Wood Shims Embedded into Multi-Wythe Brick Walls 1

[jerseyshore]

Just got called out to a job because the building inspector noticed some odd construction on an old brick building and it's not something I've ever seen before either.

It's a 3 story building built in 1900; wood-framed floors with triple-wythe load bearing brick exterior walls.

On only the inside wythe, there are wood shims embedded into the joints continuously around the entire building. They are spaced anywhere from 7 to 20 courses vertically and continue all the way thru the 3rd floor. The shims vary, someplaces 1" thick, others 1/2" or less. You can see in the last photo how they are only 1 brick wide, 4" or so.

As you can tell from my pictures, this is a mish-mosh of brick. Different grey and red color bricks all laid together randomly. I am thinking that because they used so many different brick types, they used these shims to level off the coursing every so often. However, since it doesn't go thru to the middle or exterior course, I don't know if that's true at all. The outside is all painted white so can't tell.

Has anyone seen something like this before?

My initial ideas for repair were to use injectable mortar wherever the wood shims were missing/loose/rotten/crushed. It will be tedious, but the inner wythe is doing all the load bearing work so not something I want to mess around with. If the wood is still solid and tight, they can probably leave that.

Appreciate any thoughts on this one.

 

[phamENG]

This is very common in this kind of construction. They are there for fastening of wood furring that will get wood lath fastened to it for plaster.

Removal of rotten segments and replacement with a suitable mortar (likely a 1:3 lime:sand mix) would be the best bet, especially considering you're not going back with the same fastening system.

 

[jerseyshore]

Good to know, thanks for the info. Not many old brick buildings left in NJ so not something I have ever seen before.

You wouldn't have them remove the solid wood portions right? The building inspector was trying to get them to do that, but I talked him out of it since it has been there for 123 years now. Just the bad portions I want filled with mortar.

 

[phamENG]

Right. I would leave the solid stuff. Though one thing to remember - the parts that rotted did so because water got to them. Make sure you figure out where/how and stop it.

And you've got plenty of them. I've looked at a few in Newark. Not sure which I was more scared of - the building itself, or Newark in general...

 

[jerseyshore]

Good points.

And yes NJ has them just very consolidated in cities like Newark, Jersey City, Paterson etc. Basically any older city.

And what are you talking about? Newark is beautiful. I am going to a site visit there tomorrow. I love leaving the Prudential Center at night after a Devils game. So peaceful. You just don't want to stop at any red lights late at night that's all.

 

[kipfoot]

Yes, as phamENG says, that terrible detail is in many buildings from the era, at least here in the slightly more southern latitudes. Sometimes it's wood wedges that are placed in a grid within the brick to create a nailing point.

I agree that you replace the rotted pieces with masonry: mortar, or brick if it fits, but leave the solid pieces because you're also trying to not create more problems than you started with.

 

[GeorgeTheCivilEngineer]

Agree with above but just to add that timbers are sometimes put in to provide tension capacity. Known as bond timbers they are usually put in at corners.

In my mind these are more for temporary restraint during construction and in a finished building rotten ones could safely be replaced with mortar/bricks.

 

[LittleInch]

Reminds you that just because a building is old and is good looking / period features, high ceilings etc, Victorian builders were still builders and looking to do things as cheaply as possible in the days before building inspectors.

When I did some work on my own house with "solid" brick wall ( two layers apparently intermeshed) I discovered that they weren't actually solid, but two skins built side by side with the odd tie every 7 courses or so. The appearance of cross bricks was in fact half bricks laid sideways to give the impression of a "solid" wall. The inner wall was terrible even though it held up the joists etc. Really bad bricks of many colours, gaps in the mortar, filling in with mortar where the bricks had crumbled. The word was that they gave the outside wall where people looked at the building to the good brickies and left the apprentice and the rubbish bricks for the inside wall (!!).

Remember - More details = better answers
Also: If you get a response it's polite to respond to it.

 

[GeorgeTheCivilEngineer]

That's as much a function of the manufacturing process and employment structure. Stock bricks (used on the internal leaf) were from the cooler parts of the kiln and not suitable for the outer leaf for appearance and durability reasons. The apprentice could lay those and it would all be covered up and consolidated with a thick, hair reinforced lime plaster.

It was an efficient and structurally sound solution.

As manufacturing improved the decent bricks could economically be used throughout but other forms of construction (blockwork) would take over.