Bricklaying - cement problem

[womble69]

I laid several courses of bricks some days ago. I'm not seeing any curing or drying taking place. No bloom, nothing. In fact, the cement is still sodden and appears to have turned to nothing more than wet sand.

I used the right mix, so what's gone wrong? The only thing I can think of is that the bag of cement that I used was a bit old. Does cement go bad?

 

[gingerbiscuit]

Cement sacks do have a use-by date printed on them, providing you store it well you can usually get away with going a little past this date, if moisture got into it prior to mixing it would tend to be obvious with lumps visible etc. Could also be frost causing a problem if you failed to cover the work.

 

[Doggit]

What mix did you use, and how wet was it, and what type of sand was used. I've used cement well past it's use by date, and find that as long as it hasn't gone solid, it'll usually mix up well - don't know what the long term situation is though.

 

[lostinthelight]

Two other things that will slow setting down are : Using bricks that are wet and sand that has a high clay content.
I bought sand direct from a river dredging company, it took three days to set and that was on internal walls.
litl

 

[oldbutnotdead]

And if it is really cold it'll delay curing. Hope you haven't done what I did a while ago (think a bag of dry premixed mortar was cement- mixed it up at 4:1, did 6 courses of a chimney, wondered why it was a bit soft, put my glasses on and looked at the bag again. Oops )

 

[theprinceofdarkness]

old cement goes off quickly.
Frank