brick veneer Archives - Charles Buell Consulting LLC

Walking under ladders could be the least of your problems

Being afraid to walk under ladders is a superstition that I would bet very few builders have.

They walk under ladders all the time.

In fact, most builders think ladders are recreational equipment—-at least we did in the early days of my building career—-prior to when I had employees—-prior to the watchful eyes of OSHA.

Since we were already climbing all over houses anyway, it was only natural that the apparatus that enabled us to climb all over houses would themselves become a means of amusement and entertainment as comfort levels with their use increased.

Not only did we walk under ladders, we would climb up the ladders on the underside of the rungs as well as slide down the ladders without the rungs. We would increase the extension of the ladders while we were still on them and think nothing of standing on the top of a step ladder—-you know the place where it says “DO NOT STAND” in big red letters—-we would do these things AS IF IT WERE NORMAL.

These methods of ladder use were never shown on the ladder safety instructions and of course today these practices would likely get a person fired. But this would have been in the good old days of building—-and one of the fringes of being self employed—-back when building houses was dangerous and sex was safe—-now it is the other way around.

This little conversation and reminiscing is all about getting us to the point of the post’s title. But the question has a caveat.

Would you rather walk under a ladder or use this front entryway every day?

Charles Buell, Real Estate Inspections in Seattle

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Figuring out cracks in brick veneer can be an adventure.

During my first walk around the exterior of this home, I noticed a fairly typical diagonal crack running from the base of the chimney upward at about a 30 degree angle. When we find such a crack, we usually look for a corresponding crack. In this case I expected to find another crack (or cracks) somewhere along the same side of the house. When the plane of the brick work is broken up by windows, steps in the foundation and areas of different kinds of siding, there are weak points that are likely points of cracking—or can “replace” the corresponding cracks we would be looking for.

This first picture shows the location of the crack highlighted in red.

Here is a close-up of the area showing the obvious crack.

A close-up of the crack in the brick veneer

From a distance, there really was not a whole lot jumping out at me to explain this crack. No visible cracks in the foundation—-no gaping separations anywhere. One thing is for sure in this scenario: “She’ll be coming round the corner when she comes.” As I rounded the corner to the back of the house (to the right in the picture), this is what I saw.

“Hecka-crack”

So now we have to go back to the side view to help with the explanation.

In this picture if we make point “A” stationary and the entire foundation settles along its length to point “B,” it allows all of the brick veneer to move together as a unit without any other cracks forming—-except at the pivot point “A.”

In this case the crack that develops at point “A” had a corresponding crack on the side of the house around the corner—-and in this case it was where the foundation was weakened at the door to the basement. Doorways cut through foundations are a very common “breaking point”—-as are windows and step-ups in the foundation. These kinds of corresponding cracks result in not only foundation settlement but tilting of the foundation—-as is evidenced in this case by the brick pulling away at the top at point “C.”

This is a little unusual because the brick usually stays adhered to the wood framing creating long horizontal cracks more or less parallel to the settling foundation. In older homes, the brick ties that hold the brick to the wood structure pull out of the deteriorating mortar when put under this kind of stress. In this case the whole facade of brick is vulnerable to falling off the side of the home under the right seismic conditions.

This more or less patchable crack at point “A” has now become a fairly major structural repair involving stabilizing the foundation and redoing the brick veneer.

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Charles Buell, Real Estate Inspections in Seattle

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