We have a new stick built 2 story house under construction. We gave sheathed the outside with 5/8 plywood and 2 layers of 15 lb. tar paper. We have applied expanded lath and installled a base and scratch coat for our stucco. These coatings have dried for the last 3 wks and at present we have many cracks showing. Cracks range in lenght from 1 to 10 feet long and 1/16 to 1/8 inch in width. One side of the house is 30 x30 feet and I estimate 200-300 cracks in this area. When I thump on the base coats it appears to be solid over most of the area. What should we do? We don’t want these cracks to show through on our top coat. We suspect the base and scratch may have cured too rapidly?
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You are correct in your assumption that the stucco dried too quickly. Hard to control - 3 coat, portland cement stucco almost always cracks. I would worry more about the intallation of the flashing and "two coats of 15Lb. tar paper" and its ability to prevent moisture entry into the structure.
You may want to suggest the use of a polymer modified finish coat of stucco to prevent the cracking problem.