Why was cement used?

[JHD]

I'm about to purchase my second wood framed house, the second a bit older than the first (C17 rather than C19). What I don't understand is why both of them have a cement render. Everything I've read suggests that lime renders are far superior, and both my structural surveys have suggested replacing the cement render with lime. Which leaves me wondering why cement was used in the first place? The house I'm currently buying was stripped to it's bare timbers in the 1980s, so the decision to use a cement render was made relatively recently.

Just wondering...

 

[Gareth Hughes]

Cheap, quick, miracle product, ignorant builder, owner and specifier, that's why, I'm afraid.

 

[Keithj]

What he said!

The main problem with cement is that it stops the timber from breathing. That may not be a killer if the timber has plenty of exposed surface, but if (as with our house) the timber is completely smothered in cement, then it will need to be removed PDQ.

There's a horror story of our house and the repairs we had to make at http://jillings.org/tudor - I hope yours isn't as bad!

 

[JHD]

Gareth - Thanks, I guess we're now quite fortunate to live in "the Information Age", websites one this wouldn't have existed 30 years ago.

Keith - Just looked at your photos, my last house was a little like that although not quite as bad, the worrying thing was that the previous owner was a builder who claimed to specialise in timber framed houses!

 

[Zebra]

Hello JHD. You're not related to our forum member DJH are you?
There are others on here with far more knowledge but I understand that the resurgence of interest and belief in lime as a credible, beneficial building product is quite recent, and even now, only amongst a relative minority. It would seem that for the larger part of the 20th century, cement was simply considered a superior product, and builders lost the skill of how to use lime and the understanding of its benefits. Even now if you asked your everyday normal house builder, he'd say "That wants a cement render that does!" My brother is a normal everyday house builder, and said to me exactly that. Thankfully, I have all of you to back me up, and I ignored him.
Were your structural surveyors particularly experienced with older buildings by chance?

Edit: Keith, I have seen your site before, but looking through it again I am so amazed at what you achieved, and in six months. I've done a fraction of that in three years!

 

[Keithj]

'Tis never ending, Zebra. The green oak has shrunk, and I've spent the last seven Mondays out with my little pot of lime filler doing all the gaps. We love the place, so it's all worth it.

Next week I may get out the limewash and start turning the white stripes pink

 

[Matt Green]

There's a horror story of our house and the repairs we had to make at http://jillings.org/tudor - I hope yours isn't as bad!

We don't know what this fluffy growth on the timber is, but we're not going to risk it. It's not oak, either.

They are the pupal cases of wax moths, Galleria mellonella. Just in case it was keeping you awake at night Keith.

 

[Penners]

ignorant builder, owner and specifier, that's why, I'm afraid.

Not so very long ago, there were others who were somewhat ignorant on this matter, too.

When I did by first period property repair on a 15th century timber-frame building, in the 1970s, I was told by the CO to use expanded metal lath and cement render. So I did.

 

[Keithj]

They are the pupal cases of wax moths, Galleria mellonella. Just in case it was keeping you awake at night Keith.

Well stone me! I'd never have known that, or whether we should worry. On the basis it didn't look right, and that bit of timber didn't look like oak anyway, we burned it and replaced it with green oak.

 

[Keith Bowman]

ignorant builder, owner and specifier, that's why, I'm afraid.

Not so very long ago, there were others who were somewhat ignorant on this matter, too.

When I did by first period property repair on a 15th century timber-frame building, in the 1970s, I was told by the CO to use expanded metal lath and cement render. So I did.

Me too (same CO, same village, similar house?) but, worse still, we carried on following that advice when we moved to our present house (Still in the 1970s). Undoing it all should keep me occupied till way past my centenary!

 

[Penners]

same village...?

Ridgewell?

 

[Keith Bowman]

same village...?

Ridgewell?

Indeed, the very place. Let's hope the CO, or his successor, has taken the lime lesson to heart!

 

[Penners]

I can't remember his name, but he used to wear a velvet jacket and a bowtie. His periodic "inspections" (yes, they did that in those days!), consisted of popping his head round the door, muttering, "yes, that all seems to be coming along nicely." He then retreated from the muck and bullets to our residential caravan in the garden to chat with Mrs P, who gave him tea and chocolate cake.

 

[jocelyn plummer]

Didn't you have kit kats in those days?

 

[LadyArowana]

Didn't you have kit kats in those days?

I thought you were supposed to keep the kit kats in reserve for the day that the Conservation Officer needs to be quickly distracted from seeing something he wouldn't like.

 

[Penners]

What?! Give the CO one of my precious Kit-Kats?!

Listed building consent is certainly not worth that!

 

[MatthewC]

What?! Give the CO one of my precious Kit-Kats?!

Listed building consent is certainly not worth that!

I think it could be; I never thought of bribery. I'm now sat here wondering for how long, if the requested LBC had been granted first time, I could have given the CO a daily Kit Kat and still spent less? I suspect the answer is about three or four years!