OT - house cracks

[Globalti]

A Victorian house is unlikely suddenly to begin collapsing, unless you had had a "flood event" recently around the foundations!

Unfortunately the heating will dry out plaster and woodwork too. Your best friend is decorator's caulk, which unlike Polyfilla is actually flexible. Buy a good quality caulk though and equip yourself with a skellington for the tube.

 

[Jaded]

Fill them in with grout or polyfilla, or better still plaster, and then sand over it and apply another coat of paint.

or toothpaste.

 

[Chuffy]

Add that to your crimes. Not mine.

I used to think that chuffy was a girl that lived in John Street, in Cyprus.

In my less sober moments I imagined rescuing her from her cypriot oppressors, on holiday.

I could put on a long blonde wig and shout 'Hayulp! Hayulp!' in a Penelope Pitstop fashion from an upstairs window if it would make you feel better.
You do look like the Anthill Mob, don't you?


Ta for the advice folks. It's just hairline cracking in all sorts of places, including around the windows. We're 99% certain that it's just cosmetic and related to the new heating.

 

[bonj2]

I could put on a long blonde wig and shout 'Hayulp! Hayulp!' in a Penelope Pitstop fashion from an upstairs window if it would make you feel better.
You do look like the Anthill Mob, don't you?


Ta for the advice folks. It's just hairline cracking in all sorts of places, including around the windows. We're 99% certain that it's just cosmetic and related to the new heating.

The prospective buyer may not think that.

 

[Chuffy]

The prospective buyer may not think that.

We've only just bought it and we haven't started decorating yet. A competent surveyor should be able to tell the difference between structural and cosmetic.

 

[bonj2]

He wont' know the crack's there in the first place if you paint over it.

 

[freakhatz]

..make sure you use old paint so it doesn't look recent

 

[Aperitif]

and heat it before applying so that the coefficient of expansion is equivalent to that of the substrate...

 

[simon l& and a half]

this is a bit like CSI. The relevant fact doesn't appear until the umpteenth post. You just bought the house? Hah! The cracks are around the windows? Hah!

If Chuffkin were to read this he'd be able to tell us whether the cracks were at the head or the cill of the window.......

 

[andygates]

CSI might zoom in on Chuffy's crack from space, but NCIS has the hot goth Quincy girl. She'd soon sort out that crevice.

 

[simon l& and a half]

Yehbut, CSI's Marg would point her pointy torch into Chuffy's crack and make some five word remark that hinted at a life of pain. And facial surgery.

What would Horatio say? (very, very male, but slightly camp, voice) 'Chuffy bought it. Now he'd gonna pay.'

 

[buggi]

i doubt your house is falling down. worse thing it will be will probably be blown plaster. walk along the wall from one end to the other tapping it lightly with the ends of your fingers (finger pads, not nails) and listen closely. it will sound hollow on the bits it has come away from the wall. if it doesn't sound hollow it's probably just a crack.

 

[Baggy]

OK crack fans...

CSI would also spray Chuffy's crack with their special green liquid that indicates whether a builder has ever been present in the house.

As a sharer of the crack burden, I can provide more facts evidence:
There are no cracks on any of the walls which are freshly plastered.
It is two months since the heating was installed, previously there was none.
The cracks round the windows are red-herrings as it's only one window which has a crack in the plaster. The others are on internal walls and ceilings, the worst culprit being where the wall bears the marks of a previous Poyfilla-ing (by someone partially-sighted who used a flounder instead of a spatula judging by the quality of the finish).
I think we've ruled out the likelihood of imminent structural collapse - it's definitely not blown plaster, just hairline cracks which on closer inspection look like old cracks which are re-cracking.
Bearing in mind we've been heating parts that heve never been heated before and battering things with gert big hammers for 3 months I'm surpried more bits haven't fallen off.
BUT - where was Simon heading with his window theory?

 

[simon l& and a half]

OK crack fans...

CSI would also spray Chuffy's crack with their special green liquid that indicates whether a builder has ever been present in the house.

it's blue, and it would only tell you if the builder had left sperm in the house. Cherish the thought.

BUT - where was Simon heading with his window theory?

only this - cracks at window heads can be bad news. Now this is speculation (as in get a surveyor in if you're worried, and don't ask a bunch of numpty cyclists) but Victorian houses do shift about, and sometimes the lime mortar will accommodate the shifting, whereas the plaster won't. Window openings, particularly those which are spanned by timber lintols supporting brickwork, tend to give, particularly if the timber has got wet. And that's not good. (Those arches you see on the outside might be too flat to be doing much, and it's the rather shitty bit of wood that you screw your curtain rail to that is holding the wall up).

Lots of Victorian houses are built on clay, and most of the smaller ones (actually all that I've ever seen) have foundations that would be judged inadequate by today's standards. Some of the internal walls can be of exotic construction (exotic as in crap). Bricks laid on edge in a framework of three inch studs. It's best to think of this kind of house as a work in motion. The motion might be slow, but it might also be erratic. You come home one day and the front door won't quite close because the house has shifted. That kind of thing. Generally speaking they do stand up, although there have been some spectacular failures on clay slopes, particularly when the drains have shifted, leaked and the resulting seepage has made the clay a little slippy...

So, the message is, don't take anything for granted, especially if work has been done, or you are taking out walls. And, if you're doing things like putting in new windows a) don't rely on the openings being square (aluminium and upvc being remarkably difficult to plane) and bear in mind that the opening might change shape still further.

I did do the obvious thing to the previous house and took out the internal walls to the ground floor to make one big white space. An engineer friend came around to look at it prior to works starting. He stared at the foundations gloomily. 'The thing is', he said, 'I can't prove this is standing up now, let alone in the future'.

Having said all that...if you want real under-engineered crap, buy a house (or a flat) built in the thirties. Hipped roofs (shakes head, gets coat).

 

[simon l& and a half]

oh - and 'blown plaster'. Why? As in why would plaster 'blow'? Might it have something to do with water getting through the brickwork? Is it time to look at the pointing? Has a crack opened up that is admitting water? I don't know, but, like I said, don't take these houses for granted. If something is moving then there's a reason for it. And don't forget this, Victorian House Fans. If you think the thing is shifting, read your buildings insurance policy for the bit that tells you what you must do to comply with the terms and conditions.