What is a wall tie?
Cavity wall construction was used in around 90% of homes built between 1920 and 1981. As a result, your house is likely to suffer from wall tie corrosion and failure. This is approximately 10 million houses in the United Kingdom!
Typically, your home features an outer leaf of 100mm thick brickwork, a 50mm deep cavity, and an inner leaf of 100mm thick blockwork. The exterior and interior leaves of your property are connected with wall ties. Horizontally, they are usually 900mm apart and vertically 450mm apart. Older ties were also known to have a relatively thin layer of galvanizing coating, which was insufficient to prevent the steel from rusting away.
A wall tie is a steel bar, strap, or twined wire that is embedded into your masonry wall to keep it together; generally made of mild steel. The stability of your exterior walls depends on the efficacy of your wall ties. Wall ties are quite important for the structural integrity of your walls. If you have any older ties, they were composed of a thick mild steel bar shaped like a fishtail. Modern wall tiles are made out of a twisted wire and resemble a butterfly.
Why do Wall Ties fail?
The all-too-familiar rusting cycle begins when your wall ties’ steel is exposed to air and oxygen. The corrosion and failure of the wall tie in your home are possible as a result of this rusting. If this happens, the outer leaf on your property has a significant chance of caving in, especially during strong winds that create suction on the face of the wall.
Another issue is the larger volume of steel, which causes your home’s masonry to fracture and lift. Oxidization takes up more room than the original metal. As a result, the growth in length of the bed connection forces it to fracture. Every 450 millimetres along the wall, cracks run down the bed joints. As a result, they are an obvious indication of wall tie corrosion in your house. This is where you may notice swelling in your walls
What are the signs of Wall Tie Failure?
Your walls may show signs of horizontal cracking – at regular intervals in your external masonry joints.
Excessively wide walls, on the other hand, maybe detected by outward bulging–the wall expands causing it to deflect outwards around your window frames.
Internal fractures may be visible, but they’re often minor. Internal wall junctions in your house may contain vertical cracks, and internal wall and ceiling joints can create horizontal fractures.
What if I think I have insufficient wall ties?
Do you believe that insufficient wall connections may be a problem for your property? The first step is to schedule an appointment with one of our expert inspectors to assess the severity of the issue. We’ll use a metal detector and an endoscope to figure out where current wall ties are placed. For the practical examination of sample ties, we may need to remove bricks.
For a modest fee, our fully qualified Wall Tie surveyor, Jamie, can carry out a thorough wall tie survey and provide you with a complete set of recommendations. If the wall tie survey shows that remedial work is necessary, we will give you a precise timetable of the proposed repairs as well as an estimate. We assure you of competitive pricing while still providing high-quality repairs that you can trust. All of our quotations are delivered on a fixed price basis, and our reputation assures you in terms of quality and fairness.
What can you expect from our survey?
Investigation – We collect information on the type and condition of masonry, cavity width, as well as the current wall tie type and condition. Depending on the status of the existing wall ties, we may need to isolate/remove them. Specification – choice of remedial wall tie type; density and arrangement of remedial wall ties. Installation of replacement wall ties. Visual inspections, torque testing, and so on Quality control – visual checks, torque testing
The installation of replacement wall ties:
Atlantis Damp highly experienced and skilled specialists on staff at Atlantis Damp who will carry out any necessary repairs. Resin, drive ties, or cementitious wall ties are among the alternatives available. In most cases, your old ties are disconnected to prevent additional damage.