Browse Forums Building A New House 1 Jul 26, 2010 11:26 pm Unfortunately we are experiencing ongoing problems trying to get out brickwork up to an acceptable standard. ISSUES - Structural - Mortar contains no lime (to harden) and does not meet Australian Standard AS3700 - Visual - During the process of cleaning the bricks, much of the mortar was damaged and eroded away. Also classed as a defect according to AS3700 as it can be seen from 1.5m away. PATH TO FIX (BUILDER) 1. Rebrick sections with bowed walls 2. Use steel reo bar to try to smooth mortar 3. Repoint where appropriate 4. Nawkaw treatment as required 5. Alkaline treatment to harden mortar They are currently finished point 3 / moving onto point 4. We have had approx 3 meetings on site to review the work done on the bricks, with little progress. We are still not happy with the quality of the mortar. As you can see from the above pictures the mortar is not a cleanly rolled joint as we would expect. OTHER OPTIONS 1. Render - ruled out as we love our bricks! 2. Scrape out mortar approx 1.5 inches and repoint - creates lots of dust 3. Rebrick entire house We are getting frustrated with the lack of progress. Our contract date is next week so we have been at this for a little while now! If this was your house, what would you expect your builders to do to fix both the structural and visual problems? Building Monaco32 with Carlisle Homes in Alamanda Estate 20/08/2010 - HANDOVER 24/8!! Blog - http://ourmonaco32.blogspot.com/ Thread - viewtopic.php?f=31&t=14415 Re: Defective Brickwork - What would you do? 2Jul 26, 2010 11:44 pm Sarah, do those pics represent the quality of the work on the entire house? If so, I think I'd be going the re-brick option. A few weeks is nothing in the context of seeing those bricks every time you pull into your driveway for the next however many years. I leave you to fend for yourself, figure things out yourself. Terrence Malick Re: Defective Brickwork - What would you do? 3Jul 27, 2010 9:03 am Hi Sarah If they are moving along (onto #4), are you saying that they haven't properly fixed the previous points from the list? Also, what do you mean with "Use steel reo bar to try to smooth mortar"? Insert reo somewhere? Is you mortar join supposed to be rolled? If the pics are showing the "fixed" (repointed) parts, this certainly doesn't look like rolled mortar. Do you have any pics of the repointed work? The main issue I see is the structural quality of the mortar - have you/they done further tests that show it is still not OK? Looks like this is the last step in the fixing process? How do they apply this alkaline treatment? Is it going to damage any fixes done prior to this treatment? Now, to answer your Q - What would I expect: That the bricking visually and structurally complies with all rules and regulations and that it visually complies with bricking on builder's display homes. My signature is distracting people from my wise posts ... Re: Defective Brickwork - What would you do? 4Jul 27, 2010 9:32 am Those pictures look awful. I would expect the builder to fix it! I don't care how, but the end result has to look as if they were done properly in the first place. It's the builder's fault for using a cheap, inexperienced bricklayer. Metricon Riva 33 - http://herlihy-riva.blogspot.com Site start 15/03/2010 - Handover 23/12/2010 9 months and 8 days (284 calendar days) from site start to handover Re: Defective Brickwork - What would you do? 5Jul 27, 2010 4:34 pm sarahq Unfortunately we are experiencing ongoing problems trying to get out brickwork up to an acceptable standard. If this was your house, what would you expect your builders to do to fix both the structural and visual problems? Hi sarahq ..... check your pm ............SherWin Re: Defective Brickwork - What would you do? 6Jul 27, 2010 10:53 pm Thanks for all your replies! joles Sarah, do those pics represent the quality of the work on the entire house? If so, I think I'd be going the re-brick option. A few weeks is nothing in the context of seeing those bricks every time you pull into your driveway for the next however many years. The mortar on the entire house can be rubbed out with your finger (fails AS3700). The high pressure cleaning has damaged the mortar around the whole house to one degree or another (mostly to about this level). I know what you mean about constantly having to look at the bricks. Now I know that they look bad I get so annoyed every time I see them! Lex Hi Sarah If they are moving along (onto #4), are you saying that they haven't properly fixed the previous points from the list? Also, what do you mean with "Use steel reo bar to try to smooth mortar"? Insert