A wee damp issue...

Whistling_Gypsy

.....well, soaking wet to be more precise:D!!

To cut a very long story short, bought an 1870's semi-detatched cottage 3 months ago which appeared to have been renovated. Have since found it was done stunningly badly.:eek:...have stripped back most of the ground floor to brick walls/earth floor. Ground floor of original cottage consists of hallway, living room and bathroom. When stripping the bathroom tiles off last week we discovered a leaky pipe beneath... we think the bathroom has been in for about 10 years:eek: .

Soooo.... very relieved to have found the source of the damp, but now wondering what the best course of action will be. Obviously it needs to dry out.... do we let nature take its course?.....try and heat the rooms?....dehumidifiers?....any ideas how long this drying out process may take? Not in any real hurry....but dreading the winter fuel bills if we don't get it sorted over the next couple of months.

Bathroom is about 7' by 8', with 2 external walls about a foot thick, living room 20' x 13' with one external wall - we had a couple of quotes for rectifying the damp when we moved in and both said the damp was pretty much up to the ceiling and on most walls.

Any ideas chaps?

muckybutt

We had a similar problem in our first house, it was an empty property and had been for some years, we knew there was damp so when we moved in we found the source of the damp and fixed that, then we used industrial dehumidifiers from a well known hire chain, left them on for a week with some air movers as well and the house was dry as a bone !, got the dpc done sharpish afterwards and never had a hit of damp after that.

justjohn

dehumidifiers will cost 150-250 maybe cheaper buying one.(second hand)
it can take as long as a year to totally dry out (bone dry, may look dry but will not be totally dry), but you can start renovating before a year.
i assume its ether a sandstone house or rubble filled wall. If so the dpc will not be brilliant.
I would also say use a chemical dpc even if it has had one in the past.

On a secondry note what are the joists like. Damp is ideal breeding ground for some types of woodworm.

Can i also ask how much your quotes were??

Whistling_Gypsy

Hi - thanks for your replies. Looks like dehumidiefiers may be the way to go then!!

House is brick - outer walls are 3 bricks thick. No sandstone/rubble. The existing DPC definately wasn't brilliant though - like I say the previous owner was scarily bad at DIY. (Dangerously so when it comes to the gas and electric, it appears)

Damp doesn't appear to have reached the joists at first floor - is that whet you meant? In any case, there is no sign of woodworm - but something else to look out for, thanks! No joists at ground floor - tis an earth floor (underneath concrete/quarry tiles/concrete).

Quotes for £8,000 and just inder £11,000 - both to tank/ plasterboard/skim all four walls and maybe floor too (?) in bathroom/living room - the higher one to replace floor in too (as far as aI can remember). Obviously didn't know about the leaky pipe then....but so glad we didn't go ahead straight away cos tanking would just have been a very expensive way of masking the problem, and possibly making it worse as far as I can see... (obviously I don't know much cos I bought the blummin house in the first place!!)

Cheers guys.

justjohn

Can you not claim on insurance??

Whistling_Gypsy

My Homebuyers report revealed a damp problem....but they never say how bad it is!! I just assumed that because we were made aware of the problem we wouldn't have a right to a claim.

Do you think we would?

justjohn

depends wether you claim for damp or a burst pipe lol

i would claim for a burst pipe lol

Whistling_Gypsy

Hmmm - loss adjustor may just possibly spot that the damage is years old lol

Thanks anyway ;-)

justjohn

loss adjuster could spot it has been leaking for years. But it is however a burst pipe.

Its upto him wether to refuse your claim.

gmgmgm

Dehumidifiers probably won't make much difference, unless you can seal the whole area completely. Get a couple of fans (desk ones are OK) and keep the air fresh and circulating- this will dry it out. It's impressive how fast a wall dries with a fan pointing at it.

dander

I had a similar issue in my kitchen, where there had been a slight leak behind a kitchen cupboard for years - there was just one visible wall that appeared to have rising damp because of it - to the extent that some of the plaster had blown. Once the leak was fixed, I took the flooring up to get rid of any moisture trapped under there, but everything dried out of its own accord really very quickly.