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foundation fun


Jim Baird

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1930's brick home with granite foundation wall that has concrete "coping" to support brick veneer and to span openings, has multi-wythe brick inside of granite that supports wood frame.

Inspection found signs of moisture intrusion causing spalling of brick and pulverization of mortar joints over time, plus a variety of remedial efforts over some time to shore up brick. Remedies included repointing with more than one mortar material as well as what looks like a "surface bonding" material that looks like it contains epoxy or something.

Some of the remedies have begun to exfoliate and spall themselves. Overall the surface bonds appear to have held up best.

Moisture source is most likely a buried drain system that receives guttered roof runoff. I think most likely the drain system is old fashioned masonry drain tile that tends to leak at joints. Have no idea where drain system's daylight termination is. It may well tie into the building drain/sewer system whose path is roughly known.

If my thinking is right, without having been intrusive, I am leaning toward suggesting correction/replacement of drain tiles to relieve building of moisture source other than ordinary surface collection.

Other than that, perhaps a section/by section replacement of the inner brick wythes that support the frame.

See pics below. Comments are welcome, as I have not seen a building like this before, and I am creeping out on a limb.

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View of granite with coping above

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View of surface bonding effort

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view of pulverizing brick

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I have inspected thousands of buildings from that era and never saw one constructed like that, but construction practices vary widely by region.

I would suggest not making recommendations if you are not familiar with the construction, especially if you are not certain about the construction. Replacing an exterior drainage system would be expensive and excavating adjacent to old stone foundation walls should be done with much care. They have been know to fail when badly deteriorated and they loose the lateral support of the soil.

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I appreciate the replies.

I did stand shy of suggesting remedy, as I usually do. My job is to find problems, not to solve them.

Here is what I said:

2.1) My crawl around the perimeter found mostly dry soil, but also many areas where the brick, the mortar, and the remedial repointing/parging that had been applied was flaking/spalling, pulverizing.

Those effects are from moisture migration toward the inside. This link offers good info in that regard: http://www.oldhouseweb.com/how-to-advic ... onry.shtml

I think the moisture source might be from the drain tiles I assume are buried outside the foundation wall that receive the discharge from the gutters all around the roof. I don?t know whether the drain tile travel south to daylight or whether they might join the building drain after it leaves the perimeter to tie into the municipal sewer system.

The wood columns and the steel jackposts are technically temporary and would most properly be replaced by masonry, but they appeared to be effective on inspection day.

My thinking is that the builders did not like the bearing left to them by the width of the granite block minus the width of the well-fired brick they used for exterior, so they used the other brick inside the granite. The South has long been a seat of eccentricity and I think this family was likely no exception. I do know there was a local brickyard nearby back in the day, and I don't think the exterior ones came from there, but the interior ones might well have.

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Hello All,

I am the Owner of Mold Removal Express in Denver. I am here to share my experience and way to remove mold remediation from your house, office or any where. I don't know how to start. Please some information so I can start sharing my experience with you guys.

I would like to remove mold remediation from my customer's homes. How should I proceed?

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