Deteriorating bricks

bracine · January 22, 2007, 8:46pm

I was under the impression that spalling was when chunks of brick facing were dislodged. What is this cause of the powdery deterioration that is happening here. This is a 1920 foundation.

Thanks in advance.

ckratzer · January 22, 2007, 9:01pm

Brett,
If you do some research on how bricks are made and the materials used in making them ,you would find that all bricks are not created equally.
The bricks that you show are a very soft type , old , and this deteriation due to age is common.You could probably break one in two with your bare hands.
I don’t have any brick manufucturer links but I’m sure you can take it from here.

bracine · January 22, 2007, 9:27pm

Thanks Cheremie. I’ll Google it right now. Google seldom disappoints me.

dvalley · January 22, 2007, 10:27pm

Appears that that brick could use a nice parge coating of fresh mortar throughout the entire surface.

bsumpter · January 22, 2007, 11:23pm

Perhaps one or both of these links might help:

http://www.gobrick.com/

http://www.artobrick.com/ThinBrickMain.htm

bracine · January 22, 2007, 11:42pm

Thank you for the input gentlemen.

mcyr · January 23, 2007, 12:48am

You might want to read and enjoy this one.

http://geology.about.com/od/mineral_resources/a/bricks.htm

Marcel