Damp internal wall between kitchen and dining room

[Fishwalker]

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We fitted a new kitchen in 2015 into our 1908 mid terrace and the room needed some serious attention to rotten floorboards and joists, which we resolved.

I also did some work under the floor in the adjoining dining room in 2012 installing insulating foil using a staple gun to the joists. At that time i recall being able to see through an air brick into the kitchen.

Also on the other side of the wall to where this persistent damp patch is, is a radiator, installed in 2013 at the same time as a new boiler by a gas safe company. Paint is firmly adhered on that side.

The kitchen is on a lower level than the dining room.

When we did the kitchen, there was existing damp in that area but it was pretty much ripped out back to brick to install new electrics (may be photos in my album of that).

To fill in the resulting hole, my OH used bonding plaster and then within a couple of days, a skim coat, before a proper plasterer skimmed the whole wall for us, despite me thinking it would take weeks to dry out and saying so (but i was very pregnant and we needed it finishing).

Ever since we've periodically (every few months) had to deal with flaking paint on this part of the wall, which travels just behind the fridge side.

It looks so horrible, bubbling, dampish to touch right at the bottom left near the door. We've tried zinnser bin 123 paint.

His dad just wants us to foil over this and paint on top as that's what they did in his day! (Eye roll).

I don't think the radiator is leaking, as there is no pressure dip in the boiler.

To get back under the sub floor now would take ripping up boards inside the stair cupboard, as the dining room floor is sanded now and no hatch.

Just wanted people's thoughts on how to attack this. Thanks!

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[Fishwalker]

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Found these of the kitchen in progress from 2013

 

[chris1982]

When you had the floorboards out, did you see something like a piece of slate between the brick courses below the joists? If there is nothing like this, and no other DPM, there might be some damp rising from the ground, which might not evaporate quickly on the side with the radiator but not on the other.

 

[bobasd]

on the side of the wall with the radiator is ther a chimney breast or was ther one?can you do a photo of the rad area at skirtin level?

you have a step-down into the kitchen. both rooms are suspended floors. is the terrace on a slope?
how much through ventilation is going into the kitchen underfloor?how many air brcks front and back?
you did some work on the kit joists at that damagedwall,did you do any work on the other room joists the other side of the wall?

the skirtin should be removed from that kit wall andthe damaged plaster should be hacked off to brick.
whats happenin behind the wood step arrangement?

can you do a photo at ground lavel of the backyard inside corner where the kit wall meets the main house?

 

[Fishwalker]

Hi again all. Warning - this is a long in-depth post. Read at your peril! But hopefully give good detail of the problem.

I've not gotten around to replying due to being a parent to a constantly 'on one' three year old girl. As such nothing has gotten done re: the damp.

Recently we decided we wanted to sell our house and are trying to do outstanding DIY jobs, e.g. paint dried-out damp patches that we've had repaired etc.

Coming back to this damp monsterosity, I'm really worried now.

I finally got under the floor boards today in the adjacent dining room behind the affected wall and discovered the likely reason for the damp.

There is a physical damp course on which sits what looks like a 1" high by 'brick width' plank of wood.

I'm assuming because there is a vertical 1" piece of wood attached at some point to this horizontal piece of wood - rising above, that this was to attach the skirting board and was installed when the house was built in 1906.

Anyway this wood is rotten and spongey below the damp patch on the other side of the wall. I can push my nails in and took a piece of that out in my hand.

I also borrowed my mum's damp detector thing and it beeps off the scale at certain points along both sides of this internal wall. But some points are dry along the skirting so it is localised.

I did note that the pipe to the radiator touches the brick, as does a shielded electric cable, but the water pipe is dry and no drop in pressure has been noted in the boiler.

This radiator did spew water out of the pipe - soaking the wall when my OH removed it to replace 4 years ago, so it could have soaked the wood then but not conclusively.

I also had to remove some very worrying expanding foam that I'd sprayed in that area 5 years ago, when I installed/stapled special insulating foil blanket to the joists, below the dining room's original floorboards. The foam was to stick the blanket to the wall and I did that due to the cold drafts coming up in Winter.

I wish so much we'd just laid underlay and forked out for engineered wood as I did my back in too but you live and learn - a lot it seems!

So I may have blocked an airbrick in this area (not sure as haven't got under there fully yet but today I spent an hour tediously pulling away all this foam from the wall and pipes (sore thumb nails now). It was touching above and below the damp proof course.

