My neighbour pointed out to me that the wall around my outside utility door was soaking. Turns out the gutter had dropped from the low roof of the extension and all the rain water (for gawd knows how long) had obviously been pouring over the gutter and down the wall.
There is almpst a perfect triangle of damp staining (and some moss) on the brickwork.
I have now got the gutter repaired and working correctly - what is the best way to dry the brickwork out? The position of the door doesnt really get much sun in the summer never mind in the winter.
Should I just leave to dry out naturally with air and wind, or try and enclose it with tarpaulin or something and stick some sort of warm blower onto the bricks?
There is no sign of any damp internally, walls are facing brick with block inside.
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If you cover it with anything, it stays damp. Putting a hot air blower on an external wall is like trying to fire a steam loco with a candle.
You get the moss off, make sure the damp mortar hasnt blown - if it has get it repointed, and then let it dry naturally.
One has to ask, how come you didnt notice it yonks ago.
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At back of the house I have a back door from the utility room and back patio doors from the back extension. If you come out the utility door you are onto the decking which runs down the side of the rear extension.
As utility room is usually filled with clothes horses, ironing baskets and a dog bed, we have got into the lazy habit of just using the patio doors from the extension. We would very rarely actually then walk back down the side of the extension to the utility room door (if all that makes sense)
This we never noticed the brickwork or gutter issues.
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What Z says - let it dry naturally.
The source of wetness has been removed - assuming the mortar is good it will be fine.
Have had damp appear on an inside wall before in my last house (sandstone walls) - problem was the ancient cast guttering had rotted through at the back and although it looked ok it was bathing the wall in rainwater.
Once the gutter was replaced the wall dried out within a week or so.
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Shame the neighbour didn't notice sooner.
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>> You get the moss off, make sure the damp mortar hasnt blown - if it
>> has get it repointed, and then let it dry naturally.
Why in that order? The mortar will inevitably be cement based and thus impermeable so why would it not be better to repoint after the wall has dried out?
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If you are repointing, and it's an old house, make sure you use lime mortar.
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A couple of years ago, my son bought a Victorian place; it had previously been occupied by a single lady with 4 children - I don't think that she had the time, the money or the inclination for maintaining the building.
I was horrified by the damp patches on the inside of some of the outer walls which was discolouring paintwork - where had that come from? It didn't take long to realise that the guttering, a hotch-potch of iron and plastic channels, was cracked in several places and utterly useless; this was repaired a.s.a.p. The walls dried out naturally, and a year later the internal walls could be repainted.
As others have said, repair the gutter and let the wall dry naturally- in our experience, that approach has worked.
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The west-facing back wall of this 216 year olde cottidge gets damp. I did spray the external elevations with some rather expensive German waterproofing stuff a few years ago but, my damp meter tells me the damp is getting through again.
It doesn't bother me TBH, as I know it will dry out onece the ole currant bun returns to Sunni Cornwall.
One of the joys of living in an old stone cottage. Granite is porous apparently, which is why a lot of olde cottages down 'ere are either rendered or slate hung.
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I ain't no builder, but my understanding is that dampness doesn't really affect the integrity of the walls themselves, but can cause mould/staining/rot in the innards of the house.
The original use of double skinned walls was not for insulation, but simply to allow the outer course to get as damp as it wanted with the elements leaving the inner course (and consequently the inhabitants) nice and dry.
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>>The original use of double skinned walls was not for insulation, but simply to allow the outer course to get as damp as it wanted with the elements leaving the inner course (and consequently the inhabitants) nice and dry.
And then along came some bright spark who had the idea of filling said cavity with polystyrene beads or mineral wool.
8-)
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>
>> Granite is porous apparently,
>> which is why a lot of olde cottages down 'ere are either rendered or slate
>> hung.
>>
Not as porous as other building materials. But it is very dense, and will be very slow to heat up, having a huge heat capacity.
I'd suspect your damp is condensation, caused by the wall being permanently colder than the interior air temperature. Any stones that span the width of the wall will act as especially effective heat bridges to the outside.
Heating the cottage will make condensation worse, as warm air holds more moisture.
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>>Heating the cottage will make condensation worse, as warm air holds more moisture.
