Beautiful job especially when we think of the replacement of stone and the eye-hand coordination and patience to do such a piece of work. Having grown up in a house made of pudding stone which is a VERY hard sedimentary rock each weighing perhaps 25 to 50 lbs. The basement of the house had walls 4 feet thick at the base tapering to about 2 feet at the second floor and then clapboard to the roof line. I remember as a child going into the attic and looking at the floor joists that were chestnut 6" x 8" and the rafters that were a true 2 1/2" x 6" white oak. Very fond memories of that house as in the summertime I could climb out the window and use a piece of hemp rope to lower myself to the ground and with one or more of my buddies head to the lake for a swim.
Well done that is a fantastic professional job. What type of lime would you recommend for pointing the interior of an old (100 + yrs) stone walled living room in southern Ireland.
4 sand 1 lime hydrated or not add a little fine stone dust granite or marble dust, any hard stone dust usually does, as most of the Roman concrete structures were made with lime sand and volcanic dust, basically granite crushed the dust helps the lime set quicker. Here in Ireland they used quarry dust help line go off. Or fire ash, ie clinker, as the industrial Revolution came along coal ash was abundant that's why cement came into being but cement has chemicals that make mortar go very hard and non porous.
Your doing the right thing by using a sympathetic free lime putty, but the finish on a putty joint is horrible, you could of used a NHL2 pre mix with a nice course aggregate which would of looked lovely when brushed up. Putty looks like kids are throwing there poop around
Hey Mike! in one of your videos you say in your next video you will show how to deal with cracks in lime putty. we are a few months into our build with cracks. Please let us know what best to do and please direct us to a video on how to deal with cracks. Love the videos!
The cracks can only be dealt with when the mortar is soft. It remains workable for up to three days so wet it up and smooth out the cracks and then brush it again.
Cracks are caused by shrinkage of some sort . Too much water ,too much fine sand ,joints not deep enough ,not compacted enough. You should not be getting cracks in new work ,technique flawed . Cracks in limework cure themselves by a process known as autogenius healing . As the rain runs down the face of the wall it picks up small amounts of lime and so becomes a weak lime soloution .This gets drawn into the microscopic hair line cracks by capillary attraction sealing the cracks before they become visible .
@@eddieharding5961 That's a remarkably concise explanation Eddie. You certainly know your stuff and this contribution is highly valued. I guess the only thing I could add would be that hot and drying winds or direct sunlight could influence the speed of drying and the mortar could suffer from cracking. I say 'could' because some mortars are more prone to it than others.
@@eddieharding5961thank you. I repoint old stone barn at the moment. First time working with lime mortar, I started with NHL but stoped and switched to hot lime mix mixed with lime putty and added brick dust. I do have cracks next morning but close them with bit of wooden stick. It's good to know about those self healing properties of lime mortar. Thank you again.
Looks fantastic, with lime putty doesn’t it take months to harden or “set”? It looks like you’ve brushed the excess off maybe with a stiff brush or wire brush so I’m just wondering approximately how long you left it? Trying to explain using lime rather than cement and the differences between hydrated hydraulic and putty is a nightmare even to other builders Cheers
Why the quotation marks for the word set? Why not put harden in quotation marks as well. Just thought I'd ask because I used to be a grammar teacher and can't quite understand the trend to put certain apparently arbitrary words in quotes.
+michaeljamesdesign I’m sure you understood my question, you sound like the typical lime fanatic that likes to profess to know everything there is to know about historical buildings and the type to generally get on peoples nerves. Get off your high horse, you point houses for a living. I can bet you are middle aged never married or divorced and haven’t had a sniff of a female for decades
@@jakemeakin7279 Ha ha! Jake, you're a star. Love the attitude. Get's off horse, dusts self down. Now then Jake, my issue here is that you put the word set in quotation marks for emphasis and I thought it an apt opportunity to give you a hard time over it and bust your balls. What you've got to do is learn to temper your response and be a tad chilled. In answer to your question: sometimes you can brush at the end of the day, other times its a few days after. It depends on the type of aggregate used, the weather, the location of the mortar on the wall - a host of other variables. In response to your, well, accusations. I'm also a psychologist and I saw something in you so I pushed a button. The response was as I suspected. Go easy Jake. And don't go so hard on yourself. And never forget that you are loved by God.
Can you offer advice please on repointing a 1938 house built with Fletton bricks and lime mortar. Also, would be grateful for advice on re-rendering front elevation (need to remove cenentitious pebble dash applied over a softer render) and what mix could be used as render close to ground level to prevent ingress of moisture from rain? Thanks, Andrew.
