On this page I want to write a few words about the wet house editing, so that you can cope alone or with my help with a very serious problem, which is moisture with the consequences of mold and fungus in your asylum, which is also a home for your family. I am not a writer and I do not want to be smart and convince you to make any decision regarding the drying of the house, I am not going to usurp this kind of powers. You will do what you want with these patterns and if you are not interested in this topic then stop reading and cleer from memory what you have read so far and block the address of my site. There are thousands of pages, like mine on the web, so there are many with education. Still, thank you for reaching this place and good luck.
It was at the beginning and now I wanted to describe my first serious job draining a historic tenement house in the suburbs of Katowice. The city is located in southern Poland in a very industrialized region. My uncle's friends bought this property along with a large garden on a small hill. Uncle knew that my interests were focused on dehumidifying the house, because I grew up in a 150-year-old house , and as it good happened now, I positively experienced various methods of removing moisture from homes.
My uncle told the new house owners that I was able to dry my family home.
The new owners of the tenement house turned to me for help in draining their new facility. I agreed and went to Katowice, I spent 3 or 4 days there to diagnose the problem, the house was wet like a bath sponge. There were about two centimeters of water in the basement, condensation was pouring from the walls, the walls were covered with mold and fungus in 90%. It stank of mold, disgusting rat marks were visible, the wet environment is home to rats. It was over 30 years ago, there were no meters for measuring humidity or other devices except thermometers for temperature and the machines were only fans.
Moisture is a gas that consists of air and water. The optimum water content in the gas should be between 40% - 60% of the amount of water in the air. Below 40% is the so-called dry air, a normal person feels the craving for drinking in such a room, his nostrils dry, the easiest way in such a room is to leave a container with water. Water evaporates and mixes with air.
However, if the humidity is above 60% it is the first warning signal that something is not going well with the humidity in the facility. Clothes start to get damp, windows are often covered with dew, in the lower part of the walls and most often in the corners, moist spots first appear, after a while there is a visible coating on these spots which is called mold and in the worst period of the problem mushrooms begin to grow. I describe it for this, because living in damp conditions by people or animals is a disaster, it is a delayed ignition bomb and can threaten staying in mold with the consequences of death or permanent damage to health. But I don't want to scare you, I'm here to help you and that's why this site was created.
Returning to the wet house in Katowice and my research towards liquidation of water from the walls and basement. This work was simple, it turned out that for a long time the gutters were damaged and also the rainwater drainage was now . There was also a broken roof.
Rainwater poured down the walls to the stone foundations of the basement. However, from the roof around the chimney the water soaked the internal walls.
It was necessary to fix it all and drain the rainwater first. It required a lot of time and the investment was financially conditioned, because it was an expensive implementation. After a year I returned to Katowice and started draining the house. First, I installed the appropriate fans in the basement that blew moisture and dirt. And in the above-ground part of the tenement house, on sunny and not humid days, I recommended to carry out a draft. At night, the windows and doors had to be closed because no moisture was allowed to enter.
The problem was with the walls around the chimneys because soot absorbs water and does not release it, but I will write about it in another post, because heavy industry and car exhaust fumes are an additional pest for homes.
Currently, to accelerate drying and cleaning, fans are also needed, but now we additionally use microwave dehumidifiers, special dehumidifiers, and ionizers which are combined into electronic sensors and controllers. Because the devices must not allow the point of dew condensation, condensation, overheating of the wall and, above all, capillary corridors in the walls and cannot allow moist outside air into the interior, it is not allowed to heat damp rooms and walls. I will also write about all this in the future.
I must also mention here the salinity of the capillary corridors in of the walls. This is a very long and time-consuming neutralization process. The reason for salinity is a bad environment, most often it is visible near roads and industrial factories.
Almost the next year has passed, i.e. two years of work on one property. There were no more rats in the house and basement, they didn't stink from the basement walls I removed old and dead dead mushrooms, mold residues. At that time I used a hand-held wire brush, it was not possible to use wire grinders to avoid inhaling the remains of fungus and mold. Currently, I use a pressure sandblasting method to clean the walls. Mortar losses between foundation stones have been I supplemented with lime mortar mixed with sand, under no circumstances should cement be used. Then, after an additional drying period, I covered the wall with slaked lime for maintenance with a brush.
The period of this service was over 3 years and so far it has been a similar time for building drainage.
The longer the water failure in the home lasts, the longer the drying takes, so you should control the humidity level in residential homes for people and animals. Modern drying technology should not be used in old and historic buildings and, above all, under no circumstances should old and historic walls see cement or gypsum. We use lime and sand for old buildings.
You do not have to adapt to my experience or read about my experience and use my services if you are not interested, just erase from memory what you have read so far and delete the address of this page.
Because this site is not intended to force anyone to any action. But it has a hint for those who love a clean, dry and flawless home.