That was a good video. I'm a structural engineer and I'm a bit sceptical about structural engineering videos on youtube, because you find people just start pretending to know stuff. But that video was really informative and well explained, and didn't try to make generalised statements about solutions for a very complicated problem!
Exactly spot on! My father was a bricklayer /renderer from Yugoslavia. I never believed him that he used to biuld up render to 100mm. I came across a UK renderer and he told me he sacked a bloke because he couldn't render! He told him : you're a skimmer only. Then on site he tells me ; your dad is right mate! Same with those cracks: mortar joints only and it's fine! Top video and tutorial. Cheers from Australia 🙂👍👍👍
good practical advice Roger. I complained to my father about something in my house's construction and he rightly pointed out it has already lasted 100 years that way
Thanks Roger that was the most comprehensive yet simple explanation of cracks I have ever watched and I now understand the reasons behind the cracks in my brick house alot better and how to deal with them. Cheers Darren in Australia.
Very informative video Roger. I see alot of cracks where loadbearing timber windows have been replaced with UPVC [generallly houses built 50s, 60s and 70s] and the cracks and deforming of brickwork above as a consequence. Helifix works well here to create a beam effect to prevent further movement and I have also seen Acrow props used to allow for inclusion of a metal angle to act as a lintel to the external brickwork. It would be good if you could do a video on this problem, as it seems to be in every town and village.
@@jamesbirch6522 just dealt with a wooden lintel above a kitchen window. The outer area had rotted but the inner (I.e. inside the house) was sound. I cleaned up the outside timber getting rid of the worse of the rot. Then I sprayed three lots (it was a hot week) of rot and worm killer on the timber. I got a length of 30mm by 30mm by 4mm steel angle cut the exact length to go under the wooden lintel sitting on the supporting brickwork at either end of the lintel. Onto the steel angle I welded a 30mm by 4mm flat bar. This was hammered (it took a heavy hammer) in under the lintel with the 60mm under the lintel. The whole lot (front and under side) was then covered with expanded steel mesh. Formwork (made out of 3mm ply supported with timber) was placed under the lintel, angle and mesh. The formwork makes it easy to face up with render. Using a mortar gun I pumped a one to one mortar mix under the lintel on top of the ply, then rendered up the outer area with standard 3 to one mortar. This means that the timber will not bend it would have to crush (that will not happen) for the upper brickwork to slump. I may put some helical reinforcement in next year above the lintel but there is only one course of bricks before the upper pebble dashed area.
Brilliant! I’d suspected that this might be the case with my 1916 built house. We’re on clay soil, and certainly over the past couple of summer/winter cycles, it’s definitely moved. I’ll now just fill the crack with a lime mortar to stop water ingress! Thanks for the very informative video.
Well done! One of the best videos I've watched to convey information about a simple yet frightening subject. My crack doesn't seem problematic to me after viewing this. Thanks.
very illuminating - fancy a visit to Australia LOL. I'll be looking up more of your videos so I can get my wet and cracking 120 year old chimney fixed based on knowledge of what should be done. Had a bad water leak from rusted out old pipes that the plumber lazily kept instead of replacing 5 years ago when work was done in the bathroom. Took advantage of me as a woman working away at the time. Poor chimney ended up sitting in a big puddle for months and I didn't know as my son was in the house while I was away. Cracks inside and out with the foundation bricks on the ground crumbling! Another problem is the outside of the chimney was cement rendered over lime mortar so you rising damp also a big problem. Many thanks for posting.
It would have been good to have also had a more directly vertical crack through mortar and brick (i.e. not just mortar) discussed, kind of like as pictured at 0:30 but where the brickwork is overlapping and the cracks gone straight down through the middle of the brick on alternate courses of bricks.
Thanks for this video, it was very informative! People do worry when they see cracks in there houses, but understanding that the ground moves depending on the climate conditions may put peoples minds at ease!
This advice makes so much sense I can't help smiling throughout or even sniggering! It's just comic how sometimes people act when they don't know anything about a problem and try to address it by just treating the obvious symptoms without recourse to common sense. The fact that a simple act of stupidity can cost someone their house is material for tragi-comedies. The subtle causes that result into houses'/buildings' deterioration without the dwellers' noticing or caring about is food for thought and quite sobering. Nothing lasts for ever but if it was made to last forever, it certainly wasn't built cheap. In the latter case, perhaps it's something worth thinking about before taking an old, soundly made building down (or severely altering it) just because "we don't like it" or "we want something better".
I dunno about the rest of you but these videos have been so informative. I've learnt so much from them - thank you! Currently have a Crack on my internal breeze block of my outhouse...
Roger, Thank you for the informative & reassuring information. You are absolutely correct as I had a small crack on the side of my 120 year old house & a year or two later it had closed.
