Update on how it’s holding up here. Treating damp, the follow up .. .. .. .. YES it works! #lime #limeplastering #damp #treatdamp th-cam.com/users/shortsGuNcFCstLyo?feature=share And the answer is very well!
As the ground level is so high, I personally would have gone full wall height of the first meter of the long wall next to the window. Or was that part already lime further up?
@@kuk3411 your right you always need to go above the ground. In this case 1- the long wall is internal, 2- it’s lime above the cut line, 3- it’s a massive double height wall.
Very good video, a lot of skill involved in plastering, especially with lime! I would caution however touting lime as a cure to damp. You are completely right that the lime will allow the wall to breathe. But this will not eradicate the damp, it simply allows it to exist with the house in a more symbiotic manner. Old properties were never designed to be lived in or heated in the manner they are in our modern lives. In times of old there would have been far more ventilation in a house, in the form mostly of open fires but also draughty windows and doors! If you don’t have good sources of dry heat and ventilation the damp will persist. Think of the lime like the mouth and the fireplace the lungs. Both are needed in order to breathe. Exciting stuff, good luck with the rest of the house!
There's a cathedral in the states they have been refurbishing for the past 100 years so they've been through the transition from lime to Portland cement and their going back to lime added into mixes, they say their rule of thumb is the mixture needs to be as weak as the building material your using. Mixes of 5 sand,1 lime, 1 cement, trying to make mortars as breathable as possible, as to the previous comment about dpc, if you have an old stone wall with lime, if you render with cement, the cement locks in the moisture and often changes the weight of the wall on the orginal foundation, thus leading to cracks, your choice of solution was spot on for the conditions in hand.
This channel is gold. I have a farmhouse and a townhouse in west Mexico that are both 150-200 years old (roofs are newer) and damp has always been a problem. We just apply cement and paint over but it always comes back after a year or two. It's been years since I've been looking for a way to do things myself and some restorers and knowledgeable people I've contacted all charge insane amounts for giving an assessment on a problem that's already been identified. This has helped a GREAT deal sir. I'll be doing a few tests and screw ups with some back walls before giving the real thing a go.
0:02 Thanks, it's great to watch a professional! I don't know if you cover appropriate paint in your videos, but I'm sure you understand the importance. I've worked in decorative restoration for 35years and particularly as an historic paint & colour consultant. Unfortunately nowadays most decorators let alone DIYers have no idea about limewash, distemper and so on, and why they need to finish the wall as they started. 👍🤗
Interesting thought process :) I would always recommend that all drains are surveyed, along mains mains and plumbing leaks checks first. When you do knock off render, dry the walls down before lime rendering as this can help with hygroscopic salt stain migration. Brilliant thought that you can see the benefit of using traditional materials. :)
Hello there, nice project! Had something very similar in my house here in the Netherlands (they had also injected the resin in the wall and then covered the bricks with cement...). I could not find a professional that could plaster using lime (I assume the skill is more or less lost here for most plasterers) so after removing everything and going back to the bricks we had to re-plaster with gypsum but we used an extremely open paint (keim) and the wall can actually evacuate the humidity. The worst offender in those cases is really often the paint... most likely in multiple layers... sometimes even between layers of plasters.. 🙂
Some plaster blends are somewhat porous but not as good as lime. They are also hard so more prone to cracking. And you are right the covering (paint / wall paper / tiles) is also just as important.
I’m glad I found this channel. I just inherited an old brick house, pre 1900’s. Hand made bricks. Any way upon emptying out two of the rooms I found I have a rising damp problem. Water dripping of the bottom of the walls after rain type of problem. Plaster falling of the walls . The house is all above ground, sandy, rocky ground. Anyway watching you doing the replastering was great because with a bit of luck I’ll be doing the same if I can fix the problem. Floorboards up first I think 🙂
@@oldhousediy gutters are good but I wasn’t there when it rained so I missed checking water flow. There’s an underground stream under the house, it’s about 15 feet down and it’s salt water. I’m a dowser.
