Realign stone wall?

[Roy Bloom]

Hello.
I am hoping you gentle folk might offer me some advice, even if it's a "don't be daft", or "that'll never work".

I'm at my uncle's house in France, helping him with some restoration work.
We're in the process of pointing the barn walls. I think it's the very first time it's being pointed with lime mortar because there's no sign anywhere that it's been pointed before.
One section is quite mis-aligned. See photos, attached.

As I see it we have three options, 1. ignore it and point it up as is, 2. dismantle that bit of the wall, and rebuild it, which would be a fair bit of work, and I wouldn't fancy working underneath it in case the lot comes crashing down.
The other option I thought of is to suspend a log from the tractor bucket, and use it like a battering ram to try to realign that bit of the wall.

The centre rubble filled part of the wall looks kind of empty. It's posssible to take a stone out, and you can see space behind the outer skin. Hence the two photos showing a hole in the wall.
The other side of the wall, inside the barn shows no sign at alll of being misaligned.
I guess it would make sense to have a spotter inside during any attempted battering process.

Is it a daft idea, or will it work?

 

[Roy Bloom]

Hello again.
As no-one wants to make any comment on my idea, I am guessing that either no-one has tried this, or no-one wants to guess what might happen.

If we try it, I'll let you know how it goes.

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

Just be a bit more patient will you, it's not a paid forum you know!

 

[Roy Bloom]

Sorry.

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

Just drive the tractor at full speed into the wall I'm sure it will all be good.

 

[Roy Bloom]

I didn't want to damage the stone.

 

[Fred Blogs]

And then after being admonished for being impatient you get a stupid answer from the same bloke. Anyway I would gently tap the center stones with a, not too heavy, mallet. If they move try to realign them that way. If they dont move I would point them up as they are. I would just point them as is, it's only a cow shed and it adds to the "old" character of the building

 

[Roy Bloom]

I took freddiemercurystwin's comment in the spirit in which I assume it wqs given.
I was glad of some respone. I thought perhaps my post had disaparu.

I have tried hitting individual stones with a club hammer, with a piece of timber to protect the stone. They didn't budge one iota, apart from the one loose stone. That's why I thought something heavier, with a bit of momentum and weight behond it might have some effect.

 

[freddiemercurystwin]

OK sorry, serious answer now, use yourself as a sacrificial packing between the tractor and the wall, thus protecting the nice stonework.

 

[Roy Bloom]

 

[fillyboy]

I was working at a place earlier this year, almost identical situation, the wall was fully repointed but some areas needed re-aligning. In this case the guy was removing sections of wall about a half square metre at a time and resetting the stones, he had the luxury of several tons of new stone for various walls being built so he could pick out a few more suitably sized stones.
In one area he took out a lot more stone than he wanted or intended but it was fairly near the top so no real danger of a major collapse.
In the area you have a problem it looks like you have a lot more smaller stones, particularly at the bottom.
Although it might be counter intuitive, I'd be inclined to start at the bottom and try to find some larger stones for here and there.
I think the shortest acro props available are about 1.2 mtrs, a couple of those using 'lazyboys' would make the job a lot safer and you can switch to taller acros as you go up.
I wouldn't think about the battering ram idea, potentially a lot more dangerous.
Are you using sand/cement or lime?

 

[Roy Bloom]

I wanted to avoid rebulding if possible. It's quite a time consuming job anyway, and my time here is limited. (and it's pouring down today)
According to my uncle, it's not feasible to just rebuild the outer skin, a whole lot of inner rubble will come down as well. The wall is about 80cm thick, at least, the visible outer skin is about 15cm.

I'm using Hydraulic lime (NHL 3.5) and sand (1:3)

 

[fillyboy]

I wanted to avoid rebulding if possible. It's quite a time consuming job anyway, and my time here is limited. (and it's pouring down today)
According to my uncle, it's not feasible to just rebuild the outer skin, a whole lot of inner rubble will come down as well. The wall is about 80cm thick, at least, the visible outer skin is about 15cm.

I'm using Hydraulic lime (NHL 3.5) and sand (1:3)

Lime complicates the issue because of the longer curing time.
Difficult one. Probably the best course of action would be to live with it and repoint as it is. I'd still be tempted to pull out a small bunch of those very small stones, rake out some infill and put in a few larger stones. To a larger area would take an age as you'd want the previous work to cure but it doesn't sound like you have the luxury of time.

 

[stuart45]

Rebuilding the outer skin may be possible depending on the way the wall is constructed. I've worked on quite a few walls like that, and rebuilding the outer stones was easier because the inner rubble fill was stabilised with lime mortar. It's often only the outer skin that fails.
NHL3.5 usually hardens quickly enough for this kind of work, provided it mixed up correctly.

 

[Roy Bloom]

Curing time isn't too bad at all.
I can usualy bash it with a churn brush after about 4 hours (depnding on the weather).
If I'm a bit pushed to try and finish a section at the end of the day, while it's still a bit too soft, I'll use a softer brush, a normal hand sweeping brush. It has the same effect of pushing the mortar into the joints, and leaving a more level and open finish.

I think the local custom round here is to give the mortar a slightly recessed look, but I'm settling for a flush finish, it's less time-consuming.
I've also settled for the natural finish because I don't have the luxury of time for carefully measured ingredients, although powdered dye is easily available round here.