Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article , The Natural
Philosopher wrote:
The Building Research Establishment did extensive tests, to try to
detect rising damp, by standing various building materials in water
for prolonged periods. They concluded that damp does not rise more
than, at most, a few inches, which implies that the DPC is entirely
superfluous. Good ventilation is far more important for avoiding damp
problems.


Well it made about a foot in my old house up 18th century porous brick.

Quite enough to rot all the floor timbers and blow all the plaster above
the skirting.

And just how old were the timbers and plaster?

Timbers? probbly 200 years

Plaster? looked like 70's

And if it were rising damp
due to no damp course would have caused these problems many times in the
house's life?

Indeed. It obviously had.

Some patching had improved it, other patching had trapped rot inside.

Plastering over what had been brick chimneys sealed its fate.


Of course if you concrete round the outside of a house where there used to
be drainage you can often get damp penetrating through porous bricks, etc.
But that's not rising damp.

Er..concrete round a house does not affect damp being sucked up in the
middle of it by the chimney.

When w finally took it apart, there was a small pond under the floor and
the chimney stood in the middle of it.