Veneer Mortar Joint

[phamENG]

I was asked to take a look at a potential issue in a house - a home inspector found a stair step crack in some brick veneer in an attic (gable end wall with an addition tacked on the side). Turns out there was some questionable framing choices made 30+ years ago. I have a plan to correct the damaged and excessively deflected framing, and where the crack extends above the roof line it's small enough to be repointed and the flashing repaired. The issue is the gaping 1" crack in the attic. I don't need to do anything with it as everything will be adequately supported, but it's going to look like there's a problem.

In a case like this, what would you do? Have the mason pack it with mortar so it looks "passable" (resulting in a 1-3/8" mortar joint - in the attic), use a sealant, or just leave it alone and let later observers think what they will?

 

[dold]

Up to the homeowner I suppose. You could have the mason fake a troweled joint and paint the flat part, leaving the 3/8 joint unpainted?

 

[phamENG]

Thanks, dold. That's a good solution where it needs to look good. My goal isn't so much to make it look good, just not so bad. It's in an attic, and a pretty difficult to access portion of the attic - it's more to prevent some future inspector (or observant occupant of the house) from thinking the wall is falling down.

 

[dold]

Ah. Well. Hmm. Jack up the bottom of the veneer and get a come-a-long to tug the bottom of the rafters back together in a wild attempt to pull the joint shut? Don't forget to cross your fingers!

 

[phamENG]

Haha. Would if I could. It's a case of "it's been that way for 30 years". I'm afraid the framing that's around it is permanently set as it is. The carpenter's...creativity...in the construction of the addition actually left me enough room to specify a really economical repair that doesn't require removing much of the existing framing. So that and, well, there's a pretty good chance that trying to jack it up would make the wall fall down. So I'm just providing a reasonable load path within allowable stress limits and leaving the other stuff to keep on performing as it has been, with a little extra help.

 

[dhengr]

PhamENG:
Don’t do anything with the stepped crack, except try to understand what exactly caused it, until after you have made your repairs to the rest of the structure. Take photos and measure the crack width at critical locations, and watch it for any changes during your work. You may understand the cause and any remediation better, after a closer look during your repair work.

Are there any Brick Tech Notes on brick (brick veneer) crack repair? Is there any out-of-plane movement of the veneer wall, is it plumb and reasonably true, except for the crack? After your repair work, you might want to do something to add some ties from the brick veneer back to the supporting backup structure. Take a look at Spira-Lok Helical Wall Ties for example. From your description, I’m not at all sure I know how everything really fits together here, so I’m not sure how much of the above is applicable.

 

[phamENG]

dhengr - thanks for the input.

The easiest way to describe it is to say that 3' at the end of a wall was effectively removed to make way for a hallway to an addition. It's a ballooned framed ceiling, with the top of the ceiling joists about 6" below rafter bearing. That little stub of wall stud is still in place. When this was done, the brick return at what used to be an exterior corner was done away with, and blocking shoved in between the lintel and the top plate of the wall that was removed. So now, the end of a roughly 12' long lintel is bearing on a 3' cantilevered double top plate. But then it gets better. The top plate is spliced over what is now its last support. So really it's a single flatwise 2x4 cantilevering those 3ft. The end stud-stub was nailed to the adjacent wall. There's lots of crushing, nail bending, etc. that has allowed it to deflect that 1" and open up this gap, but not send a pile of bricks down into the family room. Most of the masonry corbeled and arched itself around the corner, so I'm only dealing with about 1000# of masonry on that point.

There is some out of plane movement, and I'm a little concerned about it remaining stable if any attempt is made to move it. The masonry itself is okay as is, so long as proper support is provided for the end of the lintel.

I don't know of any Tech Notes that address is explicitly. Typically it's a matter of repointing. If I encountered a gap this large in an area exposed to weather, I'd want to find a way to jack it back up. But since this is effectively interior and below the flashing, I'm not worried about water intrusion. Since it's not posing a big issue that way, I don't want to introduce more issues by having to strip out a bunch of framing and turn what is likely a $3000 repair into a $15000 repair.

 

[masonrygeek]

BIA Tech Note 46 covers repointng and replacing brick units:

http://www.gobrick.com/docs/default...46-maintenance-of-brick-masonry.pdf?sfvrsn=0.

If the crack is doing no harm and it doesn't indicate some other problem, just let it go. You also have to think what happens if you fill the crack with a sealant. Would that stop any moisture in the wall from drying out? One inch or more mortar joints are likely to have shrinkage cracks when they are installed so is that really getting you anywhere? Just some additional thoughts to consider...

 

[phamENG]

Thanks, masonrygeek. Good points.