Removing cement from brickwork

[Penners]

a home-made bick

Gervase - Mr Google tells me that a bick is a hotel group, a Danish professor, a charming lady who does bookbinding... and so on.

But none of these sounds particularly practical for use with a plugging chisel.

Could you please educate me? What's a bick?

 

[Gervase]

I'm surprised Google didn't help - a bick is a pointy thing. It's the name for the horn on an anvil, and for a small mortar pick (it probably has the same root as 'beak' and the French 'bec').

 

[NT]

The ones I prefer have a hood that is altered by a sprung clip rather than a screw or bolt as this allows for easy, quick altering of angle and cut.

I was curious about that bit, was nodding at everything else. Does yours have a hood that gets in the way sometimes? The cover only covers about half the disc on mine, so doesnt get in the way. The evil bits are always exposed.


NT

 

[Penners]

a bick is a pointy thing

Thank you for that.

Today hasn't been a waste - I've learned something.

 

[Lime]

The ones I prefer have a hood that is altered by a sprung clip rather than a screw or bolt as this allows for easy, quick altering of angle and cut.

I was curious about that bit, was nodding at everything else. Does yours have a hood that gets in the way sometimes? The cover only covers about half the disc on mine, so doesnt get in the way. The evil bits are always exposed.


NT

I suspect the convenience of altering the hood particularly appeals to me because I'm ambidextrous with an angle grinder although primarily left-handed in general.

 

[Penners]

I'm ambidextrous

Me too. Incompetent with either hand.

 

[middi]

Removing cement based pointing mortars from bricks originally bedded in lime mortar it is not too difficult, as long as it was pointed by a good bricklayer which didn't know what he was doing, any of the above described methods or a mixture of all will do the job. The neat edging left by this "good" bricklayer will not leave the bricks damaged.

The damage will occur when an incompetent bricklayer coupled with the fact that he didn't know what he was doing " grouted" the joints instead of pointing them.

To remove this type of pointing and not cause damage to the softer texture of the brickface would make any highly skilled restoring person look ambidextrous as Penners.

 

[Timw]

I fear that in this case the wall was 'grouted' rather than pointed. As a result there is cement smeared over the bricks above and below the joint! The bricks are soft, Norfolk reds so getting the cement off will be even harder.

Earlier Lime mentioned using a propriatary acid cement remover. Any more thoughts on that?

 

[Gervase]

Most builders' merchants sell it as 'brick acid' - it's hydrochloric acid, and will shift some cementitious mortar - it's often used for getting rid of buttering or smeared bits of pointing. It works best on newish mortar, but it's worth a try if only to clean up the bricks before you start. Don't let it anywhere near limestone, lime mortar or limewash, though, as it will be "fizz, fizz, bye bye"

 

[Timw]

Thanks Gervaise - and to everyone else who has contributed their wisdom on this.

Tim