cracks in new brickwork

[ozwinner]

Just seen your pictures, and what you have there is a cut flush or brushed finish, cheap and nasty.
You seem to have a settlement zig zag crack.

The other cracks on the soldier course are due to excessive pressure used by the brick cleaner on his pressure washer, time and time again Im called back to fix this "problem", when brickwork was washed by hand before the lazy bastards started to us pressure washers I never had this problem.

Al

[Groggy]

I know nothing about brickwork, but that whole job looks shoddy to me. There are gaps in the mortar and the bricks are uneven in two planes.

[ozwinner]

I know nothing about brickwork, but that whole job looks shoddy to me. There are gaps in the mortar and the bricks are uneven in two planes.

Ok just relooked at the pics as a whole rather than at the cracks, and apart from the acid wash down its the sort of finish I would leave for a render job.

Al

[Theremin]

Is it just me, or are some of these mortar joints a bit thin?

[manoftalent]

If it is a concern to you on the way it looks, try roughing it over with an old coldchisel to get rid of any excess mortar ...its a little time consuming as in do it by hand not with a hammer ....then use some bag mortar mix from your local hardware shop and tidy it up .....in general time costs money and you pay for what you get ....on a bright note the wall looks solid enough and wont fall down and due to the unseasonal heat we have had it is normal to "see" some shrinkage in new work, you may see hairline cracks ....most of them are external.....really poor work goes all the way to the other side ....check both sides of the work and if your concerned talk to the builder, if still unsatisfied ....then the logical coarse would be to seek a second opinion......if it were me ......I would do as previously suggested and start cleaning, with a mental note to make sure that next time the builder understands what I wanted the final finish to be .....



we all make mistakes .......it how we learn from them that counts.

[TARLOX]

Is this a join between new and existing brickwork?

[contrebasse]

No its all new work. I'll think I'll take manoftalents advice and consider any fault that goes right through to be unacceptable. Anything that appears dodgy but does not go through i may complain about but resign myself to fixing myself ...

An interior dividing wall was built by the same tradesmen, and one face looked OK, but the other face was so starved of mortar I could stick my finger in the cracks. i complained about that and they filled the cracks, but not before they observed "it's going to be covered up so its not a problem". Maybe so, but I don't think it takes that much extra effort to ensure there's good mortar coverage.

[ozwinner]

Is it just me, or are some of these mortar joints a bit thin?

Tolerance for joints is nominal 10mm, + or - 3mm.

Al