that you don't have to backtrack as this can be very frustrating to start coating and then find out you have missed a spot that needs tape. So now that you have check this and corrected everything we can start.

Now I want you to take your drywall hand sander and put a piece of sand paper on it or screen paper which is what I use it lasts longer. You can buy these cut to to size to fit your sander at any building supply store, use 120 grit. Take your sander in hand and go lightly over your flats to take off any bits of drywall compound you may have left on your tape and please do not sand so hard that you are damaging the tape. The point of this is to knock off any small high points so that when you apply your coat it goes on smooth without getting little pieces of drywall in your mud. I will say this again you are not sanding your job you are prepping it.

We will now check your compound and make sure if it's a partly used pail that it does not have any bits of dry compound in it as this will cause you aggravation to no end. If your mud has too much crap in it put it aside and get a fresh pail,it's worth the extra cost and it can be used for other things. Make sure your box and 12 inch knife are cleaned as well as your mixing attachment. As before take your mixer and mix the mud nice and smooth and with your clean 3 inch knife scoop your compound into your box. Now with box and 12 inch knife in hand you are ready to start your first coat.

Start at one end of your wall and with your 12 inch knife scoop some mud out of your box and apply about an 8 inch wide amount across {vertically} your drywall seem about a 1/4 inch thick. Do this until you have gone about 3 or 4 feet down your wall,if coating a small wall 8 feet or less do half at a time, now take your knife and at the point you started and drag your knife {horizontally} lightly over the mud you applied scooping the excess mud you take off back into your box. keep repeating this until you have a very thin coat over your tape no more then about 1/16 or 1/8 of an inch thick, the thinner the better, you are not trying to hide your tape completely yet, repeat this step until you are about 4 feet from the other end of your wall.

Now start at the other end of your wall and apply mud to the rest of your wall and working from the other corner of the wall draw back to where you finished the first half, you may have a small line where you meet your other end, but don't worry to much about this you will see later. The important thing is to keep this coat as thin and neat as possible without scraping it off completely,the more seems you coat the easier it will become to you remember you are not in a race your after quality. Follow these steps carefully and never draw your knife vertically when smoothing out your seem always draw along the same direction as the seem. Coat every flat that you have and miss none then take a break and let them dry well.This ends how to first coat your drywall flats next we will first coat your corner bead.