Regarding the old wall restraints, my old man told me he saw it done just after the war they put the rods through with the X on the end against the outside wall then heated the bar so it expanded then tighten up the end and as the rod contracted it would pull the wall in repeat as necessary until the wall was where you want
@@kieranthompson779 same. 2/3 of a tube in one stream, no nozzle on from the third storey right past the groundworkers bullseye. And yes…I did hide as he came charging up the stairs.
I have a crack at my moms home. She has brick. Who do I call, what is the specialists called? Is this like structural expert. Not sure what to Google. Any advice is appreciated
Sensible advice indeed - cracks happens and, as you say, all buildings and their fabric move due to moisture and thermal variations etc. As highlighted the most important step (with all building defects) is to establish the cause (diagnosis) before deciding what to do. Building Research Establishment Digest 251 (Assessment of damage in low rise buildings) is invaluable when it comes to assessing cracks, Among other things it advises that minor cracks can be made good relatively simply and suggests that “unless there are clear indications that damage is progressing to a higher level it may be expensive and inappropriate to carry out extensive work for what amounts to aesthetic damage.” It concludes by advising that “The only certain way of confirming the progression of damage is to take a series of measurements with time.”
Cheers Roger. I've got a 200 year old cottage with a few external cracks which I'm having sorted by a great builder, your advice is seriously welcome as I now know twice as much as I knew yesterday about the various causes. Thanks mate!👍
Never used them, but Geobear look the dogs bits for subsidence etc. Watch, if you can, the underpinning of a garage - amazing stuff. Thanks Roger, for yet another cracking episode.
Honestly the most informative video I've watched on this subject, I have 2 besser brick dividing walls in my complex that have identical cracks to what you outline at the start of the video. We are built on floodplain so clay, you have put my mind at ease as these cracks have not changed since approx 2014.
Thanks Roger Excellent advice I’m just about to have my house repaired by the insurance company..a bit of movement caused by a tree in the road outside. Anyway tree has now gone and house seems stable after two years of monitoring..but I now know how those cracks outside should be repaired. Regards Jim.
Thanks for this video. The full brick house my mum lives in has a crack in one wall. My dad built this house around 45 years ago. The footings for the house were excavated from clay. I tend to think over the years the clay has expanded and contracted as it got wet and then dry. My dad died ten years ago so he can’t help us. I’ll take photos of the crack so it can be seen if the crack gets worse over time. I’ll patch the crack up with a similar mix to what originally was used, lime, cement, sand and water. I used to labour for my dad mixing mortar but that was 35 years ago so I’m out of practice. I’ll just put a bit in the surface to block up the gap.
Very precious info. You just relived my fear of my house collapsing. I just have to move further the septic tank from the house and make a drainage around the foundations
Well done. You talk the talk and walk the walk. You could argue that mastic is pliable and would move with the cracking but over time mastic can stiffen and become hard and brittle.
Thank you very much for this video, Roger. Our house is built on clay and your superb explanation has put my mind at ease about the hairline fractures we have.
Totally agree, I'm in London (Roger referencing London) and been in my 1880s build for 16 years and have cracks all over the place. They haven't been getting bigger in most of them. Thank God for RUclips!
Good explanation about the behaviour of clay. Where I live there is silt, and at some depth into the ground it seems very hard and almost impermeable for water. The original house has been built with 70cm deep concrete foundations, and these reach well into this hard silt. But an add on has been built on foundations only 20-40cm deep, and the foundation has been built very unevenly in width and depth. This foundation didn't reach "under the weather" as we say, and is subject to freezing up and thawing, and also I found that the silt around and under this foundation was very saturated with water, which caused a lot of humidity under the wooden floor causing it to rot. And also small cracks were this add on joins the main building were apparent. So my thought went over and the best solution seemed to me to underpin this foundation to the same depth as that of the main building. 1. to keep water out by bringing the foundation down to a level were water doesn't penetrate easy, and also preventing rodents digging tunnels allowing more water in. 2. To prevent cracks to develop more by bringing balance in the amount of support the parts of the building get by have them resting on the same layer of soil, and at a depth where water ingress and frost play no role in causing movement. I also applied crack stitching, and this holds up very well over the last year since I did it. So Roger, what is your view about imbalance in the construction of foundations and going under the weather? And what role can play a high water table (ours is very deep at 8m)
I moved into a flipped Edwardian house 20 odd years ago, I think the thud of the multitude of removal men caused a few cracks inside. My neighbour told us before we bought that it had been monitored, but hadn't moved. I'm finally repairing them, but none remaining have moved since. Probably why it was pebble dashed, but no outside movement in that time since. My brother was concerned about the gap of the stair stringer away from the wall. I managed to pull out a newspaper from the filled gap dating back to mid 60s, so not moved for about 60 years. The slag inside the brickwork is a bit of bitch when doing anything structurally, but it's still standing.
