Does anyone know where I could get a small amount, like ~20 lbs, of Masonry Sand to make dry pack mortar for extending a pre-fab shower pan? All of the big box stores seem to only have play sand, and all the landscaping companies only sell 3mm sand by the cubic yard....
I'd meant to repoint my wall last winter and didn't. Now I'm less inclined to have a non-emergency contractor in my house for long periods, may be worth doing.
Who can match my mortar so I don't need to trial/error it and most people won't notice my mistakes?
I am repointing several rooms in my house built around the 1880s. The internet does not have a solid answer for what i am looking for, so I'm reaching out to the reddit community in the hopes that there may be a mason that can assist me with this. I need the recipe for how to make a lime based mortar, without any portland cement. This is because the bricks from this time period are soft, compared to the bricks that are on the market today. The Mortar needs to be weaker than the brick that it is used with. The weakest type of mortar i can find is type O, and that is still too hard. I would like to find the recipe that was used when they made the house. Its held up for 140 years. For context i live in columbus ohio, in a 2 story brick house.
I was thinking type N??
Bought my first house in MN a few months ago and am working to make it more efficient. I picked up a 2 part spray foam product (froth Pak 200) with the intent of insulating my rim joists. Currently above the block wall there is a slanted mortar caps and some fiberglass insulation set on top of that which I doubt is doing much if anything. These mortar caps sound loose and have a hollow sound when I knock on them. Are they serving any function at all? Would it make sense to remove them to be able to get the spray foam further back and still be able to fit rigid insulation after the spray foam? Or should I save myself the trouble and just spray right over them? Pictures are attached. Thank you all.
https://imgur.com/a/MeRzAvZ
Hi
I bought an old traditional swedish house a few years ago. It's a 200 year old timber house. The previous owners were elderly and the house and garden has been quite neglected for probably a decade or so. Because of this there's a lot of heavy work that needs getting done.
One area I'm currently trying to get right at the moment is the garden. It's sloped and hilly and about 4000 sqm and most of it is bedrock with very little soil. Most of the garden is pretty difficult to use for anything since it is rocky and uneven. To try and increase to "usability" of it all I'm experimenting with terracing and building walls. We've got quite a bunch of sharp rocks and boulders left over from some blasting we did, as well as lots of natural boulders and rocks. I'd like to use these rather than modular pre made masonry as I feel this fits in with the rustic nature of the house.
I'm really shitty at visualising and planning, and though I've tried it never really gets me anywhere, so I've realized that in the end it's better for me to just do something and see how I like it. If it's not right, I'll just undo it. It's a lot of hard work but I don't mind.
When I build these walls I've just dry stacked or used clay and dirt to fill out the cracks and spaces between the stones. Unfortunately this isn't always as stable as I'd like, and I'm still very much in a state of learning about this. So it'd be great if I had mortar or some cement. The problem is that if I use actual mortar or cement, it'll be a huge pain in the ass to disassemble and remove the wall if I decide that it's not what I wanted. All the rocks would be ugly and ruined too, because as far as I know, removing cement isn't easy.
To the point: Is there some type of binder for rocks that doesn't harden quite as much as typical cements/mortars? I'm thinking something that hardens like mortar, looks like mortar, doesn't get washed away by rain etc, but can somewhat easily be chiseled off without leaving too much residue and broken apart should I decide I want to redo it. Maybe even reused? I don't know. Do you guys have any suggestions?
I recently hired a guy to rebuild the bricks at the base of the exterior door to my deck. They destroyed the bricks when they built the deck.
I provided replacement bricks and my contractor took them and glued them into place with gray sealant instead of mortar.
Other than looking like crap is this acceptable? (Will post a pic when i get home.)
I informed him that his mason did this and he said he would come by and check it, and another thing they missed (reset a storm door).
He came, said he fixed the door, and said the bricks look fine.
Picture Bricks at base of door. https://imgur.com/gallery/kcPU0
The previous owner of my house made holes in the brickwork to fit hooks to, but they were installed the wrong way around.
Orientating them correctly means drilling new holes, which would leave the existing holes visible. It's not a massive issue as it's just an external wall that no one will see and the holes are only 2cm deep, but I was just wondering if they can/should be filled in e.g. to prevent water getting in and freezing and expanding to create cracks?
Cheers
I am trying to drill holes into red brick for several camera and also water hose. I have a Rotary Hammer Drill, with a new Milwaukee 1/4” masonry carbide bit. Drill in hammer mode instantaneously cracked the brick into several pieces, and drill in normal mode with water to cool it down only get me less than half an inch after couple of minutes.
What else I can do to drill into this?
Edit: Brick : ACME Brick, ASTM Grade SW
Edit your location: Denver, Colorado
Can anyone recommend businesses/resources in Hamilton that have expertise in masonry/foundation work on century+ homes? *** We've got a fieldstone foundation***
So it appears that the owners of our home did some really poor masonry repair to the brick. I've attached a photo for reference, although it covers a larger area than what is pictured. What are my best options here? My thoughts, are to match the brick and masonry color and paint with exterior paint. What kind of paint am I looking for here, is this a bad idea, thoughts?
We got some lights installed, and the location where the electrician hooked it into is a stud behind a stone facade. I need to redo the mortar, because the stone broke, but I don’t know how to match the existing mortar that goes on the stone facade (which is not structural but for aesthetics only). Before everyone states that the electrician needs to pay for it; he warned us of it before hand and I told him to go ahead.
Anyways, do the big box stores have color matching pre mixed mortar? How would I find a place that has this, any particular type of shops?
I need to run RG11 cable on the outside of a building and attach it to the brick wall.
I want the most secure, strong and heavy duty possible RG11 staples. After much research I found these: https://imgur.com/riQO78X I like them because they are steel and painted black.
The specs state that the screw is #8 X 1". But the specs do NOT mention if screw is for wood or masonry.
I want to drill a pilot hole in the mortar that is between the bricks and screw that screw into the pilot hole.
I want the most sturdy attachment regardless of price.
Is it best to just drill a pilot hole and use that screw without the plastic anchor?What size of drill bit should I use? I tried researching it online but only advice I found is for pilot holes in wood.Should I use a plastic anchor? What is the best? What pilot size hole should I drill if I use some plastic anchor for that screw?
Any advice is much appreciated.
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