Hi Andrew, I'm really sorry but that's not really something I could take you through from start to finish via a public platform. Wet work in the form of repointing and rendering takes a long time to learn. There are some good videos from Mike Wye though.
@@fletton_man No but you need someone who knows what they're doing as every NHL is different, hot lime mortars need some expertise and lime putty isn't ideal for some properties. I tend to refer to myself as a conservation mortar specialist as stonemason conjures up an image of someone who spends most of their time replacing ashlar stone cills, quoins, lintels and carving gargoyles.
This is interesting Michael thank you for posting. Could you give some advice on the 'after care'? How do you look after the putty while it is drying? Did you use hessian sacking to stop the putty drying too quickly? Did you apply water to the joints? How long after applying the putty did you keep an eye on it? I'm looking forward to doing something similar on my own home.
Thanks for the enquiry Michael. These are all sensible questions and I can see that you already know something about lime. I am, however, reluctant to provide the answers as each project is different and one has to establish a feel for repointing as knowing when to do something can only be born out of experience. All substrates differ, temperatures differ throughout the year, the types of sand people use and the exposure to light and warmth also differ on each property. However, one should always wet joints beforehand and use hessian when necessary.
It's a shame that lime pointing is so bright, it overtakes the natural look of the stone. Is there any way it can be toned down? I read somewhere that when tamping down the pointing with a brush, add dry local soil to weather the pointing. What do you think?
There always has to be a purely pragmatic reason to do anything other than what is normally required with lime. Adding soil to the finished joints would interfere with the calcination coat and you'd lose your weatherproofing. The upshot would be failure of the mortar face. Use a darker sand (although this will only help marginally as sands for lime are mostly light in colour). Alternatively gauge in some organic Earthborn pigment. Do a few test panels to see which you prefer and with a bit of perseverence you'll get a nice mellow colour.
Lime mortar when mixed too wet dries out like this . You can also tell by the smooth joint finish the mortar was too wet . You must be able to squeeze the mortar in your hand with none escaping through your fingers . It should be like damp sand . The mortar is then compressed into the joint giving a dense finish . leave to the next morning and brush off using a wire brush . If done properly the joints are then a bit like cedar shingles changing colour throughout the year depending on weather conditions
Eddie, lime mortar mixed too wet can't be brushed. If it is then it cracks. This isn't a smooth finish. It's a coarse grain mortar. You don't know what you're talking about lad. Cedar shingles changing colour. You're bonkers son.
I’m about to repoint an area on my house with lime putty but needed a little advice......do you add anything to the lime putty as I’ve heard people doing to protect against frost etc or is this not needed? And do you need to cover with hessian afterwards for a few days or is this only if it’s very hot? Thank you
@@jedstone9396 No worries bud. That's a very coarse grain 1:3 mix of 2 sharp and 1 fine washed. But don't use just any NHL. You have to be very choosy as some of them are utter crap. And I mean, real rubbish.
That is a superb job, the professionalism of which is literally set in stone for generations to come
Beautiful job especially when we think of the replacement of stone and the eye-hand coordination and patience to do such a piece of work. Having grown up in a house made of pudding stone which is a VERY hard sedimentary rock each weighing perhaps 25 to 50 lbs. The basement of the house had walls 4 feet thick at the base tapering to about 2 feet at the second floor and then clapboard to the roof line. I remember as a child going into the attic and looking at the floor joists that were chestnut 6" x 8" and the rafters that were a true 2 1/2" x 6" white oak. Very fond memories of that house as in the summertime I could climb out the window and use a piece of hemp rope to lower myself to the ground and with one or more of my buddies head to the lake for a swim.
Looks amazing. Difference between before and after is unbelievable!
Good job, looks great and good to see it done properly using the correct materials.
Great job ! Stunning 👍
Why thank you kind sir.
It looks absolutely fantastic. Well done Michael
Finally, someone that knows how to repoint heritage stonework. Use lime putty people if you want to keep your stonework.
Lovely work, correctly done!
It's beautiful!
This is perfection.
Good advice thanks
Great work you information is invaluable to me thank you
Love your videos,
Thanks for taking the time to watch 'em Reece :-)
I like it too..looks creamy & cozy for cement. .
Totally awesome . Great job
Amazing work...great job!
:-)
Lovely work. That will last for a long time.
It's lovely, wish you could have shown the ceiling
Well done that is a fantastic professional job. What type of lime would you recommend for pointing the interior of an old (100 + yrs) stone walled living room in southern Ireland.
