Cracks on walls

khadich · Dec 09, 2019 2:43 pm

Hi,
I am not sure if this is correct forum to post this question. If not kindly route to correct forum.

I bought a new unit in apartment block 6 months back in NSW. It's an year old building now. Over the period of time i can see all the walls have developed multiple small hair line cracks and one of the wall has a bigger crack( bigger than hair line but not so big). I raised the issue with builder and he is categorising these as settlement cracks. I can see similar cracks in common area but not sure about other units. In one of strarta meetings one fellow resident was also mentioning about similar stuff.

I am worried thinking builder is just trying to get away by calling these as settlement cracks. During inspections i could not find similar cracks in other buildings or i could not concentrate to find those in limited time. We all residents are trying to get our building as a whole inspected by professional.

One difference this apartment block has is that majority of the walls insisde apartments are not gyprock but made of cemented sheets.

Am I worrying too much or it's normal. Kindly share your experiences.

Thanks

StructuralBIMGuy · Dec 09, 2019 5:10 pm

Hi Khadich
Welcome to the forum
If you are concerned then have the cracks inspected by a Structural Engineer
Unfortunately there is no building commission to lodge complaints in NSW
and there doesn't look like there will be one
The creation of a statutory Building commission was a key recommendation of the NSW Parliamentary
inquiry into Building Standards.

thepa1nter · Dec 09, 2019 10:01 pm

khadich

Hi,
I am not sure if this is correct forum to post this question. If not kindly route to correct forum.

I bought a new unit in apartment block 6 months back in NSW. It's an year old building now. Over the period of time i can see all the walls have developed multiple small hair line cracks and one of the wall has a bigger crack( bigger than hair line but not so big). I raised the issue with builder and he is categorising these as settlement cracks. I can see similar cracks in common area but not sure about other units. In one of strarta meetings one fellow resident was also mentioning about similar stuff.

I am worried thinking builder is just trying to get away by calling these as settlement cracks. During inspections i could not find similar cracks in other buildings or i could not concentrate to find those in limited time. We all residents are trying to get our building as a whole inspected by professional.

One difference this apartment block has is that majority of the walls insisde apartments are not gyprock but made of cemented sheets.

Am I worrying too much or it's normal. Kindly share your experiences.

Thanks

Perhaps you could upload a couple of photos of the cracks. It is normal to have settlement cracks . If they are fixed before settlement has happened they will just keep cracking. Maybe wait until they stop moving and just document and measure them in the meantime.

khadich · Dec 09, 2019 10:13 pm

thepa1nter

khadich

Hi,
I am not sure if this is correct forum to post this question. If not kindly route to correct forum.

I bought a new unit in apartment block 6 months back in NSW. It's an year old building now. Over the period of time i can see all the walls have developed multiple small hair line cracks and one of the wall has a bigger crack( bigger than hair line but not so big). I raised the issue with builder and he is categorising these as settlement cracks. I can see similar cracks in common area but not sure about other units. In one of strarta meetings one fellow resident was also mentioning about similar stuff.

I am worried thinking builder is just trying to get away by calling these as settlement cracks. During inspections i could not find similar cracks in other buildings or i could not concentrate to find those in limited time. We all residents are trying to get our building as a whole inspected by professional.

One difference this apartment block has is that majority of the walls insisde apartments are not gyprock but made of cemented sheets.

Am I worrying too much or it's normal. Kindly share your experiences.

Thanks

Perhaps you could upload a couple of photos of the cracks. It is normal to have settlement cracks . If they are fixed before settlement has happened they will just keep cracking. Maybe wait until they stop moving and just document and measure them in the meantime.

Thanks for your reply. The widest one which I said I see is attached here, others which are thinner than this one (actual hair line) are mutiple on each wall.

These are appearing one after the other.

Does it matter if internals walls have gyprock/cement sheets? Will cracks appear in both?

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SaveH2O · Dec 09, 2019 10:16 pm

thepa1nter

khadich

Hi,
I am not sure if this is correct forum to post this question. If not kindly route to correct forum.

I bought a new unit in apartment block 6 months back in NSW. It's an year old building now. Over the period of time i can see all the walls have developed multiple small hair line cracks and one of the wall has a bigger crack( bigger than hair line but not so big). I raised the issue with builder and he is categorising these as settlement cracks. I can see similar cracks in common area but not sure about other units. In one of strarta meetings one fellow resident was also mentioning about similar stuff.

I am worried thinking builder is just trying to get away by calling these as settlement cracks. During inspections i could not find similar cracks in other buildings or i could not concentrate to find those in limited time. We all residents are trying to get our building as a whole inspected by professional.

One difference this apartment block has is that majority of the walls insisde apartments are not gyprock but made of cemented sheets.

Am I worrying too much or it's normal. Kindly share your experiences.

Thanks

Perhaps you could upload a couple of photos of the cracks. It is normal to have settlement cracks . If they are fixed before settlement has happened they will just keep cracking. Maybe wait until they stop moving and just document and measure them in the meantime.

