Garden Wall falling apart!

[girlinabox]

Hello everyone,

Hope you can help me out with a bit of advice...

I don't have a clue when it comes to anything like DIY and the likes but I'm trying (thanks to a lot of information on here!!) so be kind

Anyway, we are trying to sort out our house at the moment but as my OH lost his job a weej after Xmas we can't afford to pay someone who knows what they are doing, so we are attempting things ourselves. Our wall outside is covered in this thick white stuff which is crumbling off - is it render? No idea! Anyway, as you can see from the photos it looks horrendous, and we wondered if we could just chip it all off using a hammer and a chisel or something? It is literally falling off when you look at it! What we are worried about, though, is the state of the wall underneath. I.e. if we take this stuff off and the walls are 'exposed to the elements' the wall will come down! I mean, it looks solid enough but some of the plaster between the bricks is gone..

Eventually when the OH gets back into work we will most likely pay for someone to demolish and build a new one but that could be months away and we'd like to get some work done ASAP.

Hope this makes sense and I hope to hear from you Thank you.

 

[merlin50]

clean it off and repoint wall job done

 

[girlinabox]

Re-point?

 

[merlin50]

http://www.dummies.com/how-to/content/how-to-repoint-a-brick-wall.pageCd-storyboard,pageNum-1.html

 

[girlinabox]

Thank you. This looks...dare I say it...relatively easy. Easy but imagine it's a big job!

 

[girlinabox]

Hello, thanks for previous replies but I have another question...

What should I do about the parts where some of the brick has also come out? I made a start yesterday (I have blisters on my hands to prove it!) and some of the bricks did crumble a little and on one part some of the brick came out.

Any advice apreciated.
Also, once it is all done would I need to treat the wall with anything to protect it?

TIA.

 

[girlinabox]

Additional pics uploaded