reo somewhere? Is you mortar join supposed to be rolled? If the pics are showing the "fixed" (repointed) parts, this certainly doesn't look like rolled mortar. Do you have any pics of the repointed work? The main issue I see is the structural quality of the mortar - have you/they done further tests that show it is still not OK? Looks like this is the last step in the fixing process? How do they apply this alkaline treatment? Is it going to damage any fixes done prior to this treatment? Lex, They used the steel reo bar to roll over the mortar to smooth it out. The mortar is a bit smoother than it was originally, however it is still not a rolled joint (it is supposed to be rolled). The edges of the bricks are visible all over the place (as shown in the pictures). There has been very minimal repointing done on the house so far. Only the big mortar blowouts have been repointed. Unfortunately have no pics of this. The initial test showed that the mortar failed AS3700. No changes have been made to the mortar since so one would assume that it still fails! The alkaline treatment is the last step (process to harden the mortar). I believe this is sprayed onto the bricks/mortar. Lex Now, to answer your Q - What would I expect: That the bricking visually and structurally complies with all rules and regulations and that it visually complies with bricking on builder's display homes. btherl Those pictures look awful. I would expect the builder to fix it! I don't care how, but the end result has to look as if they were done properly in the first place. It's the builder's fault for using a cheap, inexperienced bricklayer. Totally agree with you both here. I don't think it's too much to expect! SherWin, I have replied to your pm. Just an update from our site meeting today. We all came to the conclusion that the current process would not improve the bricks to the level of the display home and building standards. Other 2 options remaining are to: - rake and repoint the entire house (which the construction manager is going to look into). - rebrick the entire house. Fingers crossed that the builders agree to one of the above options. Really don't want to have to take this further, but we will if we have to.... Building Monaco32 with Carlisle Homes in Alamanda Estate 20/08/2010 - HANDOVER 24/8!! Blog - http://ourmonaco32.blogspot.com/ Thread - viewtopic.php?f=31&t=14415 Re: Defective Brickwork - What would you do? 7Jul 28, 2010 8:27 am Good luck with this, Sarah! BTW, how did the issue of mortar quality (ie. the lack of it) come about? How and what did you suspect? (It's pretty hard to say just be looking if a mortar is OK or if it should be tested further) My signature is distracting people from my wise posts ... Re: Defective Brickwork - What would you do? 8Jul 28, 2010 9:22 am just a thought but..... If they rake out some of the defect mortar to enable re-pointing to occur you will still be left with some defective mortar. Meaning that all of your bricks will have a mix of defective and "to standard" mortar. I had a car once that had rust and I cut most of it out and bogged up the holes and painted it. It looked fantastic for about a year and then ......... Same principle here. Re-pointing good mortar over bad mortar in my opinion is not what I would be accepting as a fix if it were my house. I would push for a full re-brick of the entire house. (I know this is easy to say as it's not my house and I don't know your exact situation etc) The other pictures you posted depicting the bricks that aren't level and laying inwards etc is just poor quality and the person that laid them needs to learn a bit more about the art of laying bricks Good luck, I hope it all works out for you. Re: Defective Brickwork - What would you do? 9Jul 28, 2010 9:43 am +1 I failed to mention that, since your mortar does not meet Australian Standard AS3700, what is the point of them trying to make it cosmetically better!? If it's not structurally adequate, the top 1-2 cm of a potentially better mortar is not going to help the one that is embedded deep in the brick walls. Same goes for rendering - a thin layer of cement all over the bricks is only going to mask the visually unpleasing brickwork - but most likely only for a while. My signature is distracting people from my wise posts ... Bought in Nov 21 at the height of the market (classic). Good area, atrocious floor plan. BUT has land out to the left-hand side that we can extend out on (see second… 0 8782 Thanks mate. Yeah good points! Leaning towards Option 3 to get a bit extra space in the cabinets but not going too crazy high (and expensive). 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