Painter, you need to enter your text outside the other member's quote box.

There are also three black dots on the bottom right of page, clicking those will bring up an edit function.

thepa1nter · Dec 09, 2019 10:43 pm

khadich

thepa1nter

khadich

Hi,
I am not sure if this is correct forum to post this question. If not kindly route to correct forum.

I bought a new unit in apartment block 6 months back in NSW. It's an year old building now. Over the period of time i can see all the walls have developed multiple small hair line cracks and one of the wall has a bigger crack( bigger than hair line but not so big). I raised the issue with builder and he is categorising these as settlement cracks. I can see similar cracks in common area but not sure about other units. In one of strarta meetings one fellow resident was also mentioning about similar stuff.

I am worried thinking builder is just trying to get away by calling these as settlement cracks. During inspections i could not find similar cracks in other buildings or i could not concentrate to find those in limited time. We all residents are trying to get our building as a whole inspected by professional.

One difference this apartment block has is that majority of the walls insisde apartments are not gyprock but made of cemented sheets.

Am I worrying too much or it's normal. Kindly share your experiences.

Thanks

Perhaps you could upload a couple of photos of the cracks. It is normal to have settlement cracks . If they are fixed before settlement has happened they will just keep cracking. Maybe wait until they stop moving and just document and measure them in the meantime.

Thanks for your reply. The widest one which I said I see is attached here, others which are thinner than this one (actual hair line) are mutiple on each wall.

These are appearing one after the other.

Does it matter if internals walls have gyprock/cement sheets? Will cracks appear in both?

Thanks Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅

This crack looks like a plaster tape joins, its running straight. Are all the cracks running straight? Gyprock is more likely to crack because it isn't as strong and is joined by a paper tape. Cement type board is usually only used in wet areas.

khadich · Dec 10, 2019 12:58 am

thepa1nter

khadich

thepa1nter

[quote="khadich"]Hi,
I am not sure if this is correct forum to post this question. If not kindly route to correct forum.

I bought a new unit in apartment block 6 months back in NSW. It's an year old building now. Over the period of time i can see all the walls have developed multiple small hair line cracks and one of the wall has a bigger crack( bigger than hair line but not so big). I raised the issue with builder and he is categorising these as settlement cracks. I can see similar cracks in common area but not sure about other units. In one of strarta meetings one fellow resident was also mentioning about similar stuff.

I am worried thinking builder is just trying to get away by calling these as settlement cracks. During inspections i could not find similar cracks in other buildings or i could not concentrate to find those in limited time. We all residents are trying to get our building as a whole inspected by professional.

One difference this apartment block has is that majority of the walls insisde apartments are not gyprock but made of cemented sheets.

Am I worrying too much or it's normal. Kindly share your experiences.

Thanks

Perhaps you could upload a couple of photos of the cracks. It is normal to have settlement cracks . If they are fixed before settlement has happened they will just keep cracking. Maybe wait until they stop moving and just document and measure them in the meantime.

Thanks for your reply. The widest one which I said I see is attached here, others which are thinner than this one (actual hair line) are mutiple on each wall.

These are appearing one after the other.

Does it matter if internals walls have gyprock/cement sheets? Will cracks appear in both?

Thanks Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅

This crack looks like a plaster tape joins, its running straight. Are all the cracks running straight? Gyprock is more likely to crack because it isn't as strong and is joined by a paper tape. Cement type board is usually only used in wet areas.[/quote]Yes..all the cracks are running straight..other cracks don't seem to be around joints but are at multiple places on the same wall across all walls. Those all run straight and are so thin that I can't show in a picture(i have tried to attach along this reply just to clarify but not sure if you can see, it's a very thin straight line in middle of yellow circle and parallel to blue line).

Are these (both types) of any concern? Also are these called settlement cracks. Kindly pardon my ignorance, i am very new to all this.

Till what time buildings generally take to settle? What i understand is that it's best to get this painted / repaired only once building has completely settled (please correct me if my understanding is wrong).

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StructuralBIMGuy · Dec 10, 2019 8:37 am

khadich

Also are these called settlement cracks. Kindly pardon my ignorance, i am very new to all this.

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There are no settlement cracks in the middle of the wall?
here are images of
Settlement cracks in Plasterboard generally propagate top-> down for hogging or down -> up for sagging
Did you take photos of the framework during the build?

khadich

Till what time buildings generally take to settle?

Settlement cracks start early and lessen over time...say 10 years
Also there are many other technical factors
OT it's easy to blame settlement for everything.... House slabs are engineered to resist settlement
HTH

khadich · Dec 10, 2019 8:44 am

StructuralBIMGuy

khadich

Also are these called settlement cracks. Kindly pardon my ignorance, i am very new to all this.

Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅

There are no settlement cracks in the middle of the wall?
here are images of
Settlement cracks in Plasterboard generally propagate top-> down for hogging or down -> up for sagging
Did you take photos of the framework during the build?

