Pebble dash (or similar) removal

ed110220

Hi all, my house is covered outside upstairs and downstairs with a horrible, grim, pinkish-grey pebble dash type finish. Downstairs it is applied to concrete render and upstairs to steel cladding.

It is now starting to flake off, and I was surprised to see that the base (ie the stuff that the particles are embedded in) is little thicker than a layer of paint. I thought pebble dash was a thicker, render-like coating.

Anyway, I'd love to be able to remove it all so that the house can be painted. Most of the other houses of this type that still have their original cladding are decorated in this way and look much fresher and better for it.

My worry is that if I start I'll get the flaking bits off and then find the rest is impossible to remove and I'll be left with a much worse mess than before. Are there any chemicals/strippers that can be used to take it off? It looks as though the paint-like base could be dissolved or softened with some sort of paint stripper perhaps?

Has anyone any idea what it is and whether it can be practically removed?

muskoka

I'd go knocking on other houses doors, see what they've done. Is it pebbledash? If it is than you could get it re-dashed & paint it. If its dashed, then it likely because the walls were letting in damp...

ed110220

I'm not sure knocking on doors will help as I can't see anyone else who has it locally. The other houses of the same type either have the original cladding with no dash or have been recladded. Recladding is expensive and in my opinion makes a mess of the look of the house (a bit like a Victorian terraced house covered in 70s fake stone).

I don't think it is true pebble dash as it seems much too thin and I did not think pebble dash could be applied to steel. It's about as thick as a layer of paint with particles about the size of sharp sand on the surface.

I would post a photo, but it won't let me.

ormus

its not pebble dashing, its just some sort of textured paint.
a bit like sandtex. a well known exterior wall paint.

if its water based then a power jetwash will probably remove it ok.

ed110220

Thanks ormus, that makes more sense than pebble dash. Hopefully it will be easier to remove too! Is there any sort of test etc I could do?

Normally I would try scraping off or paint stripping an inconspicuous area, but the house doesn't really have one that won't be noticed.

ormus

are your panels a bit like this one?
a typical 1950s pre fab council house.

A.Penny.Saved

Ideally you would have it removed and thick insulation added to the exterior to reduce the heat loss which will probably be quite high in those type of builds. Unfortunately that is quite expensive and there is very little help financially towards doing it. No one wants to do anything for such house builds despite them being relatively large contributors, in comparison with regular cavity wall type builds, to green house gases.

ormus

if its a pre fab, then the house should be checked thoroughly before spending lots of money on it.
these houses have a steel frame and after 50 yrs they have begun to rust badly. very badly in some cases.
like an old morris 1000.


my MIL house has just been refurbished by the local council. insulation as my per my photo above.
new roof and new windows etc. new sparks. average costs per house on her estate? 42k.

ed110220

ormus wrote: »

are your panels a bit like this one?
a typical 1950s pre fab council house.

They are rather like that, but it is a BISF house, so it is double storey and the steel cladding is only upstairs. Downstairs is concrete render.

Had a structural steel engineer look at it and she said it's fine and should be OK for at least another 40 years. Seemed to think problems were exaggerated due to unfamiliarity or confusion with other prefabricated types.

I looked into internal and external insulation but internal seems a much better option as the inside needs to be gutted anyway. The walls inside are hardboard on timber studwork with wallpaper applied directly. As I;ll be stripping off the hardboard and replacing with plasterboard and skimming, I'll put insulation in before the plasterboard goes on. It's not quite as energy efficient, but I worked out that it would take decades to save the money on the heating bills that I'd spend on external insulation.

42k would probably pay my heating bill for the rest of my life!

ed110220

In terms of energy efficiency it seems no worse and probably better than the solid-walled (ie non cavity) Victorian construction I'm used to. Certainly there isn't the chronic condensation/mould problem I've always had with solid walls caused by them being cold.

Plasterer

Pebble dash top coat is thin see pics



Old pebbledash to be removed



Scratch coat and "butter" coat render



Application of wet dash - whos a pretty boy?



Voila - Finished product