After damp
Replastering after damp on the Wirral
The plastering half of a damp job: salt damaged plaster taken off and the wall rebuilt properly, after somebody else has dealt with the cause.
- Written quote
- Drying days given up front
- Floors covered first
Replastering after damp
We are the second trade on this job, not the first
This page is deliberately not about damp proofing. Damp proofing is a different trade and we do not do it. What we do is the part that comes afterwards, and it is the part that decides whether the repair holds or whether you are looking at the same tide mark in a year.
The usual story is the bottom metre of a hall or front room wall: blown plaster, a tide mark, paper lifting, a powdery white bloom. That is generally salts carried through the brick by moisture and left behind in the plaster when the water evaporates. Salts are hygroscopic, which means they pull moisture out of the air on their own, so they keep a wall looking damp long after the original cause is gone, and they come straight through new plaster that has not been specified for them.
So the order is fixed and it is not negotiable. The cause gets dealt with by whoever is doing that work. The wall is stripped back well above the visible damage, because the salts go further than the stain. The wall is left to dry, which takes as long as it takes. Then it is replastered on a sand and cement render coat with a salt retardant and a finish over it, rather than gypsum straight onto brick. Skip any of those and the job comes back. Often asked about alongside polished and venetian plaster, plastering and skimming.
Get a price for the replastering
Someone else's work, and it has to be done and dried before we start. We will not plaster over an untreated wall.
Salts travel further than the mark you can see. Stripping to the tide line is the most common reason this fails twice.
A render coat with a salt retardant, not gypsum onto brick. This is the difference between a repair and a delay.
Done across Birkenhead, and everywhere else on the peninsula.
Replastering after damp on the Wirral
What this job looks like
Example images of the kind of work described, each one labelled as such. They are not photographs of our own jobs and nothing here is borrowed from anybody else's. Our own photographs go in as jobs are finished and customers are happy for us to use them.
Why people use us
Why the drying time is in the quote
A wall that is replastered before it has dried traps the moisture behind the new finish, and you get the same call next winter.
- We will say if the cause has not been dealt with
- Stripped back above the visible damage
- Drying time stated as its own part of the programme
- Render coat with salt retardant, specified in writing
Frequently asked questions
Replastering after damp: the questions people ask
The ones that come up most. If yours is not here, ring and ask.
Do you do damp proofing as well?
No. It is a different trade and we would rather tell you that than take the whole job. We do the replastering that follows it, which is the half that most often gets done badly.
Can you just replaster over it and see?
No. New plaster on an untreated or undried wall blows again and the salts come through the new finish, usually within a year. That is not a careful answer, it is the only one that works.
How long does the wall need to dry?
It depends on how wet it got, how thick the wall is and the time of year, and it is measured in weeks rather than days. Anybody who gives you a fixed number without seeing it is guessing. We will tell you what we are looking for rather than inventing a date.
Why strip higher than the damp mark?
Because the salts travel further up the wall than the moisture stain shows. Stripping only to the visible tide mark leaves salt in the plaster just above the repair, and that is where it reappears.
Done across Birkenhead, and everywhere else on the peninsula.
Tell us where you are in the process
Whether the damp has been treated yet changes the answer completely, so it is the first thing worth saying.
About Wirral Plastering
How the work is actually organised
Wirral Plastering takes the job as main contractor and puts the labour on it. That means one person quotes it, one person is answerable for it, and you are not chasing three numbers to find out who is coming on Tuesday.
It is worth saying plainly rather than implying a van and a family name, because the way a job is run changes what you can expect from it. What you get is a written scope, a date, and somebody whose problem it is if the date moves.
What we will tell you we are not
Damp proofing is a different trade and so is stone repair, and both come up constantly on Wirral housing. We do the plastering that follows damp work and the lime render that sits around stone, and we will tell you when the thing you are describing needs somebody else first.
Structural work is the same. A crack that runs in a line rather than a map pattern is not a plastering question and filling it is not an answer.
No photographs of our work, and why the site says so
There are no job photographs on this site. The slots are placeholders and they are labelled as placeholders. Nothing here is a stock picture presented as a job and nothing is borrowed from another company's gallery.
Real photographs go in as jobs are finished and customers are happy for us to use them, and not before. The same goes for anything that looks like a customer quote. There is a section built and ready for them, switched off, and it stays that way until there are real ones with permission attached.
Get in touch
Tell us what the wall or ceiling is doing and roughly how much of it there is. A photograph on the form answers half the questions before anybody rings you back.
- Phone0151 453 8836
- Emailcontact@wirralplastering.com
- WhatsAppSend us a photo of the job
- Based inWirral, Merseyside
- HoursMon to Fri 8 to 6, Sat 8 to 2, closed Sunday