Ah! ... when we moved here nigh-on 7 years ago, we used to get mold on the wall going up the staircase which is adjacent to the kitchen (steam)
Now that the cottage is properly heated via a multi-fuel stove and ventilated, we never see any mold at all at all.
I take your point about condensation, as there are some 'what look like' damp patches there now which could well be caused by the steam from the kitchen going up the stairwell.
I do have an extractor fan above the cooker... but I can't hear the radio when the damn thing is on.
8-)
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Heat by itself doesn't shift the water vapour.
Needs a combination of heat and ventilation.
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"Needs a combination of heat and ventilation."
Needs a dehumidifier and hygrometer.
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Nope. A dehumidifier uses electricity and that’s about all it does. Ambient temperature and air movement is what is required along with extracting bathroom and kitchen outputs.
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" A dehumidifier uses electricity and that’s about all it does."
OK, you don't have to believe me. But it worked in my son's damp house, and it works in our conservatory.
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>> Nope. A dehumidifier uses electricity and that’s about all it does. Ambient temperature and air
>> movement is what is required along with extracting bathroom and kitchen outputs.
>>
Not in my experience.
If a human being lives, washes and cooks inside a largely sealed box with walls that are colder than the inside air temperature, the inevitable moisture in the air will condense on the coldest parts - windows, upstairs walls, behind a wardrobe, WC cistern, etc.
A dehumidifier presents an even colder surface and circulates the air over it, so catches a considerable portion of the total moisture.
When I empty 2 pints of water from my dehumidifier in the morning, that is 2 pints that would otherwise have been deposited all over the coldest outside walls. It's exactly like looking outside on a frosty morning - the coldest surfaces have trapped the most water.
Obviously extractor fans in kitchen and bathroom help considerably.
Or you could leave all the windows and doors open permanently and not heat the house.
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I am a huge fan of dehumidifiers. Also of plenty of airflow.
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I had a water leak in my loft. The only damage was soggy insulation which I removed. I bought a de-humidifier (a proper compressor type, not one of those Peltier models) and left it running up there to dry it as best I could. It was pulling out several litres a day for a few days before dropping off. I now run it on the landing whenever we shower (extractor fan fitted) and in a small room when SWMBO hangs washing on a drying rack on wet days.
I usually collect around four litres a week - that's four litres less inside the house.
The water collected goes into the steam iron and steam mop.
Last edited by: bathtub tom on Sun 18 Feb 18 at 09:49
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We have been using one in the conservatory (Horrible additions, freezing in winter and boiling in summer) for a few years and it has stopped the condensation forming and causing mould on the walls.
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"We have been using one in the conservatory for a few years and it has stopped the condensation forming and causing mould on the walls."
That's why we bought our dehumidifier about 5 years ago; istr it was the same price then as it is now. It is the proper compressor type - one of these, and we are very happy with it.
www.screwfix.com/p/wdh-122h-12r-12ltr-dehumidifier/72503
"(Horrible additions, freezing in winter and boiling in summer) "
'Fraid I can't agree there ....... we use ours in spring, summer and autumn as a dining room though, admittedly, in winter, it's only good for storage .......... except for Christmas Day, when we cough-up for the electric under-floor heating. When it was built, we spent some time looking for the best roof-glass and window openings in order to keep it reasonably comfortable in the summer.
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>> www.screwfix.com/p/wdh-122h-12r-12ltr-dehumidifier/72503
"12 litres per day" but only a 4 litre tank - though with an option to drain continuously. One of these days I might rig up a permanent drain somehow.
Last edited by: Mapmaker on Mon 19 Feb 18 at 10:48
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""12 litres per day" but only a 4 litre tank - though with an option to drain continuously. One of these days I might rig up a permanent drain somehow."
I think you have to punch out a small panel at the back of the dehumidifier in order to operate the permanent drain, and once punched out, it couldn't be neatly placed back in. Used in our situation, it only needs emptying once a week so I'm prepared to put up with the inconvenience. I should add that the design of the tank is such that it is liable to spill at the sides and warrants taking outside, or held over a sink, to empty.
