Browse Forums General Discussion 1 Jul 13, 2013 8:02 am Recently I found this on a pre final inspection. The brickwork was generally good with no significant issues except around balcony door. Left side of door had oversize perpends Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅ and right side skinny perpends. Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅ If you were to apply Guide to Standards and Tolerances to oversize perpends you would have to declare it as out of tolerance and defective. However this is despite the fact that there was no evidence of poor workmanship. Bricklayer clearly was competent and did a good job. So what went wrong and who is to blame? The cause of the problem is out of position doorway. Had the doorway been positioned 15mm to the left, skinny and oversize perpends would have been avoided. What is bricklayer supposed to do? I know that in practice carpenters are sloppy with windows and rely on bricklayers to shift them around a little but I am against that. Positioning of doors and windows is framing carpenter's job and it's builder's job to check it before bricklaying. As it happened this was a big two storey home and the builder did a creditable job, I explained to my client what had happened and why and he let this one go. Foremost Building Expert in Australia,assisting with building problems/disputes, building stage inspections,pre-contract review advice for peace of mind 200 blogs http://www.buildingexpert.net.au/blog Re: When is out of tolerance brickwork not a bad job? 2Jul 14, 2013 2:17 pm As you said the bricklayer did a good job. I really doubt anyone cares too much about the odd oversize or undersize perpend. Tolerances are much more important in other areas of building. What looks off to me in that pic, is the mismatched colour of the brick end on the corner. Re: When is out of tolerance brickwork not a bad job? 3Jul 14, 2013 3:36 pm qebtel picked it, What looks odd is the bricks put in backwards i.e. the burnt side facing out or it was a bad brick that shouldnt have been installed. Face bricks have 2 good edges and to bad edges. I reckon they were put in the wrong way. Ok, now to the discussion of the offset window/door. How do you know it wasnt a pre nail frame and the carpenter already put the window hard to the side? There is no way there would have been 15mm of play once the opening was framed. Also, on the narrow side, why couldnt the bricky cut 10mm off the 2nd last brick of each row so the perps grew a bit fatter? Also, how do you know the cavity on the left hand side wasnt made bigger? Brickies commonly do this especially if the cavity is full of services. Carpenters arent sloppy, they bear more responsibility than anyone else on site. every other trade throws their hands in the air and says "what could I do" or just dont care. How do you also not know it wasnt a design issue. Is the door positioned where it is inside to suit an internal partition? I had a bricky think he was doing the right thing once and move one of my sliding doors. It was in a Laundry where the door once architraves were fitted would fit neat wall to wall. He moved it 10mm to the side, then bricked it up. When it was time for architraves to be fitted it meant 10mm had to be ripped off the LHS and there was a 10mm gap between the RHS Arc and the wall. Sometimes you just cant please everything especially with some of the complex designs and the amount of windows people design into houses these days. I would recommend a window suit the inside before the outside. What if it was a window in a kitchen critical to the kitchen design, or bathroom? Sometimes you just cant please everything and something has to give. If the bricky really cared, why didnt he trim one of the bricks in the row as I said? A tiler will start with a 3/4 tile to avoid dicky little cuts or returns or fat grout lines why not a bricky. Another trick shot that could have been played is leave the bricks 10mm short of the door on the LHS and silicone a matching flat piece of aluminium to the side to bridge the gap. You wouldnt even notice, I have done this before. If anyone was really worried there was plenty of things that could have been done instead of calling out a "sloppy carpenter". Just remember, the bricky laid the bricks, and if he just didnt care or was too lazy to seek a better remedy that is what I call "sloppy". In my time I have stood frames on what I would call "sloppy" slabs, but thats no excuse for me to be slap happy with my frame. Just my view and experiences, sorry it took so long, but as you can see my stance is blaming the guy before and not doing something about it isnt acceptable i inspect..there is no construction tolerance or building tolerances. Your option to instruct council with your surveyors report as they would have possibly had to obtain… 9 5591 7 2996 Thanks for the informative response! I'll feed that back to the site supervisor. 2 4102 |