Window frame mould removal advice

[Stevekane]

Hi, I have had great success with thermal lining polystyrene veneer covered with the really heavy duty reinforced lining paper you can now buy. We had a mystery patch of damp high up in the corner of the front room, tried everything to prevent it, had experts of various kinds give opinions but in the end we concluded that it was probably condensation, so scrubbed off the area to remove any “salts” and papered the walls in the area of the corner with polystyreen veneer and then covered that with a reinfored lining paper, all bought from Wicks, and 4 years later still no damp patch. I think there are more expensive insulated versions of this type of lining paper available and you could try that. However given that your problem seems to be just a few spots right in that corner it might still prove difficult to completely eradicate.
Steve.

 

[Ozi]

A house I rent out developed a serious damp and mold problem. A local builder advised stripping plaster from all effected walls and replacing with a water resistant insulating plaster the name of which I forget. I didn't go with this as it seemed that making the effected walls warmer would just pass the problem to the next coldest point. Instead I followed the recommendation of one of the secretaries at a letting agent I use and fitted a fan that draws air from the roof space into the house. The idea is that the air in the roof is per-warmed both by the sun and by any heat lost from below. This causes a slight positive pressure in the house so air flows out rather than in and takes moisture with it. I was quite skeptical but it works. when the house was empty for a month the fan was off and the mold started to come back. My current tenants keep the fan running and occasionally run a dehumidifier in damp weather. One effect was that the house dried out probably dryer than it has been in the last hundred years and we did get a few cracks in plaster to deal with. It's supposed to also reduce heating bills as dry air has a lower specific heat capacity, not sure if I believe that but still impressed. Once a year I clean the filter and the muck it takes out of the air is quite impressive.

At a friends house I fitted one of these

It's an old stone house on the border with Wales, a very damp area, the difference in the bathroom was dramatic, went from constantly wet floor to dry in a day.

Adding my two peneth to the argument I think there is a need for both approaches, get the moisture levels as low as practical then treat when necessary, some places will never drop below the point where mold can germinate but you can slow it down.

 

[Woody2Shoes]

Deal with why it becomes mouldy and the rest will take care of itself.

Absolutely. Suggestions include:
- Improve measures to trap and eliminate excess moisture at source - eg extraction.
- Improve insulation, identify and eliminate cold bridging.
- Improve ventilation.

 

[Nigel Burden]

We had a problem with damp in our lounge and one bedroom. It was definitely a ventilation problem, but made worse by the previously installed urea formaldehyde cavity wall insulation, 1970s house, and much of the SW is not suitable for this type of insulation. We had the cavity wall insulation removed and an extractor fan installed in the loft. This runs constantly and you can feel a slight draught when standing beneath it, but there is no noise. You can also see clothes moving a little in the bathroom if they have been put in there to dry on a wet day. Ten years on and no sign of any damp.

The fan is one of the Energy Saver Dri Air System fans by Envirowise, a division of Timberwise.
It was not cheap. £495 plus VAT in 2011, but has been very effective.

Nigel.

 

[pgrbff]

Of interest:
1. did that stone house have any mechanical ventilation?
2. Stone walls lime mortar/plaster/render?

It had rough stone walls. It was basically 4 walls when we bought it. Plastered inside and out with fat lime plaster and painted outside with limewash, inside with keim silicate paint. I put french drains around most of it bringing down the level where it had built up over the years. No mechanical ventilation but the windows were traditional sliding sash and leaked.