Could expanding foam bridge the course? It was dry but very brittle like cinder toffee around an old decommissioned gas pipe.

I've sent a query to a local damp proofing company who did a survey in 2010 of the kitchen.

In the survey they stated we should have chemical damp proofing fluid injected around the entire perimeter of the kitchen, despite not knowing if there was a physical damp course in place, as we'd not done under floor investigations then. I we suspicious of the advice so didn't go ahead, as it seemed like a 'catch all' remedy.

They advised hacking off plaster to 1.2m and injecting before re-instating new plaster and quoted then £768 + VAT for the whole kitten perimeter.

We couldn't afford it either and did our own work years later before installing a new kitchen, e.g. replaced a rotten joist at the other end of the kitchen and floorboards.

So I'm babbling everything I've learnt in the hope that someone might understand and know how to tackle this quickly, so we can get the house valued and on the market.

I was going to just foil over the damp patches in the kitchen with Three in One Anderton foil lining paper I've seen on eBay. My father in law and mum say this is what people used to do in the old days. (Great!)

Otherwise the wall paint is holding fine to the wall on the dining room side.

My 'bodge it' hubby still wants to line it and make it disappear but if we sell, it will likely be found and I am an honest sort of person who is proud of our little first house, despite buying it with loads of bodges that we had to deal with, and for 100% more than the last family did.

I want to note that there is no real damp smell. There are no notable salt deposits above the skirting. There is no mould or mildew. The floorboards are firm and it doesn't appear to be causing structural issues but what will this rotten wood do in the long term?

Also can it be hacked out and replaced?
Should it be?
Can it be injected with rot sealer instead? I used it on a garden bench once.
I want to protect the kitchen lino as it's stuck down and was £180. But the dining room floorboards can be lifted.
I assume I'd need to get the radiator taken off the wall again and my OH won't do it so do I need a plumber separately to do that?
Do I need a joiner to remedy the rotten wood?
Can a damp proofing company do everything including removing the skirting that is probably original?


I really don't want to risk selling for less than we've paid at the height of the bubble in 2007, plus all the work we've done so don't want this damp to be a bargaining tool to buyers.

Anyway now you can watch more babbling via my 2GB video I've uploaded to YouTube for lovely visuals!

 

[Fishwalker]

on the side of the wall with the radiator is ther a chimney breast or was ther one?can you do a photo of the rad area at skirtin level?

you have a step-down into the kitchen. both rooms are suspended floors. is the terrace on a slope?
how much through ventilation is going into the kitchen underfloor?how many air brcks front and back?
you did some work on the kit joists at that damagedwall,did you do any work on the other room joists the other side of the wall?

the skirtin should be removed from that kit wall andthe damaged plaster should be hacked off to brick.
whats happenin behind the wood step arrangement?

can you do a photo at ground lavel of the backyard inside corner where the kit wall meets the main house?

A photo of the drain that is next to this internal wall, which lies to the left.

There are three air bricks to the external wall at a right angle to the affected internal wall and two at the end of the kitchen extension. There is one under the kitchen/dining room door /wall, with one below the window and a large old gas vent near the window too.

The damp proofing company advised inserting 5 additional air bricks in 2010 but we didn't go ahead with that as felt there was enough air flow.

 

[Fishwalker]

Just had a thought after reading some forum posts.

Could the damp have been caused by us regularly drying clothes on the radiator in the dining room side of the wall (during Cold months (not in recent hot weather), as well as the radiator in the kitchen (albeit not on the same wall)?

If water vapour from said clothes sinks, could it fall behind, or be absorbed by the skirting board below and this have traveled into the horizontal wood above the DPC below?

We have a good dehumidifer with Ioniser that I've had on since last night and the damp patch that appeared in a day - floating above the lower patch has almost dried out.

That day before, I had left a wet pair of jeans on the nearby radiator.

Should I in any case, now the wood is wet on the internal wall below the floor, try and gouge it out with a tool and fill it in with a product devised for this?

Or can I paint on wood hardener and hope it penetrates enough to harden right through the plank?

I don't want to make the house fall down!

 

[foxhole]

Drying clothes indoors is never a good idea, causes damp and condensation.
You say it is internal wall ? But is the kitchen an extension to rear?

