# Forum Home Renovation Brickwork  Moisture coming through a brick wall?

## tgr4life

We live in a house built in the 1950's. We are having a moisture problem. The problems are with rooms that are renovated rooms. One is a bedroom that use to be the front porch and the other is a office and mudroom which was a sunroom. The problem seems to moisture on the inside of the brick walls. Both sides of the brick walls are painted. Is it wind driven rain or is condensation. The floors in all the rooms are concrete. There is not a lot of water but enough to get the carpet and pad underneath wet. Would applying a product like dry lock on the outside help. Thanks for any help.

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## HomeBuilder

Did the renovation include installing high front water guttering which is overflowing back into the wall and ceiling after heavy rain?  This type of guttering, where the front of the gutter is higher than the back has been the culprit for many cases of water entering homes.  Plumbers and manufacturers have been told last year that they must now make sure there is provision for continuous overflow when they instal this stuff.   
High front guttering installed more than a year ago is likely to have no overflow outlet (other than into your home) and there is publicity being given to what to do to resolve the problem.  Tradies are reluctant to help fix it in case they become liable for water damage, but you can do it yourself by, for example, cutting down the stop ends of the guttering to normal gutter height, and cutting overflow slots larger than the inneffective perforated slots provided in some guttering.  A googlesearch will give you some good advice.  Here is one example - Metroll Newcastle - BCA 2009 for "High Front" Eaves Gutter Systems 
This may not be what's causing your problem of course, but *if* you have this guttering, I bet it is.

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## GeoffW1

> We live in a house built in the 1950's. We are having a moisture problem. The problems are with rooms that are renovated rooms. One is a bedroom that use to be the front porch and the other is a office and mudroom which was a sunroom. The problem seems to moisture on the inside of the brick walls. Both sides of the brick walls are painted. Is it wind driven rain or is condensation. The floors in all the rooms are concrete. There is not a lot of water but enough to get the carpet and pad underneath wet. Would applying a product like dry lock on the outside help. Thanks for any help.

  Hi, 
I see you are in North Carolina, on the Hiwassee, welcome. 
Do you see any condensation on the inside surface of the wall, on the paint just above the carpet? If so I think better ventilation or other means of drying the air indoors is required. I'd also put some drainage along the wall outside, and make sure no earth is in contact with the wall above the dampcourse. I don't think rain would penetrate a well painted wall. 
If upper surfaces in the room are pretty dry, and there is no earth outside in contact with the wall at that level, I think the moisture might be coming up through the concrete floor. Causes of this are several, including a moisture membrane which has broken down, or a leaky pipe in or under the concrete. 
Try peeling back the carpet in the problem area to see where the wettest patches are. 
Edit: and the windows, too. Wind driven rain can indeed penetrate around a window. Is there any variation to the moisture from sunny to wet conditions? 
Cheers

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## HomeBuilder

Oops.  Sorry I didn't consider that somone from outside Australia would post here - my mistake, thanks GeoffW1.  Without knowing the soil type, your local weather conditions and condition of the plastic sheeting used as a water barrier under the slab of any home, it's difficult to say what might be causing dampness in floors and lower walls. 
My own concrete slab dampness problems have been caused by the local council requiring me to excavate down to the shale subsoil to build (27 years ago), meaning that every time I get rain, the concrete flooring responds by getting damp and shedding white powdery lime.  Painted sealants on the floor have flaked off, so I've put some loose vinyl tiles under the carpet to help the problem.  It also hasn't helped that I've chopped up the plastic moisture-barrier sheeting on one side of the house when digging a garden. 
Most dampness problems have an obvious source - poor drainage near the house, lousy soil, guttering problems or rainfall.  I bet if you have a good look, you'll find what it is yourself.

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