Floor up and find the cause. Part of our own house had no damp course in a few meters of one corner. I’m guessing they just forgot 140 years ago. The rest has tar cloth. I cut out the mortar where the damp course should be and packed roof slate in there before lime plastering. Maybe you could take up the floor and add a slate damp course if that is the cause of your damp issue
Even with the correct use of lime mortar the external ground level is an issue. I had damp in my 1910 house and after many days of learning everything I could about damp I found the solution. Lower the ground level around the house even if it's just a trench. As soon as I did that no issues with damp 5 years later.
Yes, ground level is a common problem. In our front garden I removed about 8 large skips of soil and fitted French drains. Unfortunately in this wall the neighbours house and back yard ground level is at the bottom of the window so half way up our wall.
@@oldhousediy Hi I've got a property where damp levels are showing on the base of all the ground floor walls. The external ground levels are the same level as the internal floor however I can't dig a trench to lower them as there's foundation around the perimeter of the property that stops me from doing so. Any solutions I could try?
Hi. I have a very similar problem that I am just getting to grips with. Could you advise how to make up the lime mortar and lime plaster please? I know about sharp sand, but what is lime putty? (I would be prepared to make up and put on the first two coats myself, but would ask an expert plasterer to do the final one). Thanks for a good, relevant, clear and interesting video! Edit: I have now seen your video about lime putty, so no need to answer my question, thanks!
Good DIY attempt. Got the joint on finish well. I'd recommend using a straight edge to rule backing coat to gain a straight wall for skirting boards to fit to.
Thanks. Sneaking up to get the joint thickness matching is tricky. If I’m doing hole walls I do use a Darby to help flatness but it’s harder working up to a very specific finish level.
Very interesting. Any reason for moisture, high ground levels, broken gutters, naturally gypsum plaster blocks moisture in, of course. Do you leave your lime plaster some time before next courses, can't recall you saying. What types of sands do you use. Sorry, so many questions.
Thanks for watching and smart question. Between dubbing-1, 1-2 and 2-3 I wait about a week, needs to be fairly hard, so you can’t dent it with your finger. Between 3 and 4 I wait a day. This room the ground level (and neighbours house) is very high and level with the bottom of the window. Historically I think it was okay but the damp treatment / gypsum made it un manageable. (The floor had varnish and plastic sheet under it which was also very bad, there is a separate video on that.)
Thanks for a very useful video. I wonder if you have any advice for insulating an old house internally or plan to do any videos on this. I’m struggling to find any DIY advice on how to add a breathable insulation without effecting the breathability
Hello. Can you do an update on how well the lime is performing as I thought it was interesting you went for a material that lets moisture through in a below ground level situation. Was there anything outside the house that could cause moisture to be higher?
It’s holding up really well. The breathability stops the moisture being trapped and avoid the impermeable plaster “blowing” (detaching) or damaging the bricks / stones. The back wall is about 1m below the neighbours (cobbled) yard so nothing we can do about that. The floor was also laid on plastic sheet which I have changed so the floor can breath too.
Here you go; Treating damp, the follow up .. .. .. .. YES it works! #lime #limeplastering #damp #treatdamp th-cam.com/users/shortsGuNcFCstLyo?feature=share
I don't understand why but digital cameras do not like the frequencies emitted by some power tools. At 3 minutes when he cuts the wall it freaks the camera out. I have experienced the same issues. Weird!
Nice work my gent. I live in a 200 year old house & I've been planning a renovation for a while. A storm has expedited that situation. Are you available for work in south Tyneside?
Another super video - thank you. Please can you tell us what you did to get the black bitumen off the bricks? Also, what is the exterior finish on the end wall - is it rendered or bare brickwork? Thanks.
The stones are very soft so a lot of the bitumen is already detached and I could chip it off with a skutch hammer. The end wall is stone externally, although the windowsill is at external ground level so a lot is below ground.
