Repair Shower Ceiling - Minor Water Damage & Mold - texture removal

[eastbay_bungalow]

Hi Folks!

The ceiling in our bathroom in the shower has started to buckle and bubble ( due to condensation via winter temp differences. probably), so I scraped off the peeling paint and discovered some minor mold and water damage to the drywall.

As you can see, the ceiling is textured - it attracts mold in winter months in the texture crevasses that I have cleaned up with Clorox spray. Perhaps that's what promoted the peeling?

NOW, I was planning to skim coat the textured walls and ceiling in the spring, ( to get rid of texture and have a clean, smooth finish) as I already did one wall successfully - skimmed coat with joint compound and painted high-quality bathroom paint no issues.

So now I need to do 2 things: 1. repair the damage so we can use shower without further damaging drywall, and 2, remove the texture by skim coating as I did with one wall.

With this in mind, I wanted to see if my plan makes sense:

Right now, I'm running a dehumidifier and its drying out the stained area well. After 24 hr of dehumidifying,
I was going to sand off most mold spots, ( use full-face respirator) then spray CONCROBUIM ( https://www.lowes.com/pd/Concrobium-32-oz-Liquid-Mold-Remover/50053503 )

on the area to prevent future mold issues, let that dry out , and then joint compound the area, dry, prime with ( 1-2-3 or Benjamin Moore Fresh Start primer? I have both) and paint a few times.

This is my emergency repair plan so we can use shower.

NOW, because I don't want to match the texture, but I want to get rid of it, and because the previous texture/paint bond failed either due to water or my Clorox use) my gut plan was to scrape the rest of the texture of the ENTIRE bathroom ceiling, ( a bigger weekend job) then joint compound skim/ prime and paint entire ceiling? VS JUST repairing that spot, and then JOINT COMPOUND SKIMMING OVER the rest of existing TEXTURE?

For the walls, perhaps just a light sanding and Joint C. skimming will be fine since the walls don't get the condensation, but I did do a test SCRAPE TEXTURE OFF in a corner, and it did scrape SOME TEXTURE off, but if I don't need to do that, I would rather just Joint compound coat on top.

The current WALL paint is slippery semigloss - Im thinking sanding lightly would give it enough tooth, but perhaps scrping off texture first, then sanding would be better.

I was going to use this compound for repair and texture removal:
https://www.lowes.com/pd/SHEETROCK-Brand-Easy-Sand-18-lb-Lightweight-Drywall-Joint-Compound/3009562

Does my emergency repair plan make sense? How would you handle the texture issue?
many thanks in advance.

 

[Snoonyb]

Cut a 6"sq. vent in the ceiling, scrape, sand prime with an oil based primer, use until final repairs are made.

 

[eastbay_bungalow]

Thanks for the advice. I actually never thought of installing a bathroom vent, but it seems we might have to although its a project I might need to hire for since we need to run a vent pipe through attic and out the roof. We were planning to install a Venting Velux skylight in a year or two, realizing we need better ventilation, but that's a bit away. We do have a window ( seen in pic) in the shower with about 16" opening that is always open during showers, but the ceiling still condenses in the winter. I was thinking to put a window exhaust fan, but the electric line seems problematic since the window is in the shower. Interesting advice on OIL primer.

 

[Snoonyb]

Vents have been standard fare in stall showers in CA for over 80yrs and they were not vented to fresh air, just to the attic. saved a lot of ceilings. They had metal frames or were just hardware cloth placed in the attic over the hole.

I'm old school and only use oil based primers because they are not only fast drying, they are transitional.