Removing Garden Floor/patio area and exposed foundations

[gordongriscti]

Hello,

After thinking this job would be quite easy, I find myself stuck, in that I removed the concrete floor connecting to the back of the house.

This then exposed 2 lines of bricks below the damp proof (Black Paint).

I am eventually going to do some decking there but what should I do with the brick work, sand & cement/render or leave it. I was told I can leave it but am worried if the ground now gets too wet we could suffer subsidance.

Any advice welcome

Gordon

 

[r896neo]

You can leave it. The bricks below dpc are designed to be constantly damp and not suffer too badly.

IT sounds like you have done the right thing as concrete being level with your dpc could have caused you damp problems.

Don't be concerned with subsidence. Its not an issue unless you start channeling lots of water towards the building, and even then its only possible with other factors adding in.

Basically speaking the ground should fall away from the house and your finished patio/ earth level should be 150mm below your dpc.

Decking can come up level with the dpc but should be spaced off the wall by 10mm preferably.

 

[gordongriscti]

Funny you should say that about damp problems in our house, we do suffer especially in the kitchen cabinets, the older ones stink, we moved in recently and are trying to make the damp situation better with new windows and generally better ventilation around the house.

Just another question, where is the actual dpc level, would it be at the top of the black line (highest point of the black paint) or does it vary? An old house by the way.

My knowledge of the dpc is poor and we have about a 2 foot high of black paint going around the base of the house.

 

[r896neo]

If its very old it may not even have one or it may have failed. We would need at the very least a few photo's.

 

[gordongriscti]

Here are a few pictures of the back of my house. You can see the dpc, and where the brickwork has been exposed, how far down do you think the foundations actually go?

I have added a bit of ballast and cement on the floor towards the back of the house so there is more of a run off as we left the ground too level and didn't want too much water accumulating there.

So, does the pictures look ok so we can just add shingle to level out the ground to start decking?

Untitled

• gordongriscti
• 23 Jul 2013
• 1

Untitled

• gordongriscti
• 23 Jul 2013
• 1

 

[Pigeon85]

Can't help with the damp coarse situation but as for your decking there would be no need to level out the whole area, just lay slabs about 1.5 metres apart to get your level then put the decking onto them. The decking will then be elevated off ground level allowing the water to just run away underneath.