@@mobilvettamotorhome2056 Your welcome, check out the follow up here Treating damp, the follow up .. .. .. .. YES it works! #lime #limeplastering #damp #treatdamp th-cam.com/users/shortsGuNcFCstLyo?feature=share
Regarding the ingredients for the interior walls: Fill or First or "Scratch Coat" is 3:1 Sharp Sand to Lime Putty/Fiber. So three units of sharp sand to one unit of lime putty (the lime putty has "fiber" in it. Sounds like you use "hair" for the fiber. What kind of hair, and do you like any substitutes--I've seen finely chopped straw, cattail fiber, and toilet paper used--and how much hair to lime putty?) Second coat same ingredients and proportions. Third Coat: 2:1 or 2.5:1 Two-2.5 units of "much finer" sand to 1 unit of lime putty; no fiber? Is this much finer sand still sharp? Maybe Fourth Coat for a fine finish surface: same proportions but water added so mix is thinner.... Thanks for your time and generosity in sharing this knowledge and showing how! Subbed.
Hair is traditionally horse or goat, but I’m naughty and use poly fibre. You can’t use anything particularly soluble as it will dissolve / rot such as toilet paper. Mixes with hair in even have a shelf life as the hair will rot out. I just dump a few big hand fills into a narrow mix, as it mixes in the hair spreads a lot aiming to get a fair bit of fibre throughout. I normally use “grit sand” for the first then “plastering sand” for the third. This is a really good booklet on lime. www.blackdogpress.co.uk/product/lime-in-building-a-practical-guide-by-jane-schofield
@@oldhousediy Thanks so much. I guess dog hair would be ok. But sounds like poly fiber, being not organic, and not soluble in water, would--far from being naughty--be superior as rot-ability goes :-)
My house was built in 1907. Built mainly of sand and field stones. Walls are about 24+ inches thick. It has a basement that is about 7-8 feet below grade level at the front and grade level at the back....about a 20% grade. We live on a hill that has natural springs and we have one that exits into a fish pond in the lower yard about 15 feet from the house. So we naturally have year round moisture in the basement. We want to use the space but it is always really humid and sometimes moisture forming on the floor with temperature swings. Anything than can mold will, so it is basically a space with no use. I have been pondering constructing additional thin block walls about 3 feet inside the perimeter walls that are completely sealed and insulated. This would be very time consuming and material intensive. This would effectively make hallways at the perimeter and drastically reduce the usable space. Would this technique help to save me a lot of time and money? Any thoughts or comments would be greatly appreciated.
@@oldhousediy I think I would need multiple dehumidifiers running constant to keep it "dry". I think the perfect fix would be to excavate around the foundation and use french drains and some sort of protection from the outside but that is not going to happen. I rerouted the front gutter drains to about 10 feet from the side of the house hoping that would make a difference but no luck on that It seems like any materials put onto the wall would never dry as the stones are always visibly moist. I don't get any water in the basement but it is noticeably moist as you descend the stairs.
0:02 I don't know how deep your pond is but an Ag pipe could redirect a lot of the downhill ground water. Most of what I've seen to deal with below ground damp is to dig all the dirt out from the basement walls, to 1 ft below floor level, bitumen paint the exterior of the wall, put in a 100mm dia ag pipe, back fill with 20mm gravel 300-600mm out from the wall. It's a lot of work, but if you want a dry basement, that's my best advice. Of course good air flow will also help. GL
@@michaelbremer-trainor1301 Thanks for the suggestion. The rear of the house is at ground level. The front of the house is underground into the hillside around 8 ft deep. The house is about 30 ft from front to back. The pond begins parallel to the rear wall about 10 ft to the side of the house but is at least 10+ ft below the house and is fed by 100mm pvc drainage pipe. You can see where the ground begins on the walls inside the basement. I have many ideas on how to remedy the problem but all of them are very labor intensive and/or material intensive. I am renovating the house so I will continue to think about it until the main floor is complete and then turn my focus to the basement. Maybe by then I will have a solid plan and probably implement a few different solutions.
Because of the damp between the bitumen and the stone quite a lot just falls off. The rest I just chip off or wire brush. Our stone is quite soft so it makes it easier but you also can’t be too aggressive on the cleaning.
About the last coat, how are you planning on painting the entire wall?. Normal breathable paint? or another coat of lime with colors in it (natural color pigments). thank you
There are a few genuine facebook groups. Your old house UK - Repair and Conservation Traditional and listed building advice Are both quite good. The first is particularly friendly.