Sitting in a London property built in 1790s - lightly built but has lasted well despite the Luftwaffe coming fairly close a while back. Problem is, modern heavy piling can and has caused cracking on wall/ceiling interfaces through racking of the structure. And, yes, the desire for open plan/wall removal and the added weight in upper floors is not always properly allowed for. The top floor of a Georgian garret was only designed for a bed, a chair, a cupboard and a thin servant - not a fully-fitted kitchen and other stuff - the floor joists aren't up to it. And don't get me started on people piling vast olive trees etc in planters on balconies and porch tops on Regency terrace houses. They weren't designed for it...on one big place a few blocks away most of the front came off a listed 'First Rate' house when the entire balcony tore out of a very crumbly wall where most of the mortar had long turned to dust (they had repointed the outer brick face but didn't look any deeper)..
Recently found a crack Roger and initially felt panic. Happened on this great advice by chance and am now simmered down. Been around for almost 3/4 o a century so have at least learned to scream inwardly and NOT make a "knee jerk" move that creates destructive pounds of idiocy that then requires tons of repairs to undo. Thanks!! Easy does it in spite of the near panic that would have been quite expensive and regretful.
Very informative video as usual. Been put off buying houses in the past because of them having cracks but you give a better understanding of this. You have to love the craic.
My 1990 built house, built by Tarmac Homes, was built using calcium silicate bricks with no frogs. When using that type of brick the mortar should contain lime due to heat movements on the sunny side of the home. Most of my housing estate suffers from cracks in the mortar.on the sunny side of the homes. I only found out the reason when matching bricks for a house extension. This was after my next door neighbour went to their insurance company who fitted helifix bars set into the mortar.
Most of the detached garages in my street have cracks in the front end of the sidewalls. A lot of neighbours blame tree roots but they are built on concrete rafts. The problem seems to be that the big garage doorways have steel lintels above them. These expand and contract forcing the side walls out creating the cracks
An add to this good advice. Long brick walls need to expend and shrink due to warmth and cold. Nowadays we use in the Netherlands vertical dilatation up from 9 meters in length and further.
I was told for smaller internal cracks to grind them out enough to put something in, then insert a bead of polymer based construction adhesive which will maintain its "grab" and never set solid so maintaining a degree of flexibility and then use filler over it. I've never had a recurring problem after following this advice.
37 year old house with a few small cracks internally. 3 years ago got some painting done to repair water damage from a broken loft header tank. Got the painter to plaster in the cracks. No more movement since.
Thanks Roger! Virtually all my lintels were cracking up, didnt seem to be any reason for it. I ended up acro propping them from the base cill and then angle grinding the crack open, and inside were rusty steel rods. I had to with a wire brush remove as much of the rust as possible, paint it with anti-rust paint and then fill in the chase. Over 100+ year old house and water must have been getting in somehow or moisture and the steel expanded so much! Seems alright now, will let you know if my house falls down...
Sound advice! I am a mason now in Canada and so many of these problems I see are due to poor grade and eves trough ( gutters and down pipes) . Very important to ensure water drains away from the building not into it. The freeze/ thaw cycle can do considerable damage to masonry once water has a way in and once its made a pathway it only gets worse. Many homeowners can fix the grade themselves by landscaping soil or paving to slope away from the house
I lived in a house built on marsh land in Cheshire East. It had been underpinned once already. It was rented. One day a builder turned up to look at knocking a wall from the back room to the kitchen as the kitchen was tiny, even for a galley kitchen. He walked in, took one look down the hall and said, the left hand side is leaning to the left and the right hand side to the right. We never saw him again. When the kitchen floor had to come up, the house was sat in 18" of water. In the back garden, if you looked, you could see the kink in the brickwork and where it had been repaired once already. Was wonderful when i left that dump.
So glad you’ve done this video Roger. I have a couple of step cracks in the brickwork on my house. I was going to repair them by putting the helix rods in and repointing but I might not bother now!!
Brilliant, looked at the problem from both sides, didnt make you panic and very informative. We are also on clay soil and the conservatory looks as though its coming away, however now i think its due to the weather.
My mothers house a traditional terrace built 1901 as actually sinking at the back. But only one side was going down so floors sloped but no cracks. Insurance were not interested in paying for underpinning.
I would get a structural engineer to prepare a report. The insurance company is paying the surveyor and they will wriggle out of anything. The need a bit of slapping around.
Moisture is probably the number one cause, cyclic movement, thermal, brick growth, subsidence, settlement. Done several kilometres of crack stitching 🤪 Good video Roger 👍
Thanks for the presentation and all the hard work and dedication you exhibit in each of your videos, I am particularly glad to inform you I have watched this video and I was asked the reason of cracking in walls and I was able to answer and explain the reasons behind it. Thanks once again for your invaluable work in improving construction standards.
