Please please advise, poss problems midway through building work!

candice56

Hi all

Long story- shortish !

We moved in to our detached 100 yr old house 2 years and discovered lots of different types of damp, we had fireplace opened in lounge and woodburner fitted we opened up the alcoves too but left them as stones were wet to touch.

Since doing this we have been waiting for walls to dry out - didnt happen so judging on state of outside walls(render cracked) we got a builder in to rerender (on personal recommendation).

This is the first time Ive had any major work done and Ive been happy with him, very clean and worked through all weathers.

PROBLEM, wall was stripped and red fire bricks were bad so he got someone in to knock out and rebuild joining up to stone walls so looks great, very solid and ready to render, BUT, come bad weather Fri night it started raining inside our fireplace!!

It must have been coming in heavy down back of wall and flue because the rug and carpet were soaked and now some marks caused by the travel of work dirt and dust. I did have a blanket up blocking off the area to stop dust but hadnt cleaned it up yet so spent yesterday shoveling wet dirt and rubble up and emptying water out of the ash tray of the woodburner. Ive now cleared, cleaned and dried but am left with a rusty woodburner, damp carpet, marked carpet(all be it at the edge) and doubts as to the solution.

DH rang builder yesterday and once he rang back it was pretty much 'well il render on Monday but your chimney was sound so that shouldnt be the cause'

It may not be a problem but how much will he be obliged to do to fix it?? what could it be??

Sorry still long

DVardysShadow

candice56 wrote: »

It may not be a problem but how much will he be obliged to do to fix it?? what could it be??

Sorry still long

Whatever the problem is, it sounds like it is long standing, so he will not be obliged to fix it. If you can't work out what the problem is and your builder is not sure, it may be worth getting some sort of surveyor in to identify the cause and suggest remedies.

candice56

Hi

thanks for the reply. Youre right the damp is long standing so I know thats not his problem, so to speak but the recent drowning of my fireplace was after he and his guys removed the render and bricks and rebricked the wall.

What will his obligation be here, my fear is he will just render the wall but if he's caused some gaping somewhere letting in all the rain then surely he will have to remedy that too??

I dont know but Im hoping that it wont come anything and he'll just sort it out but just in case more advise is appreciated.

DVardysShadow

candice56 wrote: »

...

What will his obligation be here, my fear is he will just render the wall but if he's caused some gaping somewhere letting in all the rain then surely he will have to remedy that too??

I dont know but Im hoping that it wont come anything and he'll just sort it out but just in case more advise is appreciated.

Well, if he has caused a gaping hole, he will of course have to remedy it. But if he has then firstly he must be a cowboy and secondly he will hardly own up to it.

If he is genuine, it is beyond him and beyond you to get to the bottom of it, so either way, cowboy or not, you should get independent advice. Sorry, I cannot suggest causes or remedies - if you had useful info, you would probably have worked it out for yourself.

candice56

Thanks again for replying.

There are no obvious holes at the moment - from the outside.

My query really was how much will he be obliged to fix the consequences of the work he has done - (which Ive been happy with) i.e. damp carpet, rusty woodburner etc.

And of course if anyone had similar work done and might suggest a reason for the sudden inflood - I realise its 'how long is a piece of string' but if anyone's had an exterior wall stripped and rebricked did they have leakage??

DVardysShadow

candice56 wrote: »

Thanks again for replying.

There are no obvious holes at the moment - from the outside.

My query really was how much will he be obliged to fix the consequences of the work he has done - (which Ive been happy with) i.e. damp carpet, rusty woodburner etc.

And of course if anyone had similar work done and might suggest a reason for the sudden inflood - I realise its 'how long is a piece of string' but if anyone's had an exterior wall stripped and rebricked did they have leakage??

I think you are focussing too much on apportioning blame and not enough on identifying and fixing the problem.

If you told the builder to re render and he did that, his job is done. If you told him to fix your damp problem, it gets more murky, but essentially you pay for the re rendering, unless it is demonstrably unnecessary. And you pay for whatever other work he has to do to fix the problem.

This is why I suggest you get an independent party in now to advise. To me it is obvious that you don't understand the cause of the damp. Until you do, you will have problems and you are getting in deeper by employing a builder to do stuff without being really clear about what he needs to do.

candice56

Ok Thanks, youre right I dont know the cause of the damp and will hope to start to investigate that once the working week has begun again, I dont intend to 'blame' anyone and hope my post didnt come across as that, no-one would intend to cause damage Im sure. An independant person will be called if need be.

I will of course be concentrating on fixing the problem tomorrow when my guys are back however I was just pre-empting the issue of the water damage caused and possibilty of further work being required.

As Ive said the render hasnt been done yet and just to clarify the builder has been called in to rerender with the intention of preventing further penetrative damp and was clearly shown our problem areas. Im sure any builder would fix what they have caused but I sought the opinions of others about his responisibilty for the water damage caused midway through the works and obligation to do extra work to fix that damage.

Any opinions on the works themselves are of course wanted but not my primary concern as I will be hopefully addressing that with the builder tomorrow.

If anyone has experience of needing further work midway through works I would appreciate your input, especially if the extra work wasnt required before IYSWIM.

Im hoping the render/roughcast will 'seal' us back in and sort the leak but just checking in case it doesnt.

baldelectrician

From reading the post I think the problem may cease once the render is on- the builder says he has checked the chimney
The other thing you should check urgently are the gutters and drain pipes.

Send hubby out with a hose, and take a look in the loft

candice56

Thanks baldelectrician, Its the gable end so no guttering or drainpipes but we have already asked him to do some work on the front gutters.

Sorry to be dull but do you mean soak the wall and look in loft at same time?? its a bit high up for us scaredy cats, lol but I like your suggestion.

Poppy9

Can you claim on your home insurance for the damage to your furnishing and wood burner?

macman

You are having major work done to the fireplace so wouldn't you have had to have the carpet cleaned at the completion of works anyway? You should have removed the carpet before the work started if it was a concern.
It's not possible to carry out this sort of work without some dust and dirt resulting.