Glazing putty problem - gone gooey.

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Had a look at some windows a few days ago and they have a soft putty between the wood frame and the double-glaze glass, it’s the stuff you can mark with your nail. In places it’s going very soft, so you can smear it, it’s almost like it’s gotten soggy, the best way I can describe it would be melting chewing gum.

Is there anything I can do to replace it or repair it with?
 
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Very likely to be butyl putty as opposed to linseed putty, do the windows have double glazed units?
 
Hi yes they do, I’m on another job with the same stuff, it cannot handle a south facing front and that’s the big issue here, it’s pretty dire, oozing out of the space between the frame and glass, it really shouldn’t;t be used on a south facing front. although it’s behaving in a similar way on the east west and north sides but to a lesser extent, unfortunately most of the work is south facing. I have to trim it off and it’s just sticks to everything, wood, dust sheets, glass, fingers, scrapers, knives. I’ve found methylated spirit can unstick it from tools.
 
It is indeed butyl putty , probably Hodgson flexistrip. Biggest drawback of the stuff is if it gets really hot it sticks to everything. Without taking the dgus out there is nothing you can do. It is widely accepted as the correct way to put dgus in wooden frames ( a lot just use silicone instead!'). All I can suggest is a thin bead of clear silicone over the flexistrip once you've cut it back to try and stop it doing it again
 
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Yes seems to be the norm, just looked at my neighbours who has wooden windows and DGUS and his is doing the same thing.

I’ve been looking at the sealant putty in a tube and think I’m going to cut back the butyl putty, push it back with a lolly-stick (one of the most useful tools known to man lol!) and fill to the bead with Dry Seal MP or similar, it’s not cheap but neither is going back to a job to repair the damage melting putty will cause.

Not a fan of silicone, not much sticks to it and it’s hard to remove if it needs replacing.
 
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Uh oh. As per the thread I posted yesterday, I have Flexistrip to do a hardwood door. Luckily, it's north-facing, but still...
I really don't want to have to use silicone too.

Is there anything else I can do on installation to stop/minimise the melt please?

Has anyone used the foam (dry glazing) tape instead for timber windows? I would have chosen that, but the glass is uneven & I thought Flexistrip would cope better with that.
 
Hi Toria , The flexistrip moving isn't as common as you may think. If it does ' push /bubbel ' up , you could wait until a cooler day to cut back, it only gets horribly sticky in really warm conditions ( so don't leave leave it on the glass for very long if glazing on a hot day lol! ).
I have seen the foam strip used , personally I've never used it for glazing wooden frames though
 
Butyl putty shouldn’t be fitted to a south/south east facing elevation, it just isn’t up to the job, on the north face of the house its fine. Internally the butyl putty looks like porridge its really is dire.

Having said that the woodwork was poorly maintained and this was a major factor in the putty failing, its recommended to have at least 3 coats of paint/stain to contain it which it now has, also recommended a 2 year paint cycle to keep it tip top.

The foam strip again isn’t going to survive a south facing front but on a north side its fine, the only issue is choice of wood or plastic, the wood used on this house looks a bit like ramin, I think the problem here was a lack of paint to protect the edge and the wood expanded and bowed, this created gaps for the grime to get in which subsequently stuck to the adhesive surface. Once that happened it was an ever expanding problem and ultimately it failed

You have to be careful with hardwoods as they can be a bit greasy, if it is a hardwood, you might do well to coat the back edge you are going to stick the foam too with some aluminium primer first.
 
Butyl putty shouldn’t be fitted to a south/south east facing elevation, it just isn’t up to the job, on the north face of the house its fine. Internally the butyl putty looks like porridge its really is dire..


That is your opinion. Butyl putty strip from Hodgsons sealants very rarely suffers from this so it may have been a different product..again I've never seen the double sided foam fail in a similar fashion and go ' gooey ' . I suspect poor maintenance and cleaning to be more of an issue here than the materials used to fit the sealed unit
 
Its not an opinion, it is fact, the failure of the product is exacerbated in part because of poor maintenance as mentioned above but if a product just turns into sticky chewing gum when located in a full sun south face, a few layers of paint microns thick isn’t going to stop it melting nor contain it. I also have another house with a similar issue but that house is better maintained but the butyl putty is still oozing out on the south facing windows.

re the foam I think the wood is more to blame than anything, just a poor choice of material for the fake beading, it was a job I wasn’t expecting to do but when you start sanding a bead and it falls off there is not much you can do. I'd cleaned the windows prior to applying the bead with two strips of the adhesive strip but how long it will last is a moot point. I suggested replacing the wood beading with plastic or an engineered product of some description, something that wouldn’t warp or twist out of shape.
 

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