Repointing in Tarrant Monkton

The trouble in Tarrant Monkton is usually on one elevation. Joints washed out along a course, sand and grit collecting at the foot of the wall, or brick faces lifting away in flakes after a hard winter. Sometimes it is a damp patch inside that shows up only when the weather comes from one direction.

The first job is to work out which joints have failed, because on an old Tarrant Monkton building the answer is rarely the whole house. We run a key along the beds and perpends, tap the courses for the hollow note that means the pointing has parted from the brick, and photograph every elevation. That goes into a written itemised quote, priced face by face, so you can do the gable this year and the rest later. The visit and the quote are free.

Raking out is done by hand. Joints come back to twice their width, deeper where the mortar behind them is friable. An angle grinder is quicker, and it is why so much repointing looks worse a year on: a disc widens the joint, wanders across the brick and takes the arris off both sides. Perpends are cut with a plugging chisel, and everything is brushed out and damped down before filling.

Lime on the older solid walls. The older buildings in Tarrant Monkton are solid wall, with no cavity behind the brick, and they stay dry only because water can evaporate back out through the joint. They are breathable walls, and the mortar has to be softer and more open than the brick. An NHL lime or lime putty mix, gauged to match the sand in your own mortar, goes back. Where a wall like that has already been pointed in sand and cement we take the hard mix out, because it is why the brick faces beside it are spalling while the joints look sound.

Matching the sand, not just the colour. The colour of a mortar comes mostly from its sand, so matching one means finding a sand of the right colour and grading rather than adding pigment to whatever is in the yard. We take a sample of the soundest original from somewhere sheltered, work back from it, and put up a trial panel on a discreet part of the wall for you to judge in daylight.

The profile the joints are struck to. A flush joint follows the face of the brick and is what most old brickwork in Tarrant Monkton carries. A slightly recessed joint throws a shadow line and makes the brick read larger. A weather struck joint is cut back at the top so it sheds, which suits an exposed elevation but looks wrong on an old frontage, and bucket handle belongs on later brickwork. Ribbon pointing, a band of mortar left standing proud because the wall was pointed over instead of raked out, is the one finish we will not put on a building.

Spalled faces and chimneys. Where a face has blown, the brick is cut out whole and turned or replaced against a sample from the wall rather than filled with mortar. Stacks go first on any old Tarrant Monkton building, and the penetrating damp that follows an open stack joint lands on a ceiling below. Pointing the stack and renewing the flaunching want the same platform and one visit.

Thomas comes out, scrapes at a few joints with a key to test how soft the old mortar is, and looks at how the bricks or flints have weathered. He prices the job himself.

Each elevation of a Tarrant Monkton house gets its own figure, with access, raking out, the mortar and how it will be matched, any replacement bricks, and taking the waste away shown separately. Lime needs mild, damp weather to cure, so exposed walls are done away from frost and fresh joints are kept under hessian.

Sheets go down beneath the work, dust is cleaned up daily, and old mortar leaves in bags. If a brick crumbles once the joint round it is out, we show you in a photo, with the cost of replacing it, and wait for the go ahead.

Repointing to match what is there counts as a repair: no planning application, and building control has no part in it. A listed building is different, because its mortar is protected fabric and listed building consent comes before the first joint is opened. With twenty seven listed entries in and around Tarrant Monkton, Thomas checks your address with Dorset Council first.

Ring rather than use the form. When the pointing has washed out, driving rain soaks through to the inside face, and on a chimney it gets behind the lead flashings too. Look for damp patches on an inside wall after rain and for sand at the foot of the outside wall.

On the first visit we sheet the worst of it or do a temporary fill, and price the elevation once the wall has dried enough to judge. On a listed wall nothing permanent goes in until the mix is agreed. Scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm. If no one answers, a call back follows as soon as we can manage.

Call now: 07435 839745

Most places have a conservation area boundary running down the middle and a first question of which side you are on. Here the Tarrant Valley Conservation Area covers the whole village, so that question does not arise. What it controls is appearance.

Repointing a wall exactly as it was is maintenance and needs nothing from anybody. Repointing it in a different colour, or to a different joint profile, changes how the building reads from the street, and that is what the council takes an interest in.

The profile is the part people forget, and it makes more difference than the colour. The same mortar struck flush and struck weathered produces two different walls, because the shadow line under every course changes and the bricks appear to change size. Decide it before anybody starts and get it named on the quote alongside the mix. We put the profile in writing as standard and will make the enquiry with Dorset Council for you.

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

Everything we do in Blandford Forum Repointing, all areas Every area we cover