What Is Repointing?
Posted on: 23 March 2018
Having a fireplace can be a lot of fun, especially when you are looking forward to a romantic night in front of the fire with your significant other. However, having that fireplace can also be a lot of work and responsibility. One thing that you are going to have to do is make sure that your chimney is in good shape. If your chimney is starting to break down, then you can run into trouble when you are starting a fire because your chimney may not pull smoke up the way it should or it could start to fall over. If you are worried about your chimney, then you should call a company that offers masonry services to come out to your house and check it for you. They may suggest that you need to have your chimney repointed, but what does that mean?
Mortar
When your chimney was originally constructed, it was made out of bricks with layers of mortar in between each of runs of bricks. The mortar is a form of cement and is there to hold everything together. Without that mortar, the bricks could move around and shift. The problem with mortar is that it's not as strong as bricks. So while the brick in your chimney could last for decades and decades, the mortar isn't going to last that long because of exposure to the weather and so forth. That's where repointing comes into play.
Repointing
When the mason comes over to your house to start repointing your chimney, there are several things that they are going to have to do. The first thing that they are going to do is to make sure that the old mortar is cleaned up. They will do that by using various tools and clearing out the mortar to a uniform depth. If the whole area doesn't have to be repaired, then the mason will make sure to clean out the mortar a little beyond the repair so that it's going to be secure. The mason will also make sure that they replace any bricks that look like they are in poor shape. There's no point in putting in new mortar with a brick that's falling apart.
Then the mason will start to apply the new mortar. If they working on the whole chimney, they will do only a small area at a time; that way they will have time to make sure that the mortar stays in the proper shape.
If you are worried about your chimney, you should hire a mason to come look at it for you.
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