It's kind of cool that buildings move - we often don't see any cracks but there are tell tale signs. My loft conversion is almost finished. It's going great but I can see that parts of my house have shifted slightly because I have two doors that now need adjustment. They were a little close anyway to be honest but now they stick. No cracks though!
Really good video. I have an over 100-year-old terrace house in Sheffield. We have a crack that was assessed by an engineer he explained it was old movement due to the weight of the chimney breast. He recommended Helibars if we wanted to do a repair job.
Wasn’t sure what I was going to see when you appeared as the video started but you explained a lot and I learnt a great deal about possible reasons for a crack and yes I can verify old houses no solid foundations when I had some digging work done for a new water mains thought I how’s it still standing. I’ll follow you 👍
For a new build on clay, can't you build in a permanent soaker hose system to keep the clay moist? It would keep the clay from expanding and contracting?
Brilliant. I will have some q's about cracking though as i've just taken ownership of a ye olde 500 yr old building with hugely thick walls, a meter, probably stone, and one or two walls look like cheddar gorge.
Roger, good advise, thanks, good to know people with knowledge & experience like you are willing to share information. I see so many so called experts in videos within my trade & I often have to shake my head..
I'm trying to sell my house which is built on clay and has a big crack down the back wall that opens and closes like that over the years. But I obviously don't want buyers to notice it and because the previous owner painted the house white it shows up even worse! So I filled it with some cheap white filler to a few mm and touched it up with white paint and it concealed everything perfectly. I hope that ratcheting won't happen there because the filler isn't very strong and isn't very deep and that it'll just crumble under pressure rather than make the crack worse. In any case, I hope to be moved out before I find out for sure! The previous owner had tried repairing it and I can see these secondary cracks in the brickwork parallell to the old 'repairs' - that made me worry it was something serious, but now I know better.
I dug the exterior walls to below the footer. Added a footer drain pipe. Then sealed the wall with tar. Then replaced the clay we dug out and filled the hole with washed river stone all the way to the surface.
You are incredible 👊🇮🇪. I just bought a 40 year old house in Wexford Ireland .. that has a few cracks on the ceiling and internal walls .. could I actually send you a few photos to see what you think ? Again you are the best most informative DIY channel on the tube 👊🇮🇪
In old houses timber lintels are another reason why cracks form change them for concrete or steel. Another reason why cracks form are ferrous metals in joints of brickwork and stonework. When it rusts the metal expands causing pressure on the joint. Either remove it where possible or treat the metal with anti rust paint.
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From a retired builder ( Last 30 years in France) of over 60 years...good advise, nicely explained, well done..
That was a good video. I'm a structural engineer and I'm a bit sceptical about structural engineering videos on youtube, because you find people just start pretending to know stuff. But that video was really informative and well explained, and didn't try to make generalised statements about solutions for a very complicated problem!
The first video I watched from you made me $13,000 regarding rising damp repair, Thankyou Godbless you. 🙏🏻❤❤🙏🏻
Exactly spot on! My father was a bricklayer /renderer from Yugoslavia. I never believed him that he used to biuld up render to 100mm. I came across a UK renderer and he told me he sacked a bloke because he couldn't render! He told him : you're a skimmer only. Then on site he tells me ; your dad is right mate! Same with those cracks: mortar joints only and it's fine! Top video and tutorial. Cheers from Australia 🙂👍👍👍
good practical advice Roger. I complained to my father about something in my house's construction and he rightly pointed out it has already lasted 100 years that way
Thanks Roger that was the most comprehensive yet simple explanation of cracks I have ever watched and I now understand the reasons behind the cracks in my brick house alot better and how to deal with them. Cheers Darren in Australia.
I wish I had seen such a thorough explanation of building cracks many years ago.Big thanks.👍
Very informative video Roger.
I see alot of cracks where loadbearing timber windows have been replaced with UPVC [generallly houses built 50s, 60s and 70s] and the cracks and deforming of brickwork above as a consequence. Helifix works well here to create a beam effect to prevent further movement and I have also seen Acrow props used to allow for inclusion of a metal angle to act as a lintel to the external brickwork. It would be good if you could do a video on this problem, as it seems to be in every town and village.
Is there a video on this. as this is the issue my home is having.
@@jamesbirch6522 just dealt with a wooden lintel above a kitchen window. The outer area had rotted but the inner (I.e. inside the house) was sound. I cleaned up the outside timber getting rid of the worse of the rot. Then I sprayed three lots (it was a hot week) of rot and worm killer on the timber. I got a length of 30mm by 30mm by 4mm steel angle cut the exact length to go under the wooden lintel sitting on the supporting brickwork at either end of the lintel. Onto the steel angle I welded a 30mm by 4mm flat bar. This was hammered (it took a heavy hammer) in under the lintel with the 60mm under the lintel. The whole lot (front and under side) was then covered with expanded steel mesh. Formwork (made out of 3mm ply supported with timber) was placed under the lintel, angle and mesh. The formwork makes it easy to face up with render. Using a mortar gun I pumped a one to one mortar mix under the lintel on top of the ply, then rendered up the outer area with standard 3 to one mortar.
