This is a bit off the preservation topic, though it still involves my work. I had a long and busy day surveying today, around Leeds mainly, looking at rising damp, wet rot and wall tie corrosion. The traffic was awful. The following is copy of a letter that came in the post whilst I was […]
Micro-drilling construction timbers. How and why it works.
12 Mar 11 by
Wet Rot. Dry Rot, beetle infestations. All real problems in construction timbers. In most cases diagnosis and estimation of the extent of the problem is easy; a torch and a screwdriver being all the tools needed, by any half-decent timber infestation surveyor. However, when large section timbers, valuable historic members or restricted access is concerned, […]
Property Care Association Thermography day.
10 Mar 11 by
Having had my appetite for this subject wetted, by a course with the National Flood School, I spent a morning at the PCA thermography day in Huntingdon this week. PCA general manager Steve Hodgson sat at the back of a room which was full of the usual suspects; those PCA members who never tire of […]
Cavity wall tie corrosion in Yorkshire (now getting much worse)
16 Feb 11 by
I worked on my first remedial cavity wall tie installation job in the summer of 1984. It was a domestic house in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire. The detached house was brick, built with black ash mortar. A Structural Engineer had noticed some slight bulging of the wall and suspected wall tie corrosion was at work. Without […]
Damp. The (very), basic guide. Part 2
15 Feb 11 by
Before reading this, it may help to look at the preamble in part 1. Part 2 moves on from damp visible as mould on clothes, walls and ceilings and goes onto damp coming into the property from outside the house. Specialists and surveyors refer to this as ‘Penetrating damp’. Of course this means the damp […]