Drywall water damage - replace?

[Bear28]

Hi,

My friend who knows zip about home theatre, etc recently had a bit of a flood thru his ceiling. When he moved in there were pre-existing speaker hookups run thru the ceiling for his back speakers. While the water damage isn't right above where these hookups are, he is worried about his speaker performance and stuff and if he will need to replace the drywall, etc.

I told him to just let it dry, rent those blowers/dehumidifiers from Home Depot and have them run for a day or two, and that it will be fine as it wasn't a big amount of damage or anything. Am I wrong? Would the speaker wire run be affected at all?

Thanks

[SpauldingSmails]

no guarantee, chances are the shielding should take care of it, however, if water found its way down a sheath and made contact with the copper wire it could oxidize and hurt the performance.
Your recommendation was good, dry everything out very well and they'll hear it if anything is wrong...

[My_Two_Cents]

You need to be real careful with water damage. Drying everything out is good, but unless you know what's behind the wet drywall it's a crap shoot. Once mold starts, you're in big trouble, so you need to make sure there is none, and to do that you will need to remove the drywall. As for the speaker wire, everything should be fine as long as water did not get onto the wire terminations.

[Deadset]

^ What Ricshoe said.

You have some good intentions, but what may look dry on one side might be wet on the other. Remember, that drywall paper acts as a wick and will soak up water on both sides of the wall.

You can try to dry it out, but I'd cut some test squares out to make sure it's dry. It's the paper that molds, and it doesn't happen overnight, but when it does happen it's expensive to get rid of.

Do it right now, spend the time to eliminate all risks before you have troubles down the road.

[rmcdermid]

Originally Posted by Deads3t

^ What Ricshoe said.

You have some good intentions, but what may look dry on one side might be wet on the other. Remember, that drywall paper acts as a wick and will soak up water on both sides of the wall.

You can try to dry it out, but I'd cut some test squares out to make sure it's dry. It's the paper that molds, and it doesn't happen overnight, but when it does happen it's expensive to get rid of.

Do it right now, spend the time to eliminate all risks before you have troubles down the road.

What he said. If you have any friends that are handy drywall floating isn't insanely difficult. If not I would get a professional. As stated already mold is expensive and better to be proactive than reactive.

[Hammie]

Also, drywall typically swells when wet. so he may not have as smooth an area as previous.

I would always way the side of caution and replace the damaged portions. If his insurance was involved, he probably got some money for other damaged items.

[kingofgrills]

There's been a lot of great advice from Ricshoe and others regarding mold and drywall swelling. As one who is allergic to mold and mildwew, having a mold problem is a big issue in terms of health and potential resale.

My question is this - has the original source of the water damage been repaired? I don't think that has been mentioned anywhere.

[Bear28]

Thanks for all the awesome advice. I talked to my friend at lunch and he gave me some more info which I'm not sure I mentioned:

Water spot on ceiling is about 6in x 6in and another is 2in x 2in.
The leak only happened that once and was resolved, no other water issues known.

I told him about the advice everyone here mentioned but he said that since it was stopped quickly, and is a small area he is hesitant to replace the entire ceiling drywall and/or go thru insurance. He also doesn't think the speaker wire would be run across that spot but who knows since without ripping down the whole thing you wouldn't be able to tell.

I think that based on the suggestions from here, he should at least get a humidity temp/monitor and see what it reads...if its high then rent a dehumidifier and go from there.

Thanks

[My_Two_Cents]

Originally Posted by Bear28

Thanks for all the awesome advice. I talked to my friend at lunch and he gave me some more info which I'm not sure I mentioned:

Water spot on ceiling is about 6in x 6in and another is 2in x 2in.
The leak only happened that once and was resolved, no other water issues known.

That's all? If it were me, I'd cut-out those sections, let everything air-out and dry good for a week or two, slap a drywall patch over each along with a little patching plaster, sand it down, paint it and call it done.