This means that the timber will not bend it would have to crush (that will not happen) for the upper brickwork to slump. I may put some helical reinforcement in next year above the lintel but there is only one course of bricks before the upper pebble dashed area.
Brilliant! I’d suspected that this might be the case with my 1916 built house. We’re on clay soil, and certainly over the past couple of summer/winter cycles, it’s definitely moved. I’ll now just fill the crack with a lime mortar to stop water ingress! Thanks for the very informative video.
And, as predicted, now we’ve had some wet weather, the crack has closed up again!
My 1920s / 30s bungalow moves with the seasons (built on clay) . Nothing to worry about. Let it do it's thing.
Nice description without the scare mongering and other associated crap. The video is appreciated.
God why cant I find a builder like you rodger!!!
Well done! One of the best videos I've watched to convey information about a simple yet frightening subject. My crack doesn't seem problematic to me after viewing this. Thanks.
very illuminating - fancy a visit to Australia LOL. I'll be looking up more of your videos so I can get my wet and cracking 120 year old chimney fixed based on knowledge of what should be done. Had a bad water leak from rusted out old pipes that the plumber lazily kept instead of replacing 5 years ago when work was done in the bathroom. Took advantage of me as a woman working away at the time. Poor chimney ended up sitting in a big puddle for months and I didn't know as my son was in the house while I was away. Cracks inside and out with the foundation bricks on the ground crumbling! Another problem is the outside of the chimney was cement rendered over lime mortar so you rising damp also a big problem. Many thanks for posting.
It would have been good to have also had a more directly vertical crack through mortar and brick (i.e. not just mortar) discussed, kind of like as pictured at 0:30 but where the brickwork is overlapping and the cracks gone straight down through the middle of the brick on alternate courses of bricks.
Thanks for this video, it was very informative! People do worry when they see cracks in there houses, but understanding that the ground moves depending on the climate conditions may put peoples minds at ease!
Great informative video. Cracks in buildings is owners worst nightmare, always best to get expert advice 👍
This advice makes so much sense I can't help smiling throughout or even sniggering! It's just comic how sometimes people act when they don't know anything about a problem and try to address it by just treating the obvious symptoms without recourse to common sense. The fact that a simple act of stupidity can cost someone their house is material for tragi-comedies. The subtle causes that result into houses'/buildings' deterioration without the dwellers' noticing or caring about is food for thought and quite sobering. Nothing lasts for ever but if it was made to last forever, it certainly wasn't built cheap. In the latter case, perhaps it's something worth thinking about before taking an old, soundly made building down (or severely altering it) just because "we don't like it" or "we want something better".
I dunno about the rest of you but these videos have been so informative. I've learnt so much from them - thank you!
Currently have a Crack on my internal breeze block of my outhouse...
Roger, Thank you for the informative & reassuring information. You are absolutely correct as I had a small crack on the side of my 120 year old house & a year or two later it had closed.
OK, so I've now come across this guy several times for my building project and I love his style. I'm on board.
Regarding the old wall restraints, my old man told me he saw it done just after the war they put the rods through with the X on the end against the outside wall then heated the bar so it expanded then tighten up the end and as the rod contracted it would pull the wall in repeat as necessary until the wall was where you want
Brilliant makes sense
How do you deal with builders crack? I’ve tried tipping a dash of tea down it but it keeps reappearing.
Park your bike in it! 🤣
Gun a tube of silicone down the back next time it opens up
😂😂😂😂😂
I've tried painters caulk.....just be ready to run afterwards 😅
@@kieranthompson779 same. 2/3 of a tube in one stream, no nozzle on from the third storey right past the groundworkers bullseye. And yes…I did hide as he came charging up the stairs.
As a building surveyor, I can't fault your content. Great stuff! Keep it coming.
Thanks, will do!
I have a crack at my moms home. She has brick. Who do I call, what is the specialists called? Is this like structural expert. Not sure what to Google. Any advice is appreciated
Oh and horrible issue with water flooring near the home... I will have to dip in my savings and get her some gutters and drainage eystem
Sensible advice indeed - cracks happens and, as you say, all buildings and their fabric move due to moisture and thermal variations etc. As highlighted the most important step (with all building defects) is to establish the cause (diagnosis) before deciding what to do.
Building Research Establishment Digest 251 (Assessment of damage in low rise buildings) is invaluable when it comes to assessing cracks, Among other things it advises that minor cracks can be made good relatively simply and suggests that “unless there are clear indications that damage is progressing to a higher level it may be expensive and inappropriate to carry out extensive work for what amounts to aesthetic damage.” It concludes by advising that “The only certain way of confirming the progression of damage is to take a series of measurements with time.”