3.5 or putty. But specifically Irish lime as that has more of the Blarney in it.
What kind of lime? 3.5 or putty.
May I ask you to specify exactly what products you used plus what quantity that made up the lime mortar mix for this project
Can't help you Michael. All my recipes are secret. Only those who work for me know them.
@@michaeljamesdesign get a life you tight sod, its only a lime mix
@@lazycarper7925 Shrewd business advice. I may take you up on it. One day.
4 sand 1 lime hydrated or not add a little fine stone dust granite or marble dust, any hard stone dust usually does, as most of the Roman concrete structures were made with lime sand and volcanic dust, basically granite crushed the dust helps the lime set quicker. Here in Ireland they used quarry dust help line go off. Or fire ash, ie clinker, as the industrial Revolution came along coal ash was abundant that's why cement came into being but cement has chemicals that make mortar go very hard and non porous.
Your doing the right thing by using a sympathetic free lime putty, but the finish on a putty joint is horrible, you could of used a NHL2 pre mix with a nice course aggregate which would of looked lovely when brushed up. Putty looks like kids are throwing there poop around
Nice job!
Beautiful...
looks great.
Hey Mike!
in one of your videos you say in your next video you will show how to deal with cracks in lime putty.
we are a few months into our build with cracks. Please let us know what best to do and please direct us to a video on how to deal with cracks. Love the videos!
The cracks can only be dealt with when the mortar is soft. It remains workable for up to three days so wet it up and smooth out the cracks and then brush it again.
michaeljamesdesign Thanks very much for the reply. Got 2 walls complete with lime so far.
Cracks are caused by shrinkage of some sort . Too much water ,too much fine sand ,joints not deep enough ,not compacted enough. You should not be getting cracks in new work ,technique flawed . Cracks in limework cure themselves by a process known as autogenius healing . As the rain runs down the face of the wall it picks up small amounts of lime and so becomes a weak lime soloution .This gets drawn into the microscopic hair line cracks by capillary attraction sealing the cracks before they become visible .
@@eddieharding5961 That's a remarkably concise explanation Eddie. You certainly know your stuff and this contribution is highly valued. I guess the only thing I could add would be that hot and drying winds or direct sunlight could influence the speed of drying and the mortar could suffer from cracking. I say 'could' because some mortars are more prone to it than others.
@@eddieharding5961thank you. I repoint old stone barn at the moment. First time working with lime mortar, I started with NHL but stoped and switched to hot lime mix mixed with lime putty and added brick dust. I do have cracks next morning but close them with bit of wooden stick. It's good to know about those self healing properties of lime mortar. Thank you again.
great work
Cheers Clareman!!!
Well done great job
Thanks you Alex. Have a great day.
Beautiful outcome. What type of pozzolan type of pozzolan did you use to keep it a nice cream colour?
Hi David. The pozzolan doesn't impact on mortar shade as there's never enough. It's the type of sand and lime which gives the colour.
Beautiful
Thanks Sue x
Top job
Looks fantastic, with lime putty doesn’t it take months to harden or “set”? It looks like you’ve brushed the excess off maybe with a stiff brush or wire brush so I’m just wondering approximately how long you left it? Trying to explain using lime rather than cement and the differences between hydrated hydraulic and putty is a nightmare even to other builders
Cheers
Why the quotation marks for the word set? Why not put harden in quotation marks as well. Just thought I'd ask because I used to be a grammar teacher and can't quite understand the trend to put certain apparently arbitrary words in quotes.
+michaeljamesdesign I’m sure you understood my question, you sound like the typical lime fanatic that likes to profess to know everything there is to know about historical buildings and the type to generally get on peoples nerves. Get off your high horse, you point houses for a living. I can bet you are middle aged never married or divorced and haven’t had a sniff of a female for decades
+michaeljamesdesign helpful reply dick head
@@jakemeakin7279 Ha ha! Jake, you're a star. Love the attitude. Get's off horse, dusts self down. Now then Jake, my issue here is that you put the word set in quotation marks for emphasis and I thought it an apt opportunity to give you a hard time over it and bust your balls. What you've got to do is learn to temper your response and be a tad chilled. In answer to your question: sometimes you can brush at the end of the day, other times its a few days after. It depends on the type of aggregate used, the weather, the location of the mortar on the wall - a host of other variables. In response to your, well, accusations. I'm also a psychologist and I saw something in you so I pushed a button. The response was as I suspected. Go easy Jake. And don't go so hard on yourself. And never forget that you are loved by God.
