Cellar damp proofing in mid-terrace

Jd843

Hi
I am buying a mid-terrace house and would like to get the cellar damp-proofed ASAP after moving in.  Is it just as simple as cracking on with it, or do I need to do anything about planning permission, letting the neighbours know etc.?

Doozergirl

Cellars should be damp!   They also need to be ventilated.   They don't take well to being sealed up - you can easily develop mould in the room and rot in the joists. 

A proper cellar conversion costs a fortune and it's not always guaranteed to work.  

Why do you want to damp proof it?  

Jd843

Doozergirl said:

Why do you want to damp proof it?  

Just so we can use it for storage without things getting mouldy and/or rusty

Doozergirl said:

A proper cellar conversion costs a fortune and it's not always guaranteed to work.  

What do you mean by a "proper" cellar conversion?

Doozergirl

Jd843 said:

Doozergirl said:

Why do you want to damp proof it?  

Just so we can use it for storage without things getting mouldy and/or rusty

Doozergirl said:

A proper cellar conversion costs a fortune and it's not always guaranteed to work.  

What do you mean by a "proper" cellar conversion?

You can't store anything down there wothout risk of it getting mouldy or rusty without spending a fortune.  Unless you live in London, cellar conversions to getting a cellar to habitable - and therefore correctly temperate and dry - cost more than they add in value.  

Victorian houses were built to breathe and whilst the construction is relatively simple , they're quite finely balanced and don't like to be messed around with.  They have very high humidity and some may well flood (normal) or have puddles that appear in bad weather.    They need good ventilation with airbricks both front and back of the property in order to dissipate the humidity and stop the wooden joists from rotting or trapped dampness from spreading upwards into the house causing condensation.


It's genuinely best to leave cellars alone and only store things that can cope with that environment - eg.  wine 🙂

Simple 'damp proofing' is far from guaranteed to work and can cause more trouble than it solves.   

Jd843

Doozergirl said:

Jd843 said:

Doozergirl said:

Why do you want to damp proof it?  

Just so we can use it for storage without things getting mouldy and/or rusty

Doozergirl said:

A proper cellar conversion costs a fortune and it's not always guaranteed to work.  

What do you mean by a "proper" cellar conversion?

You can't store anything down there wothout risk of it getting mouldy or rusty without spending a fortune.  Unless you live in London, cellar conversions to getting a cellar to habitable - and therefore correctly temperate and dry - cost more than they add in value.  

Victorian houses were built to breathe and whilst the construction is relatively simple , they're quite finely balanced and don't like to be messed around with.  They have very high humidity and some may well flood (normal) or have puddles that appear in bad weather.    They need good ventilation with airbricks both front and back of the property in order to dissipate the humidity and stop the wooden joists from rotting or trapped dampness from spreading upwards into the house causing condensation.


It's genuinely best to leave cellars alone and only store things that can cope with that environment - eg.  wine 🙂

Simple 'damp proofing' is far from guaranteed to work and can cause more trouble than it solves.   

Darn.  Was really hoping we could just get it tanked and that would be it.  So is there not really a way to keep stuff down there that needs to be at least kind of dry?

Doozergirl

There is a way, but it's ££££ and probably
more than the value of what you want to keep there. 

The cheap way is to keep anything down there on shelving with legs that cannot rust/rot, with good airflow around them.    

Basically, keep anything that should be dry in the loft.  

(Edit: And when you finally move, throw it down the ladder and out of an upstairs window in the general direction of a skip) 

Jd843

Doozergirl said:

There is a way, but it's ££££ and probably
more than the value of what you want to keep there. 

The cheap way is to keep anything down there on shelving with legs that cannot rust/rot, with good airflow around them.    

Basically, keep anything that should be dry in the loft.  

(Edit: And when you finally move, throw it down the ladder and out of an upstairs window in the general direction of a skip) 

We want to keep several bikes in there (safer than the garage, tidier than the dining room...) so they are quite valuable unfortunately, and obviously keeping them on shelves wouldn't be an option!  Any suggestions?

stuart45

I remember back in the 80's in Hove when loads of Regency houses were being converted and sold off as flats. 
Standard method for the basement flats was 3 coats of Synaprufe over the floors and walls, sand thrown the top coat as a key and sand/cement render over the top. 
When people lived in them they usually had condensation problems. When you went in to some of them you could taste the high humidity. As Doozergirl stated the correct ventilation is really important.
These houses were also in a chalk subsoil which has good drainage and a low water table.

TheProfessional

We were mid-terrace with a cellar. It was fairly dry down there (cardboard boxes never felt soft etc)

Once a year it would flood, particularly summer rain when it lashes down huge volumes in a short period. It flooded for every year of the six years we were there

After the second time we learnt out lesson and kept everything on crates off the floor

Some houses on the row flooded more than others. A mixture of water table, drainage surrounding the house etc

Jd843

Bumping my now kind of old thread with a bit of an update...
We've now moved into the house, and after putting a hygrometer in the cellar, I can confirm it is very damp.  RH reading has been as high as 90%.  
We kept the window open for a while to try and keep it ventilated, but obviously this makes it colder too, which won't help with the damp (?).  What would be the best course of action, if any, to be able to store things down there? Is a dehumidifier a good idea?  Keep the window open or close it?  And what about heating it?

Doozergirl

It is supposed to be damp.  It is supposed to be ventilated so that humidity is reduced - you should have air bricks at the front and back of the cellar creating a consistent through-draft.  

If you can see obvious areas of ingress that is soaking, check the guttering and rainwater pipes around the house to ensure that everything is going where it should.