TIL wetting the back of drywall tape makes it stick better, but I soaked a whole roll

Kim Mitchell · 2026-10-03T16:50:03.258189+00:00

I was taping a 12 foot seam in a garage in Boise last Tuesday and the paper kept bubbling on me, so a guy at the supply house told me to just mist the tape first. Figured more water meant better grip, so I dunked the entire roll in a bucket of water for about a minute. That tape turned into mush and every strip I pulled off the roll just tore into soggy chunks, wasted a full $9 roll and 40 minutes of my morning. I went back to just dragging a damp sponge across the strip right before I bed it, which actually works great. So the trick was real, I just took it way too far like an idiot. Anyone else got a tape trick that backfired before you dialed it in?

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TIL wetting the back of drywall tape makes it stick better, but I soaked a whole roll | Drywall Installers - Guest Forum