Drywall Cutting

Anyone who has ever worked with drywall, he is well aware that this building material must be cut to the desired size. In ideal conditions, most sheets of drywall are installed in a holistic form. If the walls are aligned in a large room, then the GCR will have to be cut a little, and this can be done under the ruler. However, in small rooms you will have to constantly cut the sheets so that they fit perfectly evenly.

Over how to cut drywall, you have to think about anyone who started a repair using this material. Fortunately, if you just need to cut the material to the desired size, but what if you want to create non-standard shapes, such as arcs, triangles, ovals, etc.? Consider all these nuances in more detail.

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• 1. Preparatory work
• 2. Which tool to choose
• 3. We use construction knife
• 4. Rules of working with a manual hacksaw
• 5. To create complex cuts using a jigsaw.

Preparatory work

There are special rulers for cutting drywall

At the preparatory stage, everything is quite simple. It is necessary to lay the cut sheet in a convenient position. If a professional in some cases can carry out cutting on weight, then for a beginner a smooth solid surface on which drywall is placed is required. Most often use a large table or, in extreme cases, put a sheet on the floor. If there is no table, and the floor is not an option because of the tools used, then the sheet is simply placed on two stools (or more).

Sheets drywall better cut from the front.

It is necessary to ask not only the question of what is better to cut drywall, but also what additional tools may be needed for this. What can be useful?

1. A tape measure or ruler is required for accurate measurements before cutting.
2. Construction knife is directly cutting. You can use a clerical knife as a fallback.
3. A hacksaw can be used instead of a knife.
4. The pencil is needed to mark the location of the cut.
5. The edge planer is needed to immediately trim the cut edges. After cutting, they do not look very. You can also immediately chamfer.
6. For the same purposes as in the previous paragraph, file files or sandpaper will be required if the cut was not even (the plane is good only for straight edges).
7. The electric fretsaw is used by the most experienced craftsmen on large volumes of work. To rent or buy a tool for a dozen straight lines does not make sense.

Of course, not all of these tools come in handy. It all depends on what kind of cutting is required to perform.

Which tool to choose

How to cut drywall at home? To answer this question you need to understand what kind of work you need to do. If you want to make a hole under the socket, then this is one situation, if the sheet is simply clipped to the size of the wall, then this is a different situation. A completely different approach is required when figured shapes are attached to the edge of the sheet.

Regardless of the tool chosen, it is always necessary to pre-mark. Only after marking and checking its correctness can you start cutting drywall.

Most often, the following tools are used for cutting:

• knife;
• hacksaw;
• jigsaw.

Office or kitchen knives - this is absolutely amateur tools. It makes sense to use them only when there is nothing left at hand. As they say, if there is no pencil, then the marking can be done with a nail. So here, if the construction knife was not at hand, you will have to take any other. However, thick sheets of such tools will be difficult to cut.

The whole list of necessary tools each determines for itself.

How to cut drywall with a construction knife? First you need to make sure that the selected tool is correct. The construction knife should have a double-sided blade. It is clear that you can work only with a sharp blade. It is necessary to lay a sheet on a hill and make several cuts with such a knife along the marked line. It is advisable to attach a metal ruler or profile along which an incision will be made. Then the sheet is cracked along the cut line. The cardboard from the back of the sheet is easily cut when the plasterboard is already cracked.

A hacksaw is good because it has a thin blade. As a result, the edges of the sheets will be practically without chipping due to a thin cutting (the structure of the saw teeth and its thickness accompany this). When working with a saw, drywall should be like on weight, because you need a place on both its sides.

Jigsaw is good in cases where it is necessary to cut shapes of different complexity.

Next, we consider in more detail how to cut drywall at home with various tools.

We use construction knife

It is rational to use a knife in those cases when it is necessary to cut a flat piece of drywall or to dissolve it into two parts. Such situations prevail in the repair process.

The order of cutting GKL knife

The first step is to take measurements in order to determine which piece to be cut. Having a line at the place of the future cut, we will simplify the whole process. Often, several sheets are laid out at once or one sheet in several places. Therefore, take a pencil, the line from which will be clearly visible.

At the edge of the line is applied a ruler or profile, which should fit snugly to the drywall. At the same time building material should not sag. The edge of the knife is pressed into the line and with a touch held along the ruler several times.

Now the sheet must be broken open cut out. To do this, drywall is placed on the edge of the table so that the cut protrudes a little beyond this edge. Usually, they hold the sheet with one hand, and the second break the cropped part.

Breaking can be done with the help of an exact palm stroke on the back of the sheet. Someone taps a hammer or crushes the knee.

The broken sheet is placed at an angle to the floor, after which the entire piece of cardboard is cut in order to separate the cut piece. The edge of the plane is processed in order to remove burrs and make a hollow for high-quality sealing of seams.

From the video below you can learn how to properly cut a small drywall right on the floor.

Rules of working with a manual hacksaw

If you need to cut a piece of drywall a special form, then it is rational to use a hacksaw, because with a knife this effect can not be achieved. It is necessary to create arcs, waves and other curved edges on a sheet of drywall. These forms are especially relevant when creating a multi-level ceiling and interior partitions.

Again, the whole process starts with the fact that markup is done on the GCR. The order of the markup depends on the specific task. It’s one thing to make a circle for the hole for the socket and it’s quite another to make a chamomile markup on the ceiling.

Especially convenient to cut with a hacksaw arc

Creating a pattern, pattern or lines that need to be cut, you need to think about the entry point for a hacksaw. Somehow she had to go through drywall to cut it. After the hacksaw is inserted into the FCL, you just need to cut along the marked lines. It is desirable that they do not have strong bends, because such a turn is extremely difficult to repeat.

This scheme is clear if you need to cut from edge to edge. But how to cut drywall, if the shape does not touch the edges of the sheet? In this case, it is necessary somewhere in the middle of the marked line to punch a hole with a knife. The hacksaw will be inserted into this hole.

To create complex cuts using a jigsaw

The more complex the shape of the incision, the more refined the tools needed to be used. When it comes to complex pieces of plasterboard, then you need to cut the sheets with a jigsaw.

Jigsaw is often used to create holes inside a sheet.

Drywall must be marked, and then put on stools so that they are not under the cut lines. We do not need to saw an electric jigsaw hooked something along the way.

The tool itself is installed at the beginning of the line, along which it is then conducted. In the process there is nothing difficult. The main thing is to fill the hand and guide the tool clearly along the lines.

The big disadvantage of this method is the creation of a large amount of dust that will spread throughout the apartment.

The undoubted advantages of jigsaw are:

• thin blade, so that the material does not deteriorate. At the same time, the blade is tough enough to make even cuts with it;
• the presence of small teeth on the blade makes the cuts smooth and the core of the drywall is not torn;
• this tool allows not only to cut the sheet into even pieces, but also to do it, simultaneously creating figured patterns;
• due to the electric motor is attached not a lot of physical strength.

Now you know how to cut hkl in various situations. You can visually understand the jigsaw work from the video below.