Cheers Roger. I've got a 200 year old cottage with a few external cracks which I'm having sorted by a great builder, your advice is seriously welcome as I now know twice as much as I knew yesterday about the various causes. Thanks mate!👍
Never used them, but Geobear look the dogs bits for subsidence etc. Watch, if you can, the underpinning of a garage - amazing stuff. Thanks Roger, for yet another cracking episode.
Honestly the most informative video I've watched on this subject, I have 2 besser brick dividing walls in my complex that have identical cracks to what you outline at the start of the video. We are built on floodplain so clay, you have put my mind at ease as these cracks have not changed since approx 2014.
Thanks Roger Excellent advice I’m just about to have my house repaired by the insurance company..a bit of movement caused by a tree in the road outside. Anyway tree has now gone and house seems stable after two years of monitoring..but I now know how those cracks outside should be repaired. Regards Jim.
Thanks for this video. The full brick house my mum lives in has a crack in one wall. My dad built this house around 45 years ago. The footings for the house were excavated from clay. I tend to think over the years the clay has expanded and contracted as it got wet and then dry. My dad died ten years ago so he can’t help us.
I’ll take photos of the crack so it can be seen if the crack gets worse over time. I’ll patch the crack up with a similar mix to what originally was used, lime, cement, sand and water. I used to labour for my dad mixing mortar but that was 35 years ago so I’m out of practice. I’ll just put a bit in the surface to block up the gap.
Fantastic video mate, great knowledge of how a building lives and breathes
Very precious info. You just relived my fear of my house collapsing. I just have to move further the septic tank from the house and make a drainage around the foundations
Well done. You talk the talk and walk the walk.
You could argue that mastic is pliable and would move with the cracking but over time mastic can stiffen and become hard and brittle.
Depends on the mastic. Sikaflex is used for movement joints in structures all over the world.
Thank you very much for this video, Roger. Our house is built on clay and your superb explanation has put my mind at ease about the hairline fractures we have.
Totally agree, I'm in London (Roger referencing London) and been in my 1880s build for 16 years and have cracks all over the place. They haven't been getting bigger in most of them. Thank God for RUclips!
Interesting video! Our aircrete garden wall sure is shrinking and cracking, glad we didn't build our house out of aircrete! 🏡
Good explanation about the behaviour of clay.
Where I live there is silt, and at some depth into the ground it seems very hard and almost impermeable for water.
The original house has been built with 70cm deep concrete foundations, and these reach well into this hard silt.
But an add on has been built on foundations only 20-40cm deep, and the foundation has been built very unevenly in width and depth.
This foundation didn't reach "under the weather" as we say, and is subject to freezing up and thawing, and also I found that the silt around and under this foundation was very saturated with water, which caused a lot of humidity under the wooden floor causing it to rot.
And also small cracks were this add on joins the main building were apparent.
So my thought went over and the best solution seemed to me to underpin this foundation to the same depth as that of the main building.
1. to keep water out by bringing the foundation down to a level were water doesn't penetrate easy, and also preventing rodents digging tunnels allowing more water in.
2. To prevent cracks to develop more by bringing balance in the amount of support the parts of the building get by have them resting on the same layer of soil, and at a depth where water ingress and frost play no role in causing movement.
I also applied crack stitching, and this holds up very well over the last year since I did it.
So Roger, what is your view about imbalance in the construction of foundations and going under the weather? And what role can play a high water table (ours is very deep at 8m)
I moved into a flipped Edwardian house 20 odd years ago, I think the thud of the multitude of removal men caused a few cracks inside. My neighbour told us before we bought that it had been monitored, but hadn't moved. I'm finally repairing them, but none remaining have moved since. Probably why it was pebble dashed, but no outside movement in that time since. My brother was concerned about the gap of the stair stringer away from the wall. I managed to pull out a newspaper from the filled gap dating back to mid 60s, so not moved for about 60 years. The slag inside the brickwork is a bit of bitch when doing anything structurally, but it's still standing.
Watching from Nairobi and really enjoying your teaching on how to manage vertical cracks Thanx
Sitting in a London property built in 1790s - lightly built but has lasted well despite the Luftwaffe coming fairly close a while back. Problem is, modern heavy piling can and has caused cracking on wall/ceiling interfaces through racking of the structure. And, yes, the desire for open plan/wall removal and the added weight in upper floors is not always properly allowed for. The top floor of a Georgian garret was only designed for a bed, a chair, a cupboard and a thin servant - not a fully-fitted kitchen and other stuff - the floor joists aren't up to it. And don't get me started on people piling vast olive trees etc in planters on balconies and porch tops on Regency terrace houses. They weren't designed for it...on one big place a few blocks away most of the front came off a listed 'First Rate' house when the entire balcony tore out of a very crumbly wall where most of the mortar had long turned to dust (they had repointed the outer brick face but didn't look any deeper)..
