damp proofing

Stoner

Hi all,

I have a damp wall in my garage, I want to convert the garage and i need to deal with the wall, my house is lower than nextdoors so the lower part of my garage wall is actually at the same level as under their driveway.

So I'm based in Dublin, I've called the damp store, I'm waiting for a call back, is there a more cost effective or possibly better contractor that people have used? someone who can provide a certificate? I have no experience dealing with these guys they could be great or terrible for all i know

Spread

Hey Stoner! Because the wall is retaining then it has to be waterproofed ...... not just damp proofed. This is because of the possibility of water pressure. If you can get a decent plasterer, here is how you go about it. Clean dust/old plaster/mud etc. off the wall that has to be treated and to 2' above and beyond at the sides. You also need to rough up the floor - 6" out from the wall. Splatter coat the wall/floor with 1.5:1 (s:c). When that is fairly hard float out in 2:1 (add waterproofer) and splattercoat with 2.5:1 (add waterproofer), running the plaster out on the roughened floor. The angle of wall/floor and wall/wall should be rubbed with a bottle to give a bull nose effect. The following day float out with 3:1 (plus waterproofer) and rub up. This final coat will bring the thickness to 1". Your wall is now waterproofed. (Tanking is the technical term). Clean washed sand must be used and the additives as recommended. You can then batten the wall out (plastic plugs and screws in tanked area) to take insulation board. Or mushroom using plastic ones only on the tanked area.

moy83

Would the sand and cement with waterproofer alone be enough to stop water coming through ? If you used plug and screw or mushroom fixings in the tanked area would that not cause areas for water to travel through the screw or fixing and out to the slab again

Stoner

I know this is DIY but I'm not looking to DIY this one, I really want a company that can deal with this, I have been chasing the damp store and have provisionally received a date they will check it out on, but I'd like to shop around, I'd like a certified job for this as it's not worth doing unless this wall is right.

Anyone know any alternatives, web searches seem to be throwing up much larger projects than my little garage.

moy83

check out VANDEX its a uk based company but they do good stuff

Stoner

ok just though I'd add this to the database

I had zero luck with the dampstore they must have been very busy but I made arrangements more than once and they never showed up or called to rearrange.


so I went about it a different way. I'm including this here as it may be useful to others as there was little consistent information at the time. I needed to deal with the salt/chemical reaction issue, the rising damp and the water proofing/tanking.
I ended up speaking to a couple of technical sales reps and this is what I ended up doing.

I got my material from

http://www.ibcltd.net/ibchq.htm
http://www.ibcltd.net/datasheets/Liquid%20Waterproofer_new.pdf

IBC LTD - Irish Building Chemicals,
Unit 143,
Baldoyle Industrial Estate,
Dublin 13,
Ireland.

they don't carry stock at the above address, see the end of the post.
I needed the following information

I required 7.6M wall linear lenght

1.6M of wet wall to treat (i'm down lower than next door)

160mm block

Steps

1. Clear the wall of plaster 1.6M (the plaster can react with salt and the new chemicals and is better off gone)
2. From a point 150mm above the level of the ground (on the high side) drill holes with 10mm bit every 100mm only one line needed 9/10 of the way into the wall
3. Inject the chemical using the gun into the holes, its described on the web demo, this will form a barrier against the rising damp.
4. Plug the holes on the inside with mortar
5. Brush and clean the wall
6. Brush on one coat of sbr
7. brush on another light mix of sbr mixed with cement
8. mix half the 25KG bag of max seal with 3L of water and apply first coat
9. Wait at least overnight but no more than 48 hours then apply the second coat
10. Mix some SBR with cement and spot the wall where standard blobs will be used
11. Blob the wall and work away (i did not blob the wall i used a foam glue)

when I cleared the wall of plaster I noticed that it was a cavity block wall however the original builder had used two solid red bricks, the position of these bricks lined up with the two worst damps spots on the wall, it seemed that there were a conduit for the water. I removed these from the wall and repaired it leaving an air gap.

Materials needed
1 x Gun
3 x 600 tubes of application unit
2 x gallon of SBR unit
1 x bag of max seal 25Kg unit





I picked it up at johnson Logistics, up past the potien still pub on the Naas road, exit 5

Spread

Well done Stoner. That will work if instructions and application were followed. A word of caution .......... if you're fixing skirting/baseboard, do not screw or nail. Stick it on. Best of luck.