[Hammie]

Originally Posted by Ricshoe

That's all? If it were me, I'd cut-out those sections, let everything air-out and dry good for a week or two, slap a drywall patch over each along with a little patching plaster, sand it down, paint it and call it done.

[krazeyeyez]

lol i was reading down this thread thinking FLOOD type water damage, as my basement theatre just flooded this past month. In my case holes had to be cut and quite a bit of insulation pulled to avoid molding. Im with the others on just cut it out lol, or don't even bother about it. What exactly leaked that only caused two small specks?

[Hammie]

Originally Posted by krazeyeyez

lol i was reading down this thread thinking FLOOD type water damage, as my basement theatre just flooded this past month. In my case holes had to be cut and quite a bit of insulation pulled to avoid molding. Im with the others on just cut it out lol, or don't even bother about it. What exactly leaked that only caused two small specks?

I've been there. Not necessarily with a bad flooding, but the owners before us finished off the basement before properly waterproofing the basement. I live in a 1910 home with a stone foundation. We had water seeping in. The only thing they did right was to dig out the basement to 8 feet deep and put the proper foundation support to accommodate the extra depth. (BTW, my neighbor has a 5-5.5 foot basement)

Over $10K later, we have french drains, a sump pump, and proper waterproofing on the wall. This was after I had to rip out all exterior walls (there was no insulation left from about 4 feet down to the ground), including studs due to mold. We also had to get some orange chemical sprayed to kill off any other mold that may still be lurking. I then refinished the entire basement.

[Fors*]

Originally Posted by louhamilton

I've been there. Not necessarily with a bad flooding, but the owners before us finished off the basement before properly waterproofing the basement. I live in a 1910 home with a stone foundation. We had water seeping in. The only thing they did right was to dig out the basement to 8 feet deep and put the proper foundation support to accommodate the extra depth. (BTW, my neighbor has a 5-5.5 foot basement)

Over $10K later, we have french drains, a sump pump, and proper waterproofing on the wall. This was after I had to rip out all exterior walls (there was no insulation left from about 4 feet down to the ground), including studs due to mold. We also had to get some orange chemical sprayed to kill off any other mold that may still be lurking. I then refinished the entire basement.

Aside from the our home being built in 1950, my basement has gone thru about the same thing as yours lou. We only had a small amount of mold on a wall where the basement wasn't finished, but we did the whole french drains (all around the base of the walls, 3 feet deep), sump pump (2 of them) and waterproofing all walls and it cost us $10,000 as well. Oh by the way, since you live only 45 minutes from me, do you have any radon in your area? I had to get a radon test before we started to finish the basement, and luckily we were on the low/safe side.

[Hammie]

Originally Posted by forsberg21

Aside from the our home being built in 1950, my basement has gone thru about the same thing as yours lou. We only had a small amount of mold on a wall where the basement wasn't finished, but we did the whole french drains (all around the base of the walls, 3 feet deep), sump pump (2 of them) and waterproofing all walls and it cost us $10,000 as well. Oh by the way, since you live only 45 minutes from me, do you have any radon in your area? I had to get a radon test before we started to finish the basement, and luckily we were on the low/safe side.

I think it was checked before we bought the house in 1998 and the levels were in the low/acceptable range.

[Fors*]

Originally Posted by louhamilton

I think it was checked before we bought the house in 1998 and the levels were in the low/acceptable range.

Probably true, because something like that is usually the responsibility of the seller.......

[Yautja]

Originally Posted by kingofgrills

My question is this - has the original source of the water damage been repaired? I don't think that has been mentioned anywhere.

This is very true, you need to fix the source of the problem first before you can attempt anything else & this is very important you don't want to end up with a more serious problem to health caused by mould this is more important than speaker wires etc.
My best advice to your friend is fix the source of the problem first he needs to find out where the source of the water infiltration & pinpoint the exact location, fix that then worry about the wires & wall etc