HELP! Old Farm House Cotswold stone Exterior Repair

[HannahFarm]

Hello, I am hoping for some help, I need to repair our exterior wall which has been crumbling. I can tell it has been patch repaired in the past with cement? and it looks like it has made the situation worse.

I have started pulling off the paint and cement that is crumbling.

I assuming I will need to use lime mortar? some of the cotswold stone has completely crumbled away leaving big gaps, can I just fill these with lime? Or just any old mortar?

The rest of the house seems fine just this one area needing attention.

Once repaired I will be repainting the exterior.

Any help would be greatly appreciated

 

[Cubist]

That paint is almost certainly a modern plastic product and just as certainly the true root cause of the continuing damage to the stonework. To arrest this problem you need first to remove that paint before making repairs to the stonework either by re-pointing, if possible alone, or perhaps by applying a lime mortar render. You would also be wise I think to get a closer look at the pebbledash as the same paint seems to have been used on it.

 

[HannahFarm]

I can actually pull off some of the paint and it’s very stretchy! It Feels horrible.

It would actually look lovely left alone, but I'm not sure how to get the paint off the rest of the house so all the stone is uncovered.

 

[Cubist]

I suspect that you should be wary of attempting to remove the paint from the pebbledash walls above the plinth and should seek some further advice on that. On the other hand the paint coating the stone plinth/supporting wall does need to be dealt with to protect the stone. Others here have undertaken this task and will be better able to suggest appropriate methods and products. Perhaps @malcolm ????

 

[Kearn]

I can actually pull off some of the paint and it’s very stretchy! It Feels horrible.

It would actually look lovely left alone, but I'm not sure how to get the paint off the rest of the house so all the stone is uncovered.

Doff / ThermaTech, same product different brothers running different companies StoneHealth in Gloucestershire, Restorative Techniques in Bristol. It’s effectively a steam pressure wash, designed for this, usually with a pretreatment of chemical softener in advance to reduce dwell time and and effort for the removal. RT will certainly analyse a paint sample for free in the lab, just cover the postage to get it to them and you can understand what’s in it and the best removal softener.

Both companies run accreditation programs where operators must be trained and effectively be sanctioned to use the kit, serviced on going etc. they have lists of these near you… doesn’t mean the providing wit vary considerable, as will the skill.

You’ll do samples first anyway, to test the softeners, and dwell time/application Frequency. And to satisfy yourself, the operator and your CO of the outcome before pressing go. It’s costly. It’s messy. It needs scaffold ideally. But it works…

The plant is plastic, hence the bubbling as the moisture and salts trapped beneath are forcing their way out as they should.

It’s doing no good to your building and its ability to be dry and insulating. From your pics, you can see historic layers of limewash, the stone wasn’t exposed, and those layers protect both stone and mortar safely.
The techniques above will my remove limewash, they’ll get the modern crap off, them make good any pointing/stone repairs and limewash again over everything.

There’s certainly previous threads on this forum, search any of the teams such as DOFF or ThermaTech and you should pull them up.