Why is gypsum plaster in the UK seemingly pink when it is wet and lime plaster grey?? It always weirds me out when I watch plastering in the UK because the colours of the plaster are so different from what I work with.
I believe that it is because of the impurities in the gypsum that they don’t bother to remove. However, lime, which I use is very different from gypsum.
Gypsum isn’t pink because of impurities. That’s the colour of the mineral where it was mined from. When I first started plastering all gypsum was grey but as they depleted all those mines and moved mines the colour changed.
It’s always a judgment question. You don’t need to change 100% just for the sake of it. There are no damp problems higher up , just the back wall and bottom of side and front, and it’s a double height room so a very big job.
@@oldhousediy Ah I've watched again and you said the top part of the long wall was original lime. On my wall I have a plasterboard over an old chimney breast that has been water damaged near the ceiling. I can tell it is plasterboard as I can see it poking up into the loft against the chimney. Is it possible to patch repair the damaged area on the plasterboard with lime render / plaster or would the entire board have to be removed? By the way, what was the purpose of the gaps in he wall that were filled with wood? Was they supposed to be an air gap?
@@Latbirget lime repairs to plasterboard wouldn’t serve any purpose. If you’ve no problems then a patch with eazi-fill would probably be the way to go. The wood is often added as fixing for items but no real idea for the one near the door.
@@oldhousediy Are you saying that if the top half of the wall was gypsum, then you would leave it as is and just deal with the lower say 1m or so if there was damp in that wall?
@@chrisatherton3911 for me it would depend on where the wall is and how bad the problem. BUT (and a big but), it is hard to get joints mid wall to match. Ceilings and corners hide joints much better, so if you are DIY and it is a small room you may be able to get a better finish doing the whole wall.
About 3:1 sharp to putty for the pointing, then same to for first coat but haired, then move to finer sand 3:1 without hair for second and then about 2.5:1 sand to putty for top coats.
Sorry, no! Injected damp courses, tanking and gypsum just trap and mask the problem causing damage to the structure. The rotten wood you saw in this video is the result of trapped moisture from an injected “damp course” and gypsum plaster.
@@eddieharding2432 Built loads over years including a bungalow this year , building control and NHBC insist on dpc that i cannot control , but most old buildings are not built in the same principle especially if they are of a date where they are built from lime mortar , and a poxy retrofit dpc tends to do fuck all , only damage the structure.
![ออกพรรษาน้ำตาหล่น - แอน อรดี [OFFICIAL MV]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/PFZtOcY9ONA/mqdefault.jpg)
Update on how it’s holding up here.
Treating damp, the follow up .. .. .. .. YES it works! #lime #limeplastering #damp #treatdamp
th-cam.com/users/shortsGuNcFCstLyo?feature=share
And the answer is very well!
As the ground level is so high, I personally would have gone full wall height of the first meter of the long wall next to the window.
Or was that part already lime further up?
@@kuk3411 your right you always need to go above the ground. In this case 1- the long wall is internal, 2- it’s lime above the cut line, 3- it’s a massive double height wall.
A really interesting video, top marks for your approach and explanation, very informative, big thanks....BB
There's not enough videos on old properties much appreciated and great educational
Thanks.
Very good video, a lot of skill involved in plastering, especially with lime!
I would caution however touting lime as a cure to damp.
You are completely right that the lime will allow the wall to breathe. But this will not eradicate the damp, it simply allows it to exist with the house in a more symbiotic manner.
Old properties were never designed to be lived in or heated in the manner they are in our modern lives.
In times of old there would have been far more ventilation in a house, in the form mostly of open fires but also draughty windows and doors! If you don’t have good sources of dry heat and ventilation the damp will persist. Think of the lime like the mouth and the fireplace the lungs. Both are needed in order to breathe.
Exciting stuff, good luck with the rest of the house!
