How To Repair A Stone Home Mason Work
Masonry: How to Repair Mortar Joints
A beginner's guide to tuckpointing, or replacing mortar joints
Crumbling mortar in brick walls and chimneys has to be cut out and replaced to avoid structural and water damage. Tuckpointing—cleaning out and remortaring the joints—is easier than information technology looks if you have the right tools.
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Tuckpointing
Crumbling masonry joints commencement out ugly, and and so things get uglier fast—bricks come loose, water seeps behind the wall and bees make their homes in the mortar holes. Allow it go and the trouble won't go away. In fact, the deterioration will accelerate and you'll have a much bigger set on your hands. But you can mend the mortar joints yourself with a process chosen tuckpointing.
Tuckpointing isn't hard or expensive—the simply real investment is your time. But you tin pick away at it in your free time, area past surface area.
The steps nosotros prove here will work on any brick walls, chimneys and retaining walls. Tuckpointing won't fix cracking or crumbling bricks, or cracks in walls caused by a shifting foundation. Those issues telephone call for more than drastic fixes that nosotros won't encompass here.
Selection upwardly tools and materials
Start and foremost, you'll need an bending grinder with a iv or 4-1/4 in. diamond blade. Don't bother renting one unless you only have several feet of bad joints. You can buy an inexpensive model for a few dollars more than the price of a 1-day rental, and even a fairly cheap one will do the play tricks (unless you're a serious tool junkie or you accept an unabridged business firm that needs extensive tuckpointing).
You'll also demand a few simple, cheap specialty hand tools that are bachelor at masonry suppliers and some domicile centers. You'll need a brick trowel and a tuck pointer. If y'all have concave mortar joints, y'all'll need a masonry jointer that'south the width of your joints. For flat joints, you'll need a joint raker. If you have but a few areas that need work, use a hammer and cold chisel to knock out the old mortar, but for more extensive work, plan on getting a rotary hammer drill fitted with a flat chisel to make the job go a heck of a lot quicker. Yous can hire i for a half-day or day. If you have days' worth of work, rental costs can break the bank. In that example, spend the money to own ane.
You'll also need mortar mix. A 60-lb. pocketbook costs a few dollars at habitation centers. If yous need colored mortar, take a minor piece of the former mortar to a masonry supplier and ask for help finding a mortar dye to friction match. Just be aware of this—fresh tuckpointing always stands out against older mortar. Notwithstanding, information technology volition somewhen weather to lucifer.
Outset pocket-size
If you only accept a few joints to tuckpoint, dive right in. Only if you accept a large wall to tackle, get-go in a small surface area to get a feel for the performance earlier y'all start hogging out entire walls. Y'all'll hone your skills and get a skillful thought of how much you lot can tuckpoint at one time. You'll have 30 to 60 minutes of working time once you lot mix the mortar.
Get fix for the grit
Tuckpointing is a dirty business. Grinding the joints creates a dust storm, with chunks of mortar covering the basis. Spread a drop textile on the footing to take hold of the mortar so cleanup volition take minutes instead of hours. Close your business firm windows to proceed out the dust, and tell your neighbors who might be affected to do the same.
How to remove mortar from brick: Grind out the joints
Photo ane: Grind the horizontal joints offset
Grind along the superlative and bottom of the horizontal joints to remove mortar. Get as close to the bricks as you lot can. If you grind against the bricks, the dust will plough the color of the brick.
Photograph 2: Plunge-cutting the vertical joints
Grind both sides of the vertical mortar joints. Plunge the grinder into the joint and work it up and downwards to brand the cuts. But exist careful not to grind the bricks above and below the joints.
Before you lot tin can put new mortar in the joints, you lot have to cut out the damaged material. And then how practise you remove mortar from brick? Showtime by grinding the top and bottom of the horizontal (bed) joints with an angle grinder (Photo 1). Concord the grinder with both hands to go along it steady and avoid grinding into the bricks. Y'all just need to grind 3/4 in. into the mortar.
Start at outside corners and work inward. That keeps y'all from putting actress pressure on the corner bricks, which could knock them out of the wall. After yous've finished the horizontal joints, practise the vertical (head) joints (Photo 2).
Knock out the mortar
Photo 3: Hammer out the mortar
Keep moving the rotary hammer drill along the joints as you lot chisel out the mortar. Be sure to keep the chisel off the bricks and so you don't knock them out of place.
Employ the rotary hammer drill to pound the mortar out of the joints. Gear up the drill on the rotating mode (it puts less pressure on the bricks). Over again, piece of work from the outside corners inward (Photo 3). Keep the chisel point in the mortar joint and proceed moving the hammer. The drill makes quick piece of work of removing mortar, merely be conscientious. The powerful tool can likewise knock out bricks. If that happens, take them all the manner out, chisel off all the mortar, then reset them when yous fill the joints.
