I am attempting to remove wallpaper. The walls are drywall. Underneath is paint. I am using vinegar water to wett the walls before removing. In some places the paper comes off perfectly, leaving the blue paint underneath showing. In other places the drywall is coming off, no matter how much or how little water I apply. When the drywall comes off it leaves dents in the wall. I want to paint the walls so they can't have dents in them. Some of the dents are as small as a quarter, others are as large as 2ft x 2ft. It's a mess. My question is: Is there a more effective way to remove the paper than vinegar water---a machine or a chemical? Question 2: Is there a product that will fill in the gouges that have already been made? Thank you for any suggestions.

Wow, never heard of leaving dents in the dry wall, wonder if these places you are describing have been patched previously? There is wallpaper remover chemical that I've used but I just used water and it worked the same just need to let it work into the wallpaper for a little bit. Sounds like you're going to have to do some patching afterwards, the proper way. Hopefully someone will be able to direct you to the right way of doing this here. There's certain drywall compounds you can get at the hardware store, they can direct you to which would work best for you.

I use warm water with washing up detergent in it for removing wallpaper. Brush it on liberally and leave for about 10 mins. You should then be able to remove the wallpaper very easily with a scraper.
As for filling in the dents, a basic wallfiller should suffice. Apply, then when dry sand down. You should then be able to paint over it no problem.

There are a couple of things you could try, the first and most important tool you need (I think) is a wall paper scorer.

It is a round disk shaped tool which has a series of blade underneath and it will perforate the surface of the wall paper allowing any treatment you do afterward to get through the usually sealed surface.

Score the wall paper through out.

Then you could do one of the following.

Spray Water: wall paper has been using a water based glue for years all you really need to use is water, spray it on the scored wall paper, let it sit to wet the glue and the wall paper should peel easily. It may require light use of a putty knife. I would suggest that that putty knife be a plastic one.

You could rent a steamer, which requires that you score the paper then hold up the steamer attachment and let the steam do the same thing as the water.

I only use a steamer when I have several layers of wall paper on the walls - in my opinion the cost to rent a steamer is more than the job is worth since both sprayed water and steaming take about the same amount of time for one or two layers of wall paper.

There are chemicals out there, but these are designed for the older glues which may not be water based.

I say save your money, buy a couple of spray bottles and a scorer. You could even use hot water (tap hot) if you feel that will help. I haven't found any difference over the temperature of water sprayed.

What may have happened is that through the years water got trapped behind the paper, this has soaked in to the wall causing the paint and perhaps even some of the finish plaster work to work loose.

Or it may be that the reason why wall paper was used int he first place was due to those dents.

Assess what is coming off, is it plaster or is it just paint? Is it the paper of the dry wall (dry wall is a sandwich of plaster like white chalk between two surfaces of gray paper-like cardboard)

If the grey paper is coming off you will need to use a great deal of plaster, and then finish is off with a thick primer (just the patches areas) I would suggest a tinted primer that is applied in at least three coats so it will soak in and give a hard surface to the patches.

If it is not the paper, but just the surface texture/plaster or paint, then using three coats of your paint will work well (Pint is far less expensive than primer)

If it is paint then a thick layer of new paint (perhaps 3 coats) will even out the surface. If it is plaster you will need to match it with either spray texture, or applying plaster.

If the walls are smooth apply the plaster in thin layers, spreading it out with a larger than the area putty knife. In the case of the 2' x 2' areas, you can find an assortment of concrete/plaster tools at any hardware outlet which will be up to a foot long. Ask the Clerk which is best to use.

Spread out thin layers plaster, let dry, sand a little, spread more as needed, sand when dry.

Most likely you have a texture on the wall, in that case you will either have to try to match it with spray bottles of 'texture repair' which comes in an assortment of spray patterns and usually has instructions on how to 'knock down' the texture.

Or you may decide that you want to buy a bucket of plaster, grab a trowel and spread out a thin layer of plaster to make a 'homemade' texture. This will give you a 'southwest' stucco kind of texture.

The latter will use a gallon or two of plaster and is rather easy, but slightly messy, it would require a bit of time to get the feel of spreading the plaster, then letting it dry and light sanding to get the smoothness and evenness you desire.

This method is easy, but it is a bit time consuming. Instead of renting a sprayer when I remodeled my Kitchen, bath and bedroom, I used two methods of application, on the ceiling I spread out a thin layer of plaster and when still wet I dabbed it with a sponge giving it a rough texture, on the walls I spread out thin uneven 'smears' with the trowel, I let it dry then followed with a light sanding with a sanding block. The other all treatment gave it the 'old world' feel and in the case of the dry brushed bedroom walls, the texture 'popped'. in the kitchen and bath we went with a solid color which smoothed out the texture and can only bee seen when close up.

Texture is used to hide the imperfections of hanging dry wall. Used to be they would spend many hours spreading out glass smooth layers of plaster (at least three) which they would follow with a light sanding. today texture is sprayed, and either followed with a wet knock down (following with a trowel) to press the plaster down, or they wait until dry and follow with a light sanding to soften the texture.

With all texture a solid color of paint will even it out. However, if you have ever patched nail holes in a wall, if the texture doesn't match it is 'obvious' even with paint. Matching texture closely can be difficult, and sometimes nearly impossible.

While on the subject of paint, if those dents are not too deep, you may just desire to use a dry brush or sponge technique to give your walls a complementary faux finish. This will hide the blemishes and dents in the wall. There is ragging (using a rag) and other paint finishes which will hide all manner of sin.

Of you may decide to go with the flow and use that 'old' look and bring it out with paint treatments. Today either way works: http://www.eblis.com/painting_technique.htm gives some good examples. There are many others and now days you can even look at paint chips which include the instructions and the various shades of paint to achieve these faux textures.

Plaster comes in pre-mixed plastic tubs, from little pint sized to 5 gallon sizes. A little plaster can go a long way, if your dents are shallow, and you are working on a bathroom, a quart should be more than enough. If you are working on a bed room or a living room, and there are either lots of dents, or deeper dents, then I would suggest a gallon.

There are many tools out there for application of plaster, I would talk with the clerk and find out what you need and also ask how to use the tools correctly.

David