This is why I’m always very careful not to give my servants too much gruel
Recently found a crack Roger and initially felt panic. Happened on this great advice by chance and am now simmered down. Been around for almost 3/4 o a century so have at least learned to scream inwardly and NOT make a "knee jerk" move that creates destructive pounds of idiocy that then requires tons of repairs to undo. Thanks!! Easy does it in spite of the near panic that would have been quite expensive and regretful.
Very informative video as usual. Been put off buying houses in the past because of them having cracks but you give a better understanding of this. You have to love the craic.
My 1990 built house, built by Tarmac Homes, was built using calcium silicate bricks with no frogs. When using that type of brick the mortar should contain lime due to heat movements on the sunny side of the home. Most of my housing estate suffers from cracks in the mortar.on the sunny side of the homes. I only found out the reason when matching bricks for a house extension. This was after my next door neighbour went to their insurance company who fitted helifix bars set into the mortar.
Most of the detached garages in my street have cracks in the front end of the sidewalls. A lot of neighbours blame tree roots but they are built on concrete rafts. The problem seems to be that the big garage doorways have steel lintels above them. These expand and contract forcing the side walls out creating the cracks
Might also be due to rust
An add to this good advice. Long brick walls need to expend and shrink due to warmth and cold. Nowadays we use in the Netherlands vertical dilatation up from 9 meters in length and further.
I was told for smaller internal cracks to grind them out enough to put something in, then insert a bead of polymer based construction adhesive which will maintain its "grab" and never set solid so maintaining a degree of flexibility and then use filler over it. I've never had a recurring problem after following this advice.
This took me 2 seconds to find and exactly what I wanted.
Fantastic 👍👍
I wish you was here when I was doing my building surveying degree in 1990. Very enjoyable and informative 👍
Very educational, easy to understand. Thank you for using white board.
Excellent and concise explanation. Thanks so much.
@Skill Builder (Roger)...very informative and really well presented.
Never thought I'd have a crack problem, but here I am, watching this video.
I said I was going to answer before watching I didn't think you was going into this depth Roger.
37 year old house with a few small cracks internally. 3 years ago got some painting done to repair water damage from a broken loft header tank. Got the painter to plaster in the cracks. No more movement since.
Heating expert and cracks, I’m impressed Rodger
Shaun
Great vid, clear explanations and diagrams, no fluff 👍
What would you recommend for brick spalling please ?
Not making matters worse, golden advice!
Thanks Roger! Virtually all my lintels were cracking up, didnt seem to be any reason for it. I ended up acro propping them from the base cill and then angle grinding the crack open, and inside were rusty steel rods. I had to with a wire brush remove as much of the rust as possible, paint it with anti-rust paint and then fill in the chase. Over 100+ year old house and water must have been getting in somehow or moisture and the steel expanded so much! Seems alright now, will let you know if my house falls down...
Thank you, I was literally staying up worrying 😂👍I've had several cracks appearing this year and it makes sense that it's my draining outside
Sound advice! I am a mason now in Canada and so many of these problems I see are due to poor grade and eves trough ( gutters and down pipes) . Very important to ensure water drains away from the building not into it. The freeze/ thaw cycle can do considerable damage to masonry once water has a way in and once its made a pathway it only gets worse. Many homeowners can fix the grade themselves by landscaping soil or paving to slope away from the house
Hey Steve...... Line UP !
Great info Rodger. Now I need to go and clean out that cement I put in a sizable crack about 3 years ago.
Actually it was very illuminating and very well explained! Thank you!
I lived in a house built on marsh land in Cheshire East. It had been underpinned once already. It was rented. One day a builder turned up to look at knocking a wall from the back room to the kitchen as the kitchen was tiny, even for a galley kitchen. He walked in, took one look down the hall and said, the left hand side is leaning to the left and the right hand side to the right. We never saw him again.
When the kitchen floor had to come up, the house was sat in 18" of water. In the back garden, if you looked, you could see the kink in the brickwork and where it had been repaired once already. Was wonderful when i left that dump.
So glad you’ve done this video Roger. I have a couple of step cracks in the brickwork on my house. I was going to repair them by putting the helix rods in and repointing but I might not bother now!!
Try to work out why they are cracking. The helical ties is good for certain jobs but in heave and shrinkage of clay it is not the best thing.
I had them looked at a few years back and I was told it was just settlement. They just don’t look great when we come to sell up and move!
You just touched on work carried out next door. It would be great if you would do a show on the Party Wall Act. Many builders are ignorant about it.
Brilliant, looked at the problem from both sides, didnt make you panic and very informative. We are also on clay soil and the conservatory looks as though its coming away, however now i think its due to the weather.
roger first class on this video you are spot on with your diagnosis im actually doing this on a property now
My mothers house a traditional terrace built 1901 as actually sinking at the back. But only one side was going down so floors sloped but no cracks. Insurance were not interested in paying for underpinning.