There's really no cloak-and-dagger to knocking out the mortar. Just agree the drill at nigh a 45-degree angle to the wall, squeeze the trigger and lookout man the mortar fall out.
Caution: Wear eye protection—mortar pieces can go flying!
Clean out the joints
Photo 4: Sweep out the joints
Use a small broom to sweep debris and dust out of the joints. Inspect the joints for any remaining stubborn mortar and knock information technology out with the drill.
Photo 5: Give joints a bath
Stick a brush into a saucepan of h2o and rinse out the joints. Your goal hither isn't to make surfaces pristine, simply to become rid of chunks and dust.
Once you've chipped out the damaged mortar, apply a hand broom to sweep the joints. Sweep abroad mortar clumps and the dust (Photo four). Utilize the rotary hammer drill to bust out stubborn chunks.
Then wash out the joints with water. Simply don't hose downwards the wall or you'll soak everything, including the ground where you'll be standing or kneeling. Instead, fill up a bucket with water and castor the water into the joints (Photo 5). Don't worry well-nigh slopping water onto the bricks—yous want them damp earlier yous make full the joints anyway.
Mix the new mortar
Photo 6: Whip up the mortar batch
Mix the mortar to the consistency of peanut butter with no dry spots or clumps. You'll know the mix is right when it sticks to your trowel when you concur it at a 45-degree angle. Permit the mortar sit down for 10 minutes before using it.
If you're tinting the mortar, stir the dye and the mortar mix in a bucket before adding the water. Dye is typically sold in i-one/2-lb. bags. Mix 1-quarter of the dye with ane-quarter of a lx-lb. purse of mortar mix. Stir in h2o until the mix is the consistency of peanut butter (Photo 6).
The mortar will last xxx to threescore minutes, simply you may need to add h2o to proceed information technology workable. Later on one hour, throw out what's left and mix a new batch.
Piece of work the mortar into the joints
Photo 7: Fill the joints
Load your brick trowel and hold it next to the joint. Work the mortar into the joint with your tuck pointer. Pack the joint total earlier moving on to the adjacent one.
Use a brick trowel and a tuck pointer to pack the mortar into the joints. Most pros adopt this method to using a grout/mortar purse. Mortar that is hand packed is more than durable.
Scoop mortar onto the trowel. Hold the trowel next to the joint, then printing the mortar into the articulation with the tuck pointer (Photo 7). Pack the joint until it'south affluent with the front of the bricks.
Tool the joints
Photograph viii: Strike the mortar joints
Drag the jointer along the vertical joints and the horizontal joints. Apply gentle pressure to tool out the ridges where the joints intersect. Stop ane articulation before moving on to the adjacent.
Let the mortar in the filled joints set up for nigh 30 minutes. If y'all're tuckpointing a large area, continually check the offset joints you filled to see if they're ready to tool (finish). Check by pressing the filled joint with your pollex. If your thumb leaves but a slight impression, information technology's fix to tool. If it goes in deeper, wait 5 minutes and try once again. But don't let the mortar get too strong—it tin can start to harden after just 30 minutes, making it difficult to tool the joints.
If yous want rounded joints, press a masonry jointer into the top of vertical joints and pull the tool downward. The jointer volition button out some of the mortar and exit a concave shape. For horizontal joints, get-go at a corner (Photograph 8). Run the tool about halfway across the joint, then stop and cease tooling from the other side.
For flat joints, identify a joint raker over an old joint to set the depth. Then run the raker along the new joints to make them flat.
Clean the bricks
Photo 9: Wipe down the bricks
Scrub the mortar off the bricks with a stiff brush. This also knocks down and smooths out any high spots along the joint edges.
Once the joints accept ready (nearly 30 minutes after tooling), use a strong-bristle brush to clean dried mortar off the bricks (Photograph 9).
If the mortar refuses to come up off, wait three days, then use hydrochloric acid (sold at habitation centers). Apply 10 parts water to ane part acrid (add the acrid to the water, not the other way around). Circumspection: Be sure to wear center protection and rubber gloves when working with acid. Castor the acid onto the bricks with a stiff-bristle brush, scrub the bricks and let the acrid buzz. Then rinse the acid off with water. If there's still a little mortar residue left, treat information technology again.
The acid tin can slightly modify the bricks' appearance, and so test it on a small area first. If it does alter the appearance, increase the ratio of water to acid.
Required Tools for this Project
Take the necessary tools for this DIY project lined upward earlier you beginning—you'll save time and frustration.
You'll too need a brick trowel, a masonry jointer or joint raker, a minor broom, prophylactic gloves, and a potent bristle castor.
Required Materials for this Projection
Avoid final-infinitesimal shopping trips past having all your materials set up ahead of time. Here'southward a listing.
Source: https://www.familyhandyman.com/project/masonry-how-to-repair-mortar-joints/
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