Sorting out house damp.

[Mej]

if you rub all the mould off with Milton Sterilising Fluid it should not come back that is what we recommend to people.

I see it a lot, people who dont seem understand that if they dont vent their house and crank up the heating they will get mould.

Dehumidifiers can help a lot.

[tinpants]

Originally Posted by Mej

if you rub all the mould off with Milton Sterilising Fluid it should not come back that is what we recommend to people.

I see it a lot, people who dont seem understand that if they dont vent their house and crank up the heating they will get mould.

Dehumidifiers can help a lot.

Sorry. Don't agree with that. In my not inconsiderable experience in the building game I have found that one of the worst things you can do in a damp house / room is stick a dehumidifier in it. All a dehumidifier will do is drag more moisture through the wall. The best thing to do is fix the cause ( as much as possible anyway) then open the windows a little bit and shut the door on it. Once the room has dried out a bit, turn on the heating and leave the window ajar.

On a slightly different note, if your interior walls are hard finished (as opposed to dry lined or studded) try hacking the plaster off and letting them dry off naturally before replacing the plaster with a lime plaster. Most builders do lime and horsehair plastering these days. It'll let the walls breathe a bit and so reduce any moisture build up. Stone walls are a **** to work with as the material is inherently damp anyway so if your walls a stone rather than brick then you'll have a certain amount of damp anyhow. You'll just have to live with it. Having said that, if you really want to keep the wet out, you can always tank the interior walls but this is a costly thing to do and easy to do wrong.


Anyhoo, to get back on track, don't get a dehumidifier. They're completely innapropriate for your situation.


HTH

Good advice Nick, I have been pointed in the same direction by someone on another forum too. I wont be tanking though, as that needs to be perfect to work, and there's too much chance that it wont quite be perfect!

Had a guy come around yesterday to look, and says that my walls don't look bad at all. Couple of slightly damp walls in the cellar and some in the walls around bad render. He's gonna pump the walls with a damp proofing and look at a few other things for me too. He also told me I can dig down in my cellar to make it full height, without the need for underpinning. Whoop, whoop!

[Wideboy]

games room!!!......... wish i had one snooker table would be the first purchase

Bike store first, then when I've built the garage, it'll become a boys room! Did an investigatory dig this afternoon, and discovered the bottom of my foundations are higher than first anticipated. There may be an easy (ish) way around it, but wont know for sure, until my builder friend pops around in the morning.

Fingers crossed!

[Shellywoozle]

I had damp in all my lower walls and I managed to find a damp proof guy who did a foreigner 5 years ago and it cost me a grand. They even replastered my lounge where they knocked the plaster off to inject, good job too shame they didnt do all the walls LOL

I could not see the damp, was only read on a meter but I could smell it . After it was done, it was great. I have damp in my bay window still albeit I had breathing bricks in.

My damp was caused by idiots laying a gravel driveway about 5 inches thick above the house damp level. Got rid of the gravel and treated the damp.

Costs money but if it is the house you want I would go for it, get it done properly. I had company out from the surveyors from Brum that quoted me a small fortune, got myself a smaller company and bobs ya uncle

[punyXpress]

[QUOTE=Shellywoozle;2135697]
My damp was caused by idiots laying a gravel driveway about 5 inches thick above the house damp level. Got rid of the gravel and treated the damp.

As Shelley says - check soil etc hasn't been piled up against walls.
Also : First paragraph of Surveyor's Report is a typical ' boiler plate ' section that gets included in ALL reports to save his arris !

My father has a good friend that is a builder, and a bloody good one at that, he also knows a thing or two about damp. He is sorting my damp, giving me advice/guidance on digging out the cellar, helping me put a ramp in for the bikes, and will be the one who builds my garage, as well as carrying out any remedial works to the house. I wont be paying the earth either.

There has been a raised area put in to the rear of the property, which is holding soil/rubble against the outside of the building, there's not too much I can do about this, apart from treat the walls from the inside. He's already told me what he plans to do, I'm just waiting on him to get the stuff he needs.