The condensate collected is useful for steam irons, the steam floor-cleaner ands the car screen-wash; there is plenty to donate to friends.
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I empty mine daily... One of these days I plan a wood-burner which will operate on low virtually constantly. Brilliant way of improving ventilation - that's what chimneys are for. But that's not a simple thing to achieve.
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>> We have been using one in the conservatory (Horrible additions, freezing in winter and boiling
>> in summer)
My next door neighbour got rid of his and replaced it with a proper brick extension, he'd tried it for first two years of their occupation but it was intolerable. His thought was that you could get a good well insulated one but not at anything near price his predecessor paid from B&Q or similar.
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We have a conservatory - didn't think we would ever want or even like one. But this house had one when we bought it.
We really like it though to our surprise. Doesn't get too hot often and there's a fan and skylight to help. Does not cause condensation in there either. It's opened up onto the dining room so on a very cold day the room needs a fair bit of heating. We don't turn the radiators off in the dining room (two big upright ones) even when we're not using dining/conservatory.
I suspect if the conservatory was left closed off it might have a condensation problem. It's very big and maybe it's because it was a quality construction that we have not had problems. It has integral blinds covering all the windows and the roof is sort of opaque.
The room where I do have some issues with condensation on the windows is my office - the small bedroom. I work from home most of the time and so the cause of water vapour is probably me. There's is an air brick in there and I do have the window open but when it's really cold. Answer is probably have the central heating on more ;-) And maybe leave the door open.
Last edited by: rtj70 on Sun 18 Feb 18 at 20:55
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The biggest condensation we have is on the outside of the toilet cistern, from the water level down. I replaced the carpet that was down when we moved in with vinyl floor covering (Posh lino) and have a shallow drip tray placed at the back of the cistern to catch the drips.
Funny enough, the problem has not been near as bad since the vinyl went down. Or maybe that's just my imagination, unless someone knows of a reason why that would make a difference.
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"I suspect if the conservatory was left closed off it might have a condensation problem."
Ours was built onto the living-room, and the patio doors were retained in order to close off the conservatory in winter. The main reason for the condensation is, without doubt, the fact that we have plants in there; we generally bring in a few extras from outside to protect them from frost.
We have found a setting on the dehumidifier that will maintain the conservatory at 65-70% r.h. - that seems to keep the plants happy and, at the same time, prevent condensation. During the late autumn/winter/early spring period, we usually draw off some 4lt per week.
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Perhaps I should have said that they’re not a permanent solution.
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>> Perhaps I should have said that they’re not a permanent solution.
>>
We've had one for 33 years. It's permanent solution for an old house with solid stone walls.
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Am I the only one that has a clothes horse up drying washing, occasionally throw items on the radiators to dry them quicker, and don’t own a dehumidifier??
And don’t have any internal dampness or mould!
Maybe my house is just too draughty!
Oh and my kitchen doesn’t have any external windows either!
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I find that having two daughters who don't know how to close a door they just opened helps.
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Oh and my kitchen doesn’t have any external windows either!
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How odd, I don't think I've heard of a kitchen with no external windows before.
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Kitchen was at back of house with window and back door.
But as part of our extension works we got a sun room built on the back. A single storey brick walled extension with tiled roof and skylights. However due to the amount of glass it didn’t pass whatever the insulation tests were so we had to put external upvc doors between the kitchen and extension to effectively make it an external room.
Therefore kitchen doesn’t have an external window as such!
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This owse I viewed a few years ago had a bedvroom where the window looked out into the garage!
goo.gl/Rwkssg luvly sea views from the two front reception vrooms though.
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As to Bobby's original query it might take a surprisingly long time to fully dry out. Some years ago I had a leaking pipe that soaked an internal solid wall. The pipe was repaired and I forgot all about it.
A few months later we were selling the house and the buyer had a damp survey done and their test meter was able to detect higher humidity in that section of wall. As I said I had forgotten about the leak and there was no visible sign of damp but the chap using the tester said it was not unusual to take months to dry out.
In the current case, if there there is no sign of internal damp and the original source has been eliminated I'd agree with those who have already advised just to let it breathe and dry out naturally over the next few weeks.
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Drying brick wall - Zero