Thanks for your reply. I don't have any photos during build phase. I bought a unit in an apartment block which was all ready to move in. If these are not settlement cracks then what are these called. Also are these serious in nature.

Thanks a lot.

StructuralBIMGuy · Dec 10, 2019 9:06 am

An Engineer should inspect all apartments and analyse the crack patterns for starters
information will be drawn from the engineering drawings. I doubt a proper engineering inspection was carried out during construction but check with Council building department.
Sorry I cant offer a more definitive answer.. a structural site inspection is required for that

ir0nbark1 · Dec 17, 2019 12:49 am

I got a builder came the other day and he suggested to monitor the cracks as below
- Take a rule or something and place it against the crack. Take a photo to record the width of the crack.
- After a few weeks/months do that again.
- If settlement cracks, not bigger. Else you need an inspection as others have suggested

Good luck.

ArnoldKMB · Dec 21, 2019 1:53 am

ir0nbark1

I got a builder came the other day and he suggested to monitor the cracks as below
- Take a rule or something and place it against the crack. Take a photo to record the width of the crack.
- After a few weeks/months do that again.
- If settlement cracks, not bigger. Else you need an inspection as others have suggested

Good luck.

Thank you, very useful advice!

khadich · Feb 04, 2020 10:04 pm

StructuralBIMGuy

An Engineer should inspect all apartments and analyse the crack patterns for starters
information will be drawn from the engineering drawings. I doubt a proper engineering inspection was carried out during construction but check with Council building department.
Sorry I cant offer a more definitive answer.. a structural site inspection is required for that

Hi,
Last week a structural engineer inspected my apartment. As per him these cracks are from top to bottom and are due to taping not done properly at the joints of cement boards. He suggested to tape the joints again properly, sand it after that and do 2 coats of paint and that should be it. Do you agree with it. Will that be end of these cracks?

As per the engineer, in NSW builder is supposed to resolve this but just in case builder refuses to do that or comes up with some contract jargon stuff, can I get this fixed. If so should it be the job of a painter or a trades person dealing with board joints?

Thanks a lot.

thepa1nter · Feb 05, 2020 5:27 am

khadich

StructuralBIMGuy

An Engineer should inspect all apartments and analyse the crack patterns for starters
information will be drawn from the engineering drawings. I doubt a proper engineering inspection was carried out during construction but check with Council building department.
Sorry I cant offer a more definitive answer.. a structural site inspection is required for that

Hi,
Last week a structural engineer inspected my apartment. As per him these cracks are from top to bottom and are due to taping not done properly at the joints of cement boards. He suggested to tape the joints again properly, sand it after that and do 2 coats of paint and that should be it. Do you agree with it. Will that be end of these cracks?

As per the engineer, in NSW builder is supposed to resolve this but just in case builder refuses to do that or comes up with some contract jargon stuff, can I get this fixed. If so should it be the job of a painter or a trades person dealing with board joints?

Thanks a lot.

I wouldnt be doing ii myself,but realy two trades are needed or a painter who is capable of plastering.properly. these cracks in this video were inspected by the qbcc here in queensland and were deemed within tolerances..

StructuralBIMGuy · Feb 05, 2020 9:01 am

khadich

StructuralBIMGuy

An Engineer should inspect all apartments and analyse the crack patterns for starters
information will be drawn from the engineering drawings. I doubt a proper engineering inspection was carried out during construction but check with Council building department.
Sorry I cant offer a more definitive answer.. a structural site inspection is required for that

Hi,
Last week a structural engineer inspected my apartment. As per him these cracks are from top to bottom and are due to taping not done properly at the joints of cement boards. He suggested to tape the joints again properly, sand it after that and do 2 coats of paint and that should be it. Do you agree with it. Will that be end of these cracks?

Thanks for the update
The engineer will look at all possible causes resulting from , defective materials and workmanship,settlement/shear, structural & serviceability failures,etc and advise accordingly. OT the big one is brittle/sudden failure without warnings.
The quick fix is to re-tape and keep an eye on it? LOL, who hired the engineer the builder?
Poor workmanship often leaves other tell tail signs and unless you do repairs the signs are often overlooked, eg
The screw fixing are placed too far apart, so the repair should involve blocking, re screwing and taping...a good painter would check
Cheers
Chris

SaveH2O · Feb 05, 2020 9:50 am

thepa1nter

these cracks in this video were inspected by the qbcc here in queensland and were deemed within tolerances.

That is a very good video with some great tips. I also watched a few of your other videos and the passion and pride in your work certainly transmits. You are a great asset to the forum.

thepa1nter · Feb 05, 2020 10:02 am

SaveH2O

thepa1nter

these cracks in this video were inspected by the qbcc here in queensland and were deemed within tolerances.

That is a very good video with some great tips. I also watched a few of your other videos and the passion and pride in your work certainly transmits. You are a great asset to the forum.

Thanks,appreciate the input