This is the upper half of the back of our house as it was a few weeks ago.
The
pebbledash is covering everything. Not many builders want to attempt to remove it with the soft yellow brick underneath.
At this point the specialists Nigel has found have scraped off the
pebbledash, have begun to sand down the surfaces, have replaced broken or damaged bricks, and have scraped out the pointing between the bricks.
A closer view. You can also see they have two patches where they given us an option of two types of pointing finish.
The one on the left is a ribbon pointing which sticks out farther than the brick and considered very fancy. The one on the right is a flush finish and cheaper. We'll take the one on the right, please! The pointing has to be replaced about every 10 years.
And now you can see the finished wall. It is beautiful. Next we will have the windows replaced tomorrow and the rendering put back around the windows, and painted white.
What a difference! You can see the bricks are still rough about 4 bricks below the larger window. The new extension's roof will slant up to that point. Now our house looks like the spanking nice house compared to the neighbours!
The pebbledash is covering everything. Not many builders want to attempt to remove it with the soft yellow brick underneath.
At this point the specialists Nigel has found have scraped off the pebbledash, have begun to sand down the surfaces, have replaced broken or damaged bricks, and have scraped out the pointing between the bricks.
A closer view. You can also see they have two patches where they given us an option of two types of pointing finish.
The one on the left is a ribbon pointing which sticks out farther than the brick and considered very fancy. The one on the right is a flush finish and cheaper. We'll take the one on the right, please! The pointing has to be replaced about every 10 years.
And now you can see the finished wall. It is beautiful. Next we will have the windows replaced tomorrow and the rendering put back around the windows, and painted white.
What a difference! You can see the bricks are still rough about 4 bricks below the larger window. The new extension's roof will slant up to that point. Now our house looks like the spanking nice house compared to the neighbours!
13 comments:
Oooooo niiiiiiice!!!
Thanks, L!
Hi, I found your blog while googling about the topic because I want to have my pebble dash removed. Who did your house? How did you choose the company? Thanks!
Mahon did our pebble dash removal. We found them on line and went to see several houses that they had done to see what their work was like. We were very impressed and hired them to do our.
Some things we didn't know. They sand the bricks down to look new although they were in good shape when they removed the pebbledash. They only have two pointing methods and our lower extension was done in "weather struck" which Mahon did not do.
We are very happy with our results.
http://www.mahonbrickwork.co.uk/
Thanks. Do they also seal the bricks when they're done? If so, what kind of seal do they use? Did you consider other companies?
No, I don't think they sealed the bricks after. We had a really good brick layer for our lower extension that said that wasn't necessary. But you could ask them to if that is something you want. It is worth a call.
I am not sure we found many other companies (my husband did the searching and he is extremely thorough and meticulous), and this one had several places they had done local to us that we could view. We were happy with the work and their price.
The owner is something of an expert in original restoration and has trained his men extremely well. The pebble dash was chiselled off by hand, then each brick sanded down, the broken ones replaced, then the pointing replaced. It took about a week for the upper half of the back of our house and they were clean and considerate of the neighbours the entire time (even taking a ladder and sweeping their upper window sills).
Mahon also do all other building work and are interested in building using original materials (unlike many builders). But they get most of their work doing pebble dash removal since it is a speciality that not many builders want to touch (as we found out). We had already contracted other builders for our extension when we found Mahon.
Having said all of that...it didn't look that hard to do and I think builders avoid it just because it is an unknown to them. I figure I could have chiselled the stuff off myself and then hired someone to repoint.
I asked about sealing because I got a quote from another company which mentions they seal the bricks, and I read somewhere that this could cause some problems later on, depending on what is used for sealing. I'm still waiting for Mahon to get back to me with a quote. Thanks!
Update: I got a quote from Mahon, which was very high so I took it to mean that they don't want to come to North London. I went with Apollo Stone http://www.apollostone.co.uk/
and they did a great job, removing the pebbledash on Friday and sanding it today. The house looks fantastic. Later this week they will repoint and seal it. I'm very very happy!
That's fantastic. I remember it was so nice to finally see it gone. Out of curiosity, what sort of pointing did they offer?
They said they will use a lime mix, and we spoke about which color to use. They said since I have many red bricks it would be best to use gray rather than yellow. They didn't say anything about styles of pointing, and I didn't ask because, like you, I think flush is fine.
Thanks. I am glad it all worked out for you.
Thanks for your blog. I am going to get mine removed from either mahon or apollo.
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