Rendering Existing Brickwork

Ainsley1

Don't be too quick to discount renders. Done properly they last for many a year. Properly is the key!! A bit like Dan selecting the right bricks!!

My house has render, been all right now for getting on forty years.....and is a common finish in our area with dry dash chips.

Furts

Ainsley1 wrote: »

Don't be too quick to discount renders. Done properly they last for many a year. Properly is the key!! A bit like Dan selecting the right bricks!!

My house has render, been all right now for getting on forty years.....and is a common finish in our area with dry dash chips.

Fine and I agree, but the key is the location, the rain, the frost, the exposure, the substrata and the render, Put all this together with the standards of today's building and render can be a disaster.

There are many properties near me with rendered gable ends done 25 years ago that are dreadful. Others have porches in render where there is shelter from the prevailing wind and these look fine.

Dan-Dan

Furts wrote: »

An ideal scenario would be a dense concrete block, even better if fair face. But the size of all of them is standard everywhere throughout the country at 440mm by 215mm high, so size and superficial appearance will not tell you much.

these are the outer skin blocks visible

The chartered building surveyor tells me they are standard blocks and i specifically asked him about `port talbot slag`

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5457807

Furts

Dan-Dan wrote: »

these are the outer skin blocks visible

The chartered building surveyor tells me they are standard blocks and i specifically asked him about `port talbot slag`

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5457807

Difficult to add a comment. However they do raise a concern - blocks would normally be bucket handle jointed , and these are not - they are flush jointed. Might this be because the blocks are friable, with weak and breakable edges held and hidden by the mortar?

Sure blocks can be flush jointed in situations like yours, but the result would normally be tidier.

Not the best bricky either - has not maintained half bond, so might there be other issues of "not good walls?"