There's a cathedral in the states they have been refurbishing for the past 100 years so they've been through the transition from lime to Portland cement and their going back to lime added into mixes, they say their rule of thumb is the mixture needs to be as weak as the building material your using. Mixes of 5 sand,1 lime, 1 cement, trying to make mortars as breathable as possible, as to the previous comment about dpc, if you have an old stone wall with lime, if you render with cement, the cement locks in the moisture and often changes the weight of the wall on the orginal foundation, thus leading to cracks, your choice of solution was spot on for the conditions in hand.
Thanks.
David, what cathedral are you referring to?
@@adobemastr New York I think there's a video on TH-cam with the master mason talking about the different materials and stone they use.
@@davydacounsellor thanks for the information; can you provide the link for the video?
This channel is gold. I have a farmhouse and a townhouse in west Mexico that are both 150-200 years old (roofs are newer) and damp has always been a problem. We just apply cement and paint over but it always comes back after a year or two. It's been years since I've been looking for a way to do things myself and some restorers and knowledgeable people I've contacted all charge insane amounts for giving an assessment on a problem that's already been identified. This has helped a GREAT deal sir. I'll be doing a few tests and screw ups with some back walls before giving the real thing a go.
Thanks, good luck with your project 👍🏻
0:02
Thanks, it's great to watch a professional! I don't know if you cover appropriate paint in your videos, but I'm sure you understand the importance.
I've worked in decorative restoration for 35years and particularly as an historic paint & colour consultant. Unfortunately nowadays most decorators let alone DIYers have no idea about limewash, distemper and so on, and why they need to finish the wall as they started. 👍🤗
Thanks. I love limewash, I’ve just bought a range of pigments to make some coloured limewash for the next room I’m doing so please stay tuned.
Another helpful video. Great advice and tips - thank you.
Thanks, glad you enjoyed.
Interesting thought process :) I would always recommend that all drains are surveyed, along mains mains and plumbing leaks checks first. When you do knock off render, dry the walls down before lime rendering as this can help with hygroscopic salt stain migration. Brilliant thought that you can see the benefit of using traditional materials. :)
Thanks, the poor old house suffered with a 80’s make over.
Hello there, nice project!
Had something very similar in my house here in the Netherlands (they had also injected the resin in the wall and then covered the bricks with cement...). I could not find a professional that could plaster using lime (I assume the skill is more or less lost here for most plasterers) so after removing everything and going back to the bricks we had to re-plaster with gypsum but we used an extremely open paint (keim) and the wall can actually evacuate the humidity. The worst offender in those cases is really often the paint... most likely in multiple layers... sometimes even between layers of plasters.. 🙂
Some plaster blends are somewhat porous but not as good as lime. They are also hard so more prone to cracking. And you are right the covering (paint / wall paper / tiles) is also just as important.
I’m glad I found this channel. I just inherited an old brick house, pre 1900’s. Hand made bricks. Any way upon emptying out two of the rooms I found I have a rising damp problem. Water dripping of the bottom of the walls after rain type of problem. Plaster falling of the walls . The house is all above ground, sandy, rocky ground.
Anyway watching you doing the replastering was great because with a bit of luck I’ll be doing the same if I can fix the problem. Floorboards up first I think 🙂
Good luck with your project. If it is clearly linked to rain make sure you check your gutters, drains and soak aways.
@@oldhousediy gutters are good but I wasn’t there when it rained so I missed checking water flow. There’s an underground stream under the house, it’s about 15 feet down and it’s salt water. I’m a dowser.
Floor up and find the cause. Part of our own house had no damp course in a few meters of one corner.
I’m guessing they just forgot 140 years ago. The rest has tar cloth.
I cut out the mortar where the damp course should be and packed roof slate in there before lime plastering.
Maybe you could take up the floor and add a slate damp course if that is the cause of your damp issue
Just found this channel. Excellent vlog sharing your knowledge thank you. End wall left as stone finish looks fantastic 👌👏👏👏
Thanks. The exposed wall looks great but is also good for breathability.
Even with the correct use of lime mortar the external ground level is an issue.
I had damp in my 1910 house and after many days of learning everything I could about damp I found the solution. Lower the ground level around the house even if it's just a trench.
As soon as I did that no issues with damp 5 years later.
