Repointing in Milford on Sea

On a Milford on Sea house the seaward elevation goes first: the joints open and the wall stays dark for a day after every blow. Brick faces come away in thin plates, under a sill or above a patio. Up top, a chimney drops grit into the gutter, noticed because a stain has turned up on a bedroom ceiling. None of it is structural. It is all mortar, and it carries on until the failed joint comes out.

The survey covers every elevation, not the one you have spotted. Sheltered faces in Milford on Sea often have years left while the exposed face has none, and pricing a whole house when half of it is due is the commonest way to overpay. We scrape joints for the depth of decay, tap for the hollow note that means the pointing has parted from the brick, and photograph each face, free.

The exposed face, first and separately. Driven rain arrives in Milford on Sea off the Channel with very little in front of it, and it works at the joint rather than the middle of the brick: once the mortar has gone back a few millimetres the wind holds water in the recess and the joint washes out from the outside in.

On a Milford on Sea wall we rake by hand to twice the joint width, perpends included, and the angle grinder stays in the van, because a disc widens the joint and takes the arris off the brick. Joints are damped down before filling and brushed back once the mix has taken up.

Solid wall, and the older end of Milford on Sea. Around one home in nine here predates 1919, and those are solid wall: no cavity behind the brick, so it handles water by evaporating it back out through the joint, which works only while the mortar stays softer than the brick. Those get an NHL lime or lime putty mix gauged to match the original sand, struck back to the profile the wall carries. Hard cement pointing ruins a wall like that, and taking it off without damaging the brick is slow hand work.

The post war stock and the mix it was built in. More than half the housing in Milford on Sea went up between 1945 and 1982, and that is cavity work: a fired brick outer skin in cement and sand mortar, struck weather or bucket handle. It fails differently: the joint pits and opens at the arris rather than washing out, water stands in the pit, and the next hard frost lifts the face off the brick. That mortar was often gauged with lime as well as cement, so matching means matching the gauge and the sand.

Blown faces cut out, never filled. Where a face has already spalled on a Milford on Sea wall we cut the brick out whole and turn or replace it against a sample held on the wall. Packing the hollow with mortar leaves a patch that never matches and drops out inside a couple of winters. We make up a trial panel somewhere discreet for you to see in daylight.

Chimneys and flaunching. A Milford on Sea stack takes weather on four sides with nothing warming it from inside, so its joints go friable long before the walls do and the water lands on a top floor ceiling. Pointing it and renewing the flaunching want the same platform and one visit.

Communal elevations. A quarter of the homes in Milford on Sea are flats, and on a block the freeholder instructs the work, with leaseholders usually consulted under section 20 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985.

What we will talk you out of: pointing a wall still soaking from a split downpipe or a blocked gutter. Fix the water, let it dry, then point it.

Thomas scrapes a few joints on each face of a Milford on Sea house to see how deep the damage goes and what the old mortar is made of, then prices the work himself. The quote lists access, raking out, the mortar mix, the area of each elevation, any bricks to replace, and disposal.

Raking is done by hand to sound mortar, never with a disc that widens the joint. Older brick in the Milford on Sea village centre gets a lime mortar to BS EN 459; harder seventies brick can take a weak lime and cement mix. We avoid pointing in a stiff wind and cover fresh joints so the sea air does not dry them too quickly. Windows and paths are sheeted, and no wall is left half raked overnight. A cracked brick or a failed lintel found along the way gets photographed and priced, and waits for your yes.

Repointing like for like is a repair, needing no planning application and nothing from building control. Houses in the conservation area that covers central Milford can be repointed the same way, but 28 entries in Milford on Sea are listed, and on those a change of mix, colour or joint profile needs consent first. The planning authority is New Forest District Council, and Planning Portal guidance on external walls sets out where repair ends and alteration begins.

Please phone instead of using the form. Where the joints have washed out, driven rain reaches the inside face of the wall, and on a chimney it gets behind the flashings too.

We come out and make it weathertight, with a sheet or some temporary pointing, and the full elevation is priced once the wall has dried and the sound joints can be told from the bad. On this coast it is nearly always the south west side or the stack, so say which when you call. Pointing work is booked Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm. A missed call is returned, as soon as we can manage it.

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The water is under a kilometre from these streets, and on a rough day it arrives as spray carried inland rather than as clean rain.

The salt sits in the outer few millimetres of every joint on the exposed side of the house, holding damp in the wall between showers so an elevation that ought to dry over a fine afternoon stays wet, then crystallising in the joint and in the pores of the brick as it dries and pushing the material apart. That is why the seaward face here is the tired one while the back looks nearly new.

On the sea side the mix is not the whole story. A raked joint on this side of the house has to be washed and brushed out first, because salt left in the back of it contaminates the new mortar from day one. And the profile matters: a recessed joint holds water and salt against the arris, so we strike the seaward face weathered or bucket handle so it sheds, and match what the wall carries on the sheltered sides. Fresh lime wants protecting while it cures, so exposed elevations are sheeted and worked in settled weather. Ask anyone quoting you what profile they intend on the sea side, and be wary if it matches the one round the back.

Nearby places we also cover for repointing, with straight-line distances from Milford on Sea, and the other trades we offer in Milford on Sea itself.

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