I would get a structural engineer to prepare a report. The insurance company is paying the surveyor and they will wriggle out of anything. The need a bit of slapping around.
Thanks for improving my sleep score! It turns out my cracks were stressing me out more than they should have.
God bless You! I live in Luxembourg and we have really simillar situations as in Englad - mud, clay and wet . This does help my and ma old house. :)
Thanks for the video I am less worried about all the cracks in my plaster.
Wow, great lesson in brick cracks! Thank you!
Moisture is probably the number one cause, cyclic movement, thermal, brick growth, subsidence, settlement.
Done several kilometres of crack stitching 🤪
Good video Roger 👍
Thanks for the presentation and all the hard work and dedication you exhibit in each of your videos, I am particularly glad to inform you I have watched this video and I was asked the reason of cracking in walls and I was able to answer and explain the reasons behind it. Thanks once again for your invaluable work in improving construction standards.
It's kind of cool that buildings move - we often don't see any cracks but there are tell tale signs. My loft conversion is almost finished. It's going great but I can see that parts of my house have shifted slightly because I have two doors that now need adjustment. They were a little close anyway to be honest but now they stick. No cracks though!
Really good video. I have an over 100-year-old terrace house in Sheffield. We have a crack that was assessed by an engineer he explained it was old movement due to the weight of the chimney breast. He recommended Helibars if we wanted to do a repair job.
Very very good video , thank you so much ! My house cracked and leaking when rainy day.
Wasn’t sure what I was going to see when you appeared as the video started but you explained a lot and I learnt a great deal about possible reasons for a crack and yes I can verify old houses no solid foundations when I had some digging work done for a new water mains thought I how’s it still standing.
I’ll follow you 👍
Great video from an estate agent who is hoping to begin a career as surveyor. Really informative.
Are you going to do the SAVA diploma?
@@thesmallnotesduo looked into it but now trying to go through the trainee route. I was priced out of sava.
Absolutely brilliant talk as usual, explains the subject in simple terms for people to understand. Congratulations, wonderful speaker.
Really informative video and has saved me a lot of sleepless nights.
For a new build on clay, can't you build in a permanent soaker hose system to keep the clay moist? It would keep the clay from expanding and contracting?
Thank you Roger! Greetings from Uruguay.
Thank you, just viewed a house with lots of cracks, was worried it would be a game over job.
Brilliant. I will have some q's about cracking though as i've just taken ownership of a ye olde 500 yr old building with hugely thick walls, a meter, probably stone, and one or two walls look like cheddar gorge.
Roger, good advise, thanks, good to know people with knowledge & experience like you are willing to share information. I see so many so called experts in videos within my trade & I often have to shake my head..
great overview. thank you. hope you get lots of shots of cracks.
Cracking advice, good video 🤞
Lol 😁👍🏻
Great video Roger, good overview of the biggies. Some other cracks to consider: thermal, moisture, chemical reactions, badly detailed movement joints.
This guy talks sense and no Bull !
I'm trying to sell my house which is built on clay and has a big crack down the back wall that opens and closes like that over the years. But I obviously don't want buyers to notice it and because the previous owner painted the house white it shows up even worse! So I filled it with some cheap white filler to a few mm and touched it up with white paint and it concealed everything perfectly. I hope that ratcheting won't happen there because the filler isn't very strong and isn't very deep and that it'll just crumble under pressure rather than make the crack worse. In any case, I hope to be moved out before I find out for sure! The previous owner had tried repairing it and I can see these secondary cracks in the brickwork parallell to the old 'repairs' - that made me worry it was something serious, but now I know better.
Brilliant video Roger, it's put me at ease with a couple of internal cracks I have.
Thanks Roger - you have put my anxieties at rest.
I dug the exterior walls to below the footer. Added a footer drain pipe. Then sealed the wall with tar. Then replaced the clay we dug out and filled the hole with washed river stone all the way to the surface.
You are so very clever I have learned a lot Thank you
Great video! Really changed my point of view on crack!
Great video . Clear explanation and common sense .
Glad I watched this. Some things are best left alone.
You are incredible 👊🇮🇪. I just bought a 40 year old house in Wexford Ireland .. that has a few cracks on the ceiling and internal walls .. could I actually send you a few photos to see what you think ?
Again you are the best most informative DIY channel on the tube 👊🇮🇪
yes by all means send them in
www.skill-builder.uk/send
Brilliant information Roger, I love all your videos, you are very intuitive and easy to watch and understand, thanks Roger.
Great video. And as an American, hearing this brilliant accent is like watching a Guy Ritchie film.
In old houses timber lintels are another reason why cracks form change them for concrete or steel. Another reason why cracks form are ferrous metals in joints of brickwork and stonework. When it rusts the metal expands causing pressure on the joint. Either remove it where possible or treat the metal with anti rust paint.