Yes, ground level is a common problem. In our front garden I removed about 8 large skips of soil and fitted French drains. Unfortunately in this wall the neighbours house and back yard ground level is at the bottom of the window so half way up our wall.
@@oldhousediy Hi I've got a property where damp levels are showing on the base of all the ground floor walls. The external ground levels are the same level as the internal floor however I can't dig a trench to lower them as there's foundation around the perimeter of the property that stops me from doing so. Any solutions I could try?
That's a lot of work time and effort. Expensive too. But will serve the test of time.
Hi. I have a very similar problem that I am just getting to grips with. Could you advise how to make up the lime mortar and lime plaster please? I know about sharp sand, but what is lime putty? (I would be prepared to make up and put on the first two coats myself, but would ask an expert plasterer to do the final one). Thanks for a good, relevant, clear and interesting video! Edit: I have now seen your video about lime putty, so no need to answer my question, thanks!
Good DIY attempt. Got the joint on finish well. I'd recommend using a straight edge to rule backing coat to gain a straight wall for skirting boards to fit to.
Thanks. Sneaking up to get the joint thickness matching is tricky. If I’m doing hole walls I do use a Darby to help flatness but it’s harder working up to a very specific finish level.
Better than the previous professional attempt.
Thanks for sharing m8, good luck
Thanks 👍🏻
Very interesting. Any reason for moisture, high ground levels, broken gutters, naturally gypsum plaster blocks moisture in, of course. Do you leave your lime plaster some time before next courses, can't recall you saying. What types of sands do you use. Sorry, so many questions.
Thanks for watching and smart question.
Between dubbing-1, 1-2 and 2-3 I wait about a week, needs to be fairly hard, so you can’t dent it with your finger. Between 3 and 4 I wait a day.
This room the ground level (and neighbours house) is very high and level with the bottom of the window. Historically I think it was okay but the damp treatment / gypsum made it un manageable. (The floor had varnish and plastic sheet under it which was also very bad, there is a separate video on that.)
Thanks for a very useful video. I wonder if you have any advice for insulating an old house internally or plan to do any videos on this. I’m struggling to find any DIY advice on how to add a breathable insulation without effecting the breathability
There are some option such as wood wool board (Mike Wye) and Hempcrete (The Limecrete company).
Hello. Can you do an update on how well the lime is performing as I thought it was interesting you went for a material that lets moisture through in a below ground level situation. Was there anything outside the house that could cause moisture to be higher?
It’s holding up really well. The breathability stops the moisture being trapped and avoid the impermeable plaster “blowing” (detaching) or damaging the bricks / stones. The back wall is about 1m below the neighbours (cobbled) yard so nothing we can do about that. The floor was also laid on plastic sheet which I have changed so the floor can breath too.
Here you go;
Treating damp, the follow up .. .. .. .. YES it works! #lime #limeplastering #damp #treatdamp
th-cam.com/users/shortsGuNcFCstLyo?feature=share
Good old lime plaster.
Yeap, can’t beat it 👍🏻
I don't understand why but digital cameras do not like the frequencies emitted by some power tools. At 3 minutes when he cuts the wall it freaks the camera out. I have experienced the same issues. Weird!
It’s odd, I haven’t had it happen again for ages.
Nice work my gent.
I live in a 200 year old house & I've been planning a renovation for a while. A storm has expedited that situation. Are you available for work in south Tyneside?
Thanks but I’m strictly DIY on my own house. There are some good face books groups where you can find contractors if needed.
Another super video - thank you. Please can you tell us what you did to get the black bitumen off the bricks? Also, what is the exterior finish on the end wall - is it rendered or bare brickwork? Thanks.
The stones are very soft so a lot of the bitumen is already detached and I could chip it off with a skutch hammer. The end wall is stone externally, although the windowsill is at external ground level so a lot is below ground.
@@oldhousediy Thank you!
