I live in a street where the has been some subsidence in some of the
other houses. My house is a 1935 built detached 3 bedroom house.

I saw a crack in the render, and pulled some of it off to reveal a
crack in the brick running down the side of the house from about
halfway up the house to the bottom. The crack is actually in the
bricks, not in the mortar between them.

Should my first course of action be to consult a structural engineer?
What would he do and how much would he charge?

Markus

Markus Splenius wrote:
I live in a street where the has been some subsidence in some of the
other houses. My house is a 1935 built detached 3 bedroom house.

I saw a crack in the render, and pulled some of it off to reveal a
crack in the brick running down the side of the house from about
halfway up the house to the bottom. The crack is actually in the
bricks, not in the mortar between them.

Should my first course of action be to consult a structural engineer?
What would he do and how much would he charge?

Markus




You _may_ be better consulting your insurers first. That way _they may_
pay for the investigative work.

Andrew

"Markus Splenius" wrote in message
...
I live in a street where the has been some subsidence in some of the
other houses. My house is a 1935 built detached 3 bedroom house.

I saw a crack in the render, and pulled some of it off to reveal a
crack in the brick running down the side of the house from about
halfway up the house to the bottom. The crack is actually in the
bricks, not in the mortar between them.

Should my first course of action be to consult a structural engineer?
What would he do and how much would he charge?

Markus

I have exactly the same problem, on a 1939 semi built on soil. The crack
also has gone through bricks, and removing the mastic that was stuffed
into it at one point, I could just see into the cavity! Looking at the
cracks,
front and back, I would say the Northern half of my house is sinking and
rotating slightly relative to the rest. Judging from the door frames on the
northern side ( I assume they were level and orthogonal once ) I reckon
the north wall may have sunk at least 3/4" to 1". I was on the roof this
year and
saw that the tiles at the northern part of the roof had pulled apart
slightly
in a line going up to the roof ridge and down the other side.

None of this seems to cause any problems, except for annoying redecorating
and the odd sticky door, but it is concerning. As precautions I have
annihalated a
30 foot Leylandii that was 10 feet from the back step, and have knobbled a
Virginia Creeper that grows from under the wall of my house and covered the
south wall every year.

I was going to repair the crack(s) in the outer wall this year, but was
wondering
whether raking out the cracks and remortaring is a bad thing to do where a
brick has cracked in two: should I be thinking of cutting out any cracked
bricks
and inserting new ones? I know that that would give a stronger result in
theory
than just packing the crack with a stiff mortar mix but don't know what is
considered acceptable.

I personally would rather keep away from the insurers as long as the house
was
structurally safe and the cracks were not growing at an alarming rate.

Andy.

Markus Splenius wrote:
I live in a street where the has been some subsidence in some of
the
other houses. My house is a 1935 built detached 3 bedroom house.

I saw a crack in the render, and pulled some of it off to reveal a
crack in the brick running down the side of the house from about
halfway up the house to the bottom. The crack is actually in the
bricks, not in the mortar between them.

Should my first course of action be to consult a structural
engineer?
What would he do and how much would he charge?

Markus

Depends what the size of crack is, and whether its moving. I would be
quite cautious about involving insurers, since it'll knock a kings
ransom off the resale value of the house, even after its fixed.


NT

"andrewpreece" wrote in message
...

"Markus Splenius" wrote in message
...
I live in a street where the has been some subsidence in some of the
other houses. My house is a 1935 built detached 3 bedroom house.

I saw a crack in the render, and pulled some of it off to reveal a
crack in the brick running down the side of the house from about
halfway up the house to the bottom. The crack is actually in the
bricks, not in the mortar between them.

We've seen something similar in the unattached wall of our 1937 3 bed semi.
There are also cracks on the same wall inside the house. Nothing really
serious but needs watching, we think.

Spouse thinks it might have something to do with heave becasue of all the
wet wether we've had in the last few years. We've noticed that garden
features have moved.

I'll be interested in replies.

Mary

Andy.

We had the same problem about 10 years ago and informed the buildings
insurance co who appointed structural engineers. These people came & fitted
small metal discs with a small hole in the centre across each of the cracks.
Then every 3 months or so an engineer would come and measure the distance
between the centres of the discs using a vernier type gauge, measured in
micrometres, to check for movement. This went on for about two years and the
outcome was that apparently we don't have subsidence just settlement and
therefore no under pinning is required just cosmetic repairs inside and out.
The Insurance co paid for the engineers and I had to pay for the brickwork &
plastering as it was less than the £1000 building excess.
Hope this helps!
Gary

wrote in message
oups.com...
Markus Splenius wrote:
I live in a street where the has been some subsidence in some of
the
other houses. My house is a 1935 built detached 3 bedroom house.

I saw a crack in the render, and pulled some of it off to reveal a
crack in the brick running down the side of the house from about
halfway up the house to the bottom. The crack is actually in the
bricks, not in the mortar between them.

Should my first course of action be to consult a structural
engineer?
What would he do and how much would he charge?

Markus

Depends what the size of crack is, and whether its moving. I would be
quite cautious about involving insurers, since it'll knock a kings
ransom off the resale value of the house, even after its fixed.


NT

"Gary" wrote in message
...
We had the same problem about 10 years ago and informed the buildings
insurance co who appointed structural engineers. These people came &
fitted small metal discs with a small hole in the centre across each of
the cracks. Then every 3 months or so an engineer would come and measure
the distance between the centres of the discs using a vernier type gauge,
measured in micrometres, to check for movement. This went on for about two
years and the outcome was that apparently we don't have subsidence just
settlement and therefore no under pinning is required just cosmetic
repairs inside and out.
The Insurance co paid for the engineers and I had to pay for the brickwork
& plastering as it was less than the £1000 building excess.
Hope this helps!
Gary

Some friends had a similar problem with cracks appearing in their end
terrace house. Some plastic sheets were glued across the cracks to monitor
movement, by inisurance company appointed engineers. The movement was
seasonal and was traced to the fact that the small garden had been concreted
completely over.

So a 10inch gap was cut between the house and patio (one row of paving
stones/tiles ?) and filled with stones to allow water into the soil and a
major area lifted up and grassed over. Then over the next couple of years
the gaps closed up and were not a problem.

"Gary" wrote in message
...
We had the same problem about 10 years ago and informed the buildings
insurance co who appointed structural engineers. These people came &
fitted small metal discs with a small hole in the centre across each of
the cracks.

We could do that ourselves! It's the same kind of thing as is done on
ancient buildings but they often use a slip of glass. If the crack opens it
breaks.

Mary

"Ian Middleton" wrote in message
...

Some friends had a similar problem with cracks appearing in their end
terrace house. Some plastic sheets were glued across the cracks to monitor
movement, by inisurance company appointed engineers. The movement was
seasonal and was traced to the fact that the small garden had been
concreted completely over.

So a 10inch gap was cut between the house and patio (one row of paving
stones/tiles ?) and filled with stones to allow water into the soil and a
major area lifted up and grassed over. Then over the next couple of years
the gaps closed up and were not a problem.

Hmm, that's something to consider when we concrete the house end of our
garden. Thanks for mentioning it.

Mary

"Huge" wrote
| ... our lovely, but way-too-close to the house (*) oak tree is now a
| large pile of firewood,

If it was that lovely you could have made it into some furniture.

Owain