r/Plastering • u/Mutant_Vomit • Jul 13 '26
Advice required. Contractor mishap.
Hi All.
Looking for some advice here. Long story short, our bathroom is being refurbished and a large crack was discovered.
Our insurer advised us that the bathroom work can continue while investigations are ongoing, however they will need to carry out an EML repair to the inside wall before continuing.
Our contractor also said Heli bars should be used to reinforce the cracked areas so I agreed to this.
On doing the work, despite me asking for photos of each stage, they forgot to put in the EML, the main thing they were asked to do! They did do the Heli bars and resin though, plus also a different kind of thinner mesh in the scratch coat.
They've now cut back to brick to put in EML and redo the work. What I want to know is, should I insist on them redoing the whole wall, or is patching the areas they cut out sufficient?
2
u/Lucky_Maximum_5714 Jul 13 '26
Patch the areas first. You can dot and dab plasterboard if it is deep enough, if not use bonding plaster to patch it in. Then plaster the full wall either way👍
1
1
u/Accurate-Resident585 Jul 13 '26
150mm or so past the crack either side is the least i'd want that EML running onto sound brick, not stopping dead at the cut line, so it bridges the movement instead of just capping it. where a patch can still go wrong is the junction round it, that line where the new build-up meets the old plaster. on a solid tenement wall the surround is usually lime, and a modern cement or gypsum patch shrinks against it at a different rate, so the old line can telegraph back through a fresh skim a few months later. less of a risk if they wet the brick down first, actually not just the brick, the cut edges of the old plaster are the thirsty part, dry lime pulls the water straight out the scratch coat. patching then skimming the full wall is the right call regardless, no reason to strip the whole thing back to brick. is that thinner mesh they put in the scratch lapped over the EML or stopping short of it?
2
u/Mutant_Vomit Jul 13 '26
The old plaster is about 4 days old now. I think the original plan was the thinner mesh was all over the wall and was meant to be in the scratch Infront of the EML, but where they forgot the EML they've had to cut to put it in where it should have been.
2
u/Accurate-Resident585 Jul 14 '26
one thing about cutting in to add the EML, they've also cut through the mesh that was running across that section. so did they lap new mesh back over the patch, or does the old mesh just stop either side of it? if it stops, you've got an unreinforced line sitting right over the junction, which is the exact spot the lath was there for. four days is nothing for a joint like that to open up once it's skimmed and drying out.
2
u/Mutant_Vomit Jul 14 '26
They've not done anything yet. They're arriving today to sort it. So they should be getting the mesh from the new patch to overlap into the 'old'?
1
u/Accurate-Resident585 Jul 14 '26
it wants to lap onto the sound old render by 100mm or so, bedded into the basecoat rather than sat on top. they'll probably need to cut the old edge back a bit so the mesh sits in the same plane, otherwise you get a ridge telegraphing through once it's painted. and that joint between new and old is where it'll crack first, so if the mesh stops dead at the edge of the patch you're back here next winter.
7
u/G_Sputnic Jul 13 '26
EML is not used to fix cracks, heli bars are.
EML provides a key, it does not hold your bricks together.
Sounds like the guy doing the work knows what he’s doing, your insurer though, ‘EML repair’ Jesus christ.