@@mobilvettamotorhome2056 Your welcome, check out the follow up here
Treating damp, the follow up .. .. .. .. YES it works! #lime #limeplastering #damp #treatdamp
th-cam.com/users/shortsGuNcFCstLyo?feature=share
Regarding the ingredients for the interior walls: Fill or First or "Scratch Coat" is 3:1 Sharp Sand to Lime Putty/Fiber. So three units of sharp sand to one unit of lime putty (the lime putty has "fiber" in it. Sounds like you use "hair" for the fiber. What kind of hair, and do you like any substitutes--I've seen finely chopped straw, cattail fiber, and toilet paper used--and how much hair to lime putty?) Second coat same ingredients and proportions. Third Coat: 2:1 or 2.5:1 Two-2.5 units of "much finer" sand to 1 unit of lime putty; no fiber? Is this much finer sand still sharp? Maybe Fourth Coat for a fine finish surface: same proportions but water added so mix is thinner.... Thanks for your time and generosity in sharing this knowledge and showing how! Subbed.
Hair is traditionally horse or goat, but I’m naughty and use poly fibre. You can’t use anything particularly soluble as it will dissolve / rot such as toilet paper. Mixes with hair in even have a shelf life as the hair will rot out. I just dump a few big hand fills into a narrow mix, as it mixes in the hair spreads a lot aiming to get a fair bit of fibre throughout.
I normally use “grit sand” for the first then “plastering sand” for the third.
This is a really good booklet on lime.
www.blackdogpress.co.uk/product/lime-in-building-a-practical-guide-by-jane-schofield
@@oldhousediy Thanks so much. I guess dog hair would be ok. But sounds like poly fiber, being not organic, and not soluble in water, would--far from being naughty--be superior as rot-ability goes :-)
How is your pointing mix so white? I’m looking for white sharp sand but can’t find it
My house was built in 1907. Built mainly of sand and field stones. Walls are about 24+ inches thick. It has a basement that is about 7-8 feet below grade level at the front and grade level at the back....about a 20% grade. We live on a hill that has natural springs and we have one that exits into a fish pond in the lower yard about 15 feet from the house. So we naturally have year round moisture in the basement. We want to use the space but it is always really humid and sometimes moisture forming on the floor with temperature swings. Anything than can mold will, so it is basically a space with no use. I have been pondering constructing additional thin block walls about 3 feet inside the perimeter walls that are completely sealed and insulated. This would be very time consuming and material intensive. This would effectively make hallways at the perimeter and drastically reduce the usable space.
Would this technique help to save me a lot of time and money? Any thoughts or comments would be greatly appreciated.
Trapping moisture never seems like a good solution but you do sound like circumstances against you. Have you tried a dehumidifier?
@@oldhousediy I think I would need multiple dehumidifiers running constant to keep it "dry". I think the perfect fix would be to excavate around the foundation and use french drains and some sort of protection from the outside but that is not going to happen.
I rerouted the front gutter drains to about 10 feet from the side of the house hoping that would make a difference but no luck on that
It seems like any materials put onto the wall would never dry as the stones are always visibly moist. I don't get any water in the basement but it is noticeably moist as you descend the stairs.
0:02 I don't know how deep your pond is but an Ag pipe could redirect a lot of the downhill ground water. Most of what I've seen to deal with below ground damp is to dig all the dirt out from the basement walls, to 1 ft below floor level, bitumen paint the exterior of the wall, put in a 100mm dia ag pipe, back fill with 20mm gravel 300-600mm out from the wall. It's a lot of work, but if you want a dry basement, that's my best advice. Of course good air flow will also help. GL
@@michaelbremer-trainor1301 Thanks for the suggestion.
The rear of the house is at ground level. The front of the house is underground into the hillside around 8 ft deep. The house is about 30 ft from front to back. The pond begins parallel to the rear wall about 10 ft to the side of the house but is at least 10+ ft below the house and is fed by 100mm pvc drainage pipe.
You can see where the ground begins on the walls inside the basement.
I have many ideas on how to remedy the problem but all of them are very labor intensive and/or material intensive.
I am renovating the house so I will continue to think about it until the main floor is complete and then turn my focus to the basement. Maybe by then I will have a solid plan and probably implement a few different solutions.
This is great, but how did you remove that bitumen paint? Did you just grind it off?
