… why it is that my little room is getting so damp. I moved a pile of wood and the evidence is right before my eyes.
The soil has once more banked itself up against the kitchen wall (I keep digging it out every couple of years) and also, some of the pointing has fallen out and water is infiltrating between the stones.
I’m glad that I’m going round to Terry’s tomorrow morning to have a pointing lesson with Mark. I can see me putting this to use in a very short space of time.
In other news, I’m still tidying up the garden, albeit in a rather desultory fashion. Most of what I’ve been doing is to sort out the scrap wood into what is useable elsewhere and what is only fit for burning. I’m also pulling up brambles and nettles in a sort-of tidying up of the scrub for I need a place to put the compost bin that I bought a couple of weeks ago and everywhere else is full up.
And what else? Ahh yes. I’ve dug over the carrot patch and the potato patch and rescued some veg. I fact I had home-grown potatoes and carrots for tea just now. I’ve also tidied up Caliburn’s cab and cleaned the inside of the windscreen which was all greased over and filthy. We’re off to Liz and Terry’s tomorrow and Strawberry Moose has been promised a huge hug from Liz. He’s quite looking forward to it.
And in other news, Rhys and I have been looking at cement mixers on the internet – Rhys has to lay a concrete foundation for his new shed. But never mind the cement mixer, Harbour Freight has a heavy duty concrete vibrator for just €99. Now isn’t that right up Lee “I’m a potty-mouth” Prostitute’s alley?
Beacuse I’m such a real man, I’m mixing my concrete by hand rather than renting or buying a mixer.
Sounds like you’ve found the source of some of your damp problem there! If you want to cure it, you’ll need a retaining wall to stop the build-up ending up against the house wall. It would be worth the extra work and since you’ll need to dig it out this year anyway, now would be a good time to do it. Dig a trench about 18″ away from you house and fill it with rubble to form a foundation for the wall. Pour in liquid cement and let it set to make a solid pad. You may need some rebar too depending on the amount of build up you get. Then build your wall 18″ to 2ft high. Waterproof the hillside face with membrane and that should make the water run along and away from the house. If you want a belt and braces approach you could also incorporate some drainage pipe too. Then you can repoint the house and it would’nt just erode straight out again. It would be cheaper in the long run and would possibly cure your damp problem.
I’m in favour of painting the side of the wall with bitumen then putting a trench around to lower ground, filling the trench with gravel and leaving it be. That should sort the damp out for a few years.
What is rebar?
But rather than dig a trench and a wall the whole lot is planned to be moved away in due course. It’s in this area that I’ll be sinking my underground rainwater storage tank so a bulldozer will be passing over it with its blade down.
I think though that a lot of the damp problem was caused by the lack of guttering on the roof – the rain was just cascading over the edge and dropping onto the ground just here. Since I did the roof I know have guttering that takes the water away so I hope that that might go a long way to solving the problem.
Rebar is the metal rods that is used to stregnthen concrete. It can be used in walls too if you use bricks/blocks with holes in. It increases the stregnth of a structure quite considerably. In the case od a wall to sink part of it into the foundation and let the concrete set around it and then build your wall with it running through it. It stops lateral force toppling the wall by sheering it from the base.
Nice pointing by the way 🙂
Ahhh right. I know what you mean now. We used to tap lengths of it vertically through stacks of breeze blocks (cinder blocks, Rhys) and interlock them and then pour the concrete in. That’s how I .
did the garden wall here.
And that pointing is quite impressive too 😉