Constructing vapour open or tight?
Old buildings used to be vapour open. With hearth fire your belly was warm and your back was frozen in winter. This hearth needed a lot of air to guide the smoke into the chimney. Candles bent because of this draught.
Drying time winter vs summer
Every big moisture problem needs a drying time of maximum 2 months in summer and maximum 3 months in winter. Measure again after this drying time and you can determine whether the taken precautions are sufficient or whether there is still a third cause present.
Rising damp
A fragment from the training “Moisture control before 2021” by Eddy Cruysberghs. Rising damp is NEVER the cause of a moisture problem.
See all our trainings given online.
The warmer, the more moisture
Per degree in temperature increase the air absorbs a whopping 6,25% more moisture. This doesn’t seem much but between 18°C and 22,6°C both at 50% relative humidity, this is an increase of 32,80%.
Where in the past the comfort temperature in a house in winter was +18°C, today it is +22,6°C.
The ten year liability
Article 1792 of the Civil Code stipulates that when a building lapses by a fault in the construction, the architect and the contractor are liable for 10 years. Article 2270 CC provides that the architect and the contractor are discharged from their liability involving the major works that they have carried out or led in the course of ten years.
Hidden defects after sale
When buying a house the buyer can expect the house to meet the reasonable expectations he has set. The matter – for example a house or apartment – does not comply with the agreement if it does not has the qualities that the buyer could expect on grounds of the agreement. Then it’s a matter of – judicially speaking – non-conformity, or a “shortcoming” or a “fault”.
Detaching of concrete
Burned roofing and other materials have to make sure the ground level zone is waterproof. In practice these often detach from the surface, especially after a (strong) winter. The consequence of this is rain water runs laterally inside by a saturated ground level zone.
92% of all cavity walls are incorrectly post-insulated
Post-insulating cavity walls goes mandatory with hydrophobating the façade stones. This obligation is stated in the Bouwbesluit (NL) and the technical prescriptions of the WTCB (B).
Occupant behaviour as a cause?!
Very often mold and moisture problems are dismissed as occupant behaviour. People say there is too much washing, ironing and cooking going on and there’s too little ventilation. This way you yourself are responsible for the mold in your house or apartment.
Nothing is less true. You yourself can never produce so much moisture so there occurs damage.
Every house makes a bell-jar
Every house makes a bell-jar. Place a transparent bell-jar on the ground and very quickly condensation moisture will appear on the inside. This is because of the vaporisation of the moisture in wet sand and the increasement of the underlying vapour pressure. In addition, the possibly present Radon gas (radioactive harmfull gas) will escape from the soil and gather in this bell-jar.
Why injecting against rising damp is never the solution
When you have a moisture problem in your home, you often get rising damp as a diagnosis. The solutions they offer for this is injecting.
Rising damp
The damage you see is only a very small part of the underlying cause. This cause is however never capillary absorbtion of groundwater.
Save 30% on heating costs without insulating
With a few simple procedures you can easily save 20 – 30% on your energy bill. For this, placing extra insulation is an obvious step, but still. In at least 30% of all houses you can save 20 – 30% on heating costs by not heating moisture anymore.
Rising damp - injecting against moisture problems!
Massimo Pigliucci, science philosopher - Exposing nonsense is our moral duty!
The myth of the so-called "rising damp" stays persistent. Everyone believes it and takes it for true (out of ignorance), while it has nothing to do with the actual cause.
Moisture by ventilating too little? Do not get caught!
Do you notice a moisture problem in your house and do you notice a lot of condensation with possibly some mould here and there, than it’s not because of your way of living. Do not get put off by so called experts, who claim that your moisture problem is caused by your way of living. You should ventilate more and you produce too much moisture by cooking, ironing, washing, cleaning and nightly activities. Nothing is less true.
Thermic setting in (big) buildings
All buildings big or small have to deal with a differential thermic setting between winter and summer. The thermal shrink of concrete is 1/100 mm/m/°C (The hygrometric expansion of bricks εr < 0,1mm/m); this means that the shrinkage cracks can be repaired or evaluated definitively after a (strong) winter. A building of 20m will undergo a theoretic, thermal setting of 20 x 0,01 x 50 = 10mm.