Because of the damp between the bitumen and the stone quite a lot just falls off. The rest I just chip off or wire brush. Our stone is quite soft so it makes it easier but you also can’t be too aggressive on the cleaning.
The best way to eradicate damp permanently is to sell it.
What paint do you use over the lime plaster, I assume it must be breathable too
Yes it has to be breathable. This room got Earthborn but I also use limewash. I’m about to do a room with pigmented limewash so stay tuned.
@@oldhousediy Thanks for your reply, great video
About the last coat, how are you planning on painting the entire wall?. Normal breathable paint? or another coat of lime with colors in it (natural color pigments). thank you
Breathable (clay based) paint. I also used home made lime putty whitewash in the stairs cupboard. Next room I’m going to try pigmented limewash.
It would look nice left stone work on the wall with the tiniest window I've ever seen.
The stone wall gives a nice result, also very breathable.
how do you find some one who will do such a thorough job as you, any suggestions or qualifications to look for.
There are a few genuine facebook groups.
Your old house UK - Repair and Conservation
Traditional and listed building advice
Are both quite good. The first is particularly friendly.
@@oldhousediy thanks
Why is gypsum plaster in the UK seemingly pink when it is wet and lime plaster grey?? It always weirds me out when I watch plastering in the UK because the colours of the plaster are so different from what I work with.
I believe that it is because of the impurities in the gypsum that they don’t bother to remove. However, lime, which I use is very different from gypsum.
Gypsum isn’t pink because of impurities. That’s the colour of the mineral where it was mined from.
When I first started plastering all gypsum was grey but as they depleted all those mines and moved mines the colour changed.
Looks good! Why did the leave the gypsum plaster on the upper part of the wall?
It’s always a judgment question. You don’t need to change 100% just for the sake of it. There are no damp problems higher up , just the back wall and bottom of side and front, and it’s a double height room so a very big job.
@@oldhousediy Ah I've watched again and you said the top part of the long wall was original lime. On my wall I have a plasterboard over an old chimney breast that has been water damaged near the ceiling. I can tell it is plasterboard as I can see it poking up into the loft against the chimney. Is it possible to patch repair the damaged area on the plasterboard with lime render / plaster or would the entire board have to be removed? By the way, what was the purpose of the gaps in he wall that were filled with wood? Was they supposed to be an air gap?
@@Latbirget lime repairs to plasterboard wouldn’t serve any purpose. If you’ve no problems then a patch with eazi-fill would probably be the way to go.
The wood is often added as fixing for items but no real idea for the one near the door.
@@oldhousediy Are you saying that if the top half of the wall was gypsum, then you would leave it as is and just deal with the lower say 1m or so if there was damp in that wall?
@@chrisatherton3911 for me it would depend on where the wall is and how bad the problem. BUT (and a big but), it is hard to get joints mid wall to match. Ceilings and corners hide joints much better, so if you are DIY and it is a small room you may be able to get a better finish doing the whole wall.
Very nice. What mix did you use for repointing?
About 3:1 sharp to putty for the pointing, then same to for first coat but haired, then move to finer sand 3:1 without hair for second and then about 2.5:1 sand to putty for top coats.
No harling coat?
Depends on the depth / unevenness. The brick is failry flat so no really need.
Hows the lime holding up? Any videos a year on ?
Holding up really well, follow up coming soon.
The only effective way to tackle damp ................. put in a DPC !
Sorry, no!
Injected damp courses, tanking and gypsum just trap and mask the problem causing damage to the structure. The rotten wood you saw in this video is the result of trapped moisture from an injected “damp course” and gypsum plaster.
DPC 🤣🤣 You must be one of those plonkers what believe water rises by capillary action 🤣🤣
@@anthonymclean9743 When you build your next house , build it without a DPC . Or have you never built one?
@@eddieharding2432 Built loads over years including a bungalow this year , building control and NHBC insist on dpc that i cannot control , but most old buildings are not built in the same principle especially if they are of a date where they are built from lime mortar , and a poxy retrofit dpc tends to do fuck all , only damage the structure.
@@anthonymclean9743 I will have to bow to your superior knowledge then .