How to Repair Wall Cracks
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This dramatic wall crack was caused by reactive clay soil shrinkage due to drought!
Such wall cracks usually indicate that the house footings need to be lifted and releveled.
Uretek closed this wall crack up, so that only minor surface patching and painting were needed.
Cracks like this can appear when walls rotate outward through loss of foundation support.
Uretek releveling brought the wall crack back together like this.
Wall crack repair starts at the bottom
A wall crack will usually appear because foundation ground under your house has weakened and part or all of your house has subsided. So the best long-term solution starts at the root of the problem. The footings of your house must be lifted, relevelled and re-supported.
Wall cracks are not uncommon in Australian houses - occurring in both outside brickwork walls and inside plaster-board and rendered walls.
Causes of wall cracking
Building footings sink when they lose support from the foundation ground. A common cause of such subsidence is the recent many years of drought. Soils containing reactive clay have dried out. The clay has shrunk and houses have sunk. Washaways from broken pipes and floods and poorly compacted fill are other causes.
Whatever the cause, subsidence practically never happens evenly, so wall cracks appear.
When Uretek relevels sunken houses such wall cracks usually close up.
The process of raising, re-levelling and re-supporting a house is called ‘underpinning’.
The traditional method was concrete underpinning but it has major drawbacks being a very lengthy process and creating considerable mess. It involves excavation to make large holes under the building footings, pouring in concrete, waiting for it to set and then jacking the house up off the concrete blocks.
Another drawback to concrete underpinning is that the large concrete blocks add significant weight to