Can you offer advice please on repointing a 1938 house built with Fletton bricks and lime mortar. Also, would be grateful for advice on re-rendering front elevation (need to remove cenentitious pebble dash applied over a softer render) and what mix could be used as render close to ground level to prevent ingress of moisture from rain? Thanks, Andrew.
Hi Andrew, I'm really sorry but that's not really something I could take you through from start to finish via a public platform. Wet work in the form of repointing and rendering takes a long time to learn. There are some good videos from Mike Wye though.
@@michaeljamesdesign Thanks Michael. Would I be correct though, in belief that I need a stonemason for lime mortar repair?
Nice work
@@fletton_man No but you need someone who knows what they're doing as every NHL is different, hot lime mortars need some expertise and lime putty isn't ideal for some properties. I tend to refer to myself as a conservation mortar specialist as stonemason conjures up an image of someone who spends most of their time replacing ashlar stone cills, quoins, lintels and carving gargoyles.
This is interesting Michael thank you for posting. Could you give some advice on the 'after care'? How do you look after the putty while it is drying? Did you use hessian sacking to stop the putty drying too quickly? Did you apply water to the joints? How long after applying the putty did you keep an eye on it?
I'm looking forward to doing something similar on my own home.
Thanks for the enquiry Michael. These are all sensible questions and I can see that you already know something about lime. I am, however, reluctant to provide the answers as each project is different and one has to establish a feel for repointing as knowing when to do something can only be born out of experience. All substrates differ, temperatures differ throughout the year, the types of sand people use and the exposure to light and warmth also differ on each property. However, one should always wet joints beforehand and use hessian when necessary.
@Sharky short hi there. Can you substitute hessian cloth to used bed linen instead? Thanks.
Is that the same place?!
It's a shame that lime pointing is so bright, it overtakes the natural look of the stone. Is there any way it can be toned down? I read somewhere that when tamping down the pointing with a brush, add dry local soil to weather the pointing. What do you think?
There always has to be a purely pragmatic reason to do anything other than what is normally required with lime. Adding soil to the finished joints would interfere with the calcination coat and you'd lose your weatherproofing. The upshot would be failure of the mortar face. Use a darker sand (although this will only help marginally as sands for lime are mostly light in colour). Alternatively gauge in some organic Earthborn pigment. Do a few test panels to see which you prefer and with a bit of perseverence you'll get a nice mellow colour.
I think it probably darkens over time as it gets older and dirtier. I like the bright mortar though because it does look lime lime mortar.
Lime mortar when mixed too wet dries out like this . You can also tell by the smooth joint finish the mortar was too wet . You must be able to squeeze the mortar in your hand with none escaping through your fingers . It should be like damp sand . The mortar is then compressed into the joint giving a dense finish . leave to the next morning and brush off using a wire brush . If done properly the joints are then a bit like cedar shingles changing colour throughout the year depending on weather conditions
Eddie, lime mortar mixed too wet can't be brushed. If it is then it cracks. This isn't a smooth finish. It's a coarse grain mortar. You don't know what you're talking about lad. Cedar shingles changing colour. You're bonkers son.
Use darker sand .
I’m about to repoint an area on my house with lime putty but needed a little advice......do you add anything to the lime putty as I’ve heard people doing to protect against frost etc or is this not needed? And do you need to cover with hessian afterwards for a few days or is this only if it’s very hot? Thank you
What's your aspect?
michaeljamesdesign it’s the front of the house and is south facing
@@adventureswiththelittleone493 July, south facing, lime putty. All I can say is good luck with that then.
michaeljamesdesign 😂😂😂 in what sense do you mean haha
@@adventureswiththelittleone493 Well I wouldn't.
Wonder if those plain tiles on the cills are listed...
There'll be no mention of it.
Do you have a website?
Can use please tell me what kind of motor you used to bind stones
Lime motor.
The black on the wood above the windows is a bit sever and harsh with the softer colours of hte stone.
Great job but it's not very helpful for the D I Y man who would like to have a go himself.
It's for marketing purposes Jed. It's by no means instructional.
So what was the mix ratio Michael
Not asking for any brands or such.
@@jedstone9396 Jed, manners don't cost anything. Say please and the information is yours.
@@michaeljamesdesign oops do beg my pardon Michael I'd forgot my self .I'm not like that honest.
@@jedstone9396 No worries bud. That's a very coarse grain 1:3 mix of 2 sharp and 1 fine washed. But don't use just any NHL. You have to be very choosy as some of them are utter crap. And I mean, real rubbish.