In both cases, you'll need to skim over the undercoat plaster or the plasterboard to achieve a smooth finish, smooth enough to paint onto. Give the masonry a good clean out with a brush and a vacuum cleaner, Remember to get the edges of the old plaster too, that'll be quite dusty and dust is not our friend.

Once the patch is dry and firmly in position, gently remove the screw. Use patching plaster, all purpose filler or multi-finish plaster — mix up enough to cover the patch and gently press into the hole and spread with a putty knife that is larger than the hole to help get a smooth finish. To repair a hole in a hollow door, wall, or ceiling, firstly trim the edges of the hole and make is square. Ironically, you actually have to make the hole larger before you can go about fixing it! For larger holes locate the joists either side of the hole in the ceiling and mark the middle with a straight pencil line and create a rectangle around the hole. Cut out and add two noggins to bridge the gap between the joists. The final stage to this repair is to fill the hole with a suitable filler such as Polyfilla or the like. Once mixed (or the tub is open if you have a pre-mixed version), scoop out a lump using a small trowel and apply it to the hole, using the trowel to completely fill the area of the hole by pushing into the corners.Feed a batten into the hole and twist it so it is either upright or horizontal and one third of the distance either up or down or across the hole. Make sure you have a 50mm overhang either side of the hole. With mine, I troweled off my bonding coat so that it was flush with the surrounding (good) plaster. This was because I was completely skimming over that wall, so the finished level will be a couple of millimeters above the existing good plaster. Tap the plaster - To determine if the plaster has become detached from the masonry behind, give it a tap with your fists. There's a bit on my video, about 3:35 in, where I tap good and bad bits of plaster.

As you will need to do a bit of cutting, before you start this, firstly run over the area around the hole with a wire detector to make sure there aren’t any wires, pipes or other items that you may accidentally cut through.Due to the nature of plasterboard and in a similar way hollow doors, they can become damaged quite easily. The first thing to do is to cut out a rectangle around the hole using a steel rule and a Stanley knife. Alternatively, mark out with a pencil and ruler and cut out with a jab saw. Painters brush - just for the PVA, so 1.5 inches or more will do and it doesn't matter if it's a rubbish brush - we're going for coverage, not quality here.