 

[Fishwalker]

The kitchen is a 2 storey connected via a lead valley to the main building. All the terraces down here are the same, some with additional ground floor extensions.

We had our valley replaced a couple of years ago.

I had another look tonight and the floorboards look fine underneath and joists not bad for possibly 112 years old. No movement in them.

Wondering at what point something becomes an issue to repair, regarding selling the house, as this rot on this wood 'could' simply be wear and tear and part and parcel of an old house? It is only an inch in height.

Also a radiator has been there well before we bought it so clothes will have been dried with possible dripping water for decades! Then there's streaming the floor occasionally!

Could it be treat with anti fungal wood hardener if no spread of rot is found?

It looks like it will be hard to dig out the wood when it's under so much pressure but then you redo pointing or replace bricks.

 

[Fishwalker]

 

[bobasd]

your posts seem to be all over the show - for me anyway.i dont understand the video or whats been done an what needs doin?

the photo of the yard gulley shows pipes that should be discharging straight down through the gulley grill not sideways an anywhere.
the blck bitumen painted plinth an the two levels of DPC chemical injection holes means that damp is a historic problem.thers also a vertical line of injection holes.
an your damp guy was proposin another line of holes?

wheres the original DPC line or lines in them two walls?

the air brick seems to be to high to vent below a suspended floor.
you need lots of through ventilation under the kitchen and through the main house.

the boards an joists in the last pic dont look to be over 100 yrs old.

you dont show the rot you complain of so i cant say anythin except hardener is useless for your probs ..

whats happened with the exposed pipe and cables at the door threshold?

 

[blup]

It's not a case of fair wear and tear, rot is rot, damp is damp: your buyers' solicitors will ask about this, and the survey should pick it up.

Looks like many attempts over the years to treat it.

Best get the damp proofing company to quote and fix it, you can then honestly say to potential buyers it's been addressed.

Blup

 

[foxhole]

You need to look up not down , likely the gulley at roof is overflowing or is not fixed deep enough into wall allowing rain to soak down to ground floor where it hits the dpc and takes the easiest route out ( inside the property ).
I would avoid damp company at all costs as it always results in unnecessary work and costs .

 

[cdbe]

Either get it sorted properly - but I can't see how you could do this without getting under the kitchen floor to find and treat the cause (although many companies seem quite happy to inject a chemical dpc above the skirting boards - maybe they think it'll percolate down the 10 inches or so to below the joists/wall plate where it should be?).

Alternatively, remove the skirting, including that bit under the door and glue on a length of uPVC soffit from Eurocell then half tile the wall above it using a cement based waterproof adhesive. Then sell it!

 

[Fishwalker]

The air bricks within the bituminous paint on the outside drain pic are below the kitchen floor level.

The brown vent you can just make out is below a suspended wooden floor and is like a periscope, in that it goes diagonally so that inside it is above the floor, serving as a gas vent for when there was a gas fire in the chimney that has since been removed and capped off.

The gas pipe and services in the pic of the non skimmed kitchen wall were repositioned.

The gas pipe removed professionally.

The electric cables run under the floor and go vertically up to the plug socket on the affected wall and on towards the external wall adjacent for the electric oven and hob etc.

The damp is defo not coming from above gully or valley. New facias were put on a couple of years ago when a new lead valley was put in.

This corner outside is prone to damp as it doesn't get much sunlight. The pipes could do with planning inside the strain bit OH won't do it. Says they're fine.

Damp proof company have quoted a total of £780 Inc VAT.

This includes: hack off plaster to 1m on kitchen internal wall and dining room internal wall part way to window, were their damp meter was going crazy (I'm aware that they are to measure wood damp not plaster).

Then they propose to inject chemical dpc £150 again, re-plaster with renovation plaster.

Also removing rotten pan wood I saw beneath the floor in dining room sitting on the original poured bitumen dpc that is in good shape. £90

They also plan to inject and tank both sides of the chimney were they also say the wall is damp, as again the meter stick thingy was going crazy and there is a tiny piece of unstuck wallpaper on the right hand side.

Oh and £70 to remove and refit the radiator in the dining room and £50 to do same with skirting boards.

I'm now worried about the amount of dust this plaster removal will make with my 3 year old around and the damage it will do to the decor and everything being covered in dust!

Considering fixing rotten pan wood, which I believe is below the damp patch causing that and re-plastering kitchen wall only.