I have plastered with the windows open before and have never had such problems.
I had another problem yesterday while plastering a 16ft by 10ft wall, but luckily I wasn't working alone. I was working out of my mixing bucket as a labourer clearing up decided to throw my board in the skip, which was emptied while I was having dinner.
I had hardly finished the first coat (not sure how long it took) and the plaster was already going off in the bucket, I only just got the first coat on before what was left in the bucket had set solid.
will plaster set faster in a bucket than it will on a board? I made the mix slightly sloppy and mixed it quite quick too, and still the plaster in the bucket was already setting in the bucket before I could get it on the wall.
am I missing something here? my buckets are all clean, I used clean water and all my tools are clean.
all these problems have happened while plastering on plasterboard.
I used multi all the way through college, before starting college I had never plastered anything before and still I didn't have this many problems. we were mixing by hand in college too which took a lot longer than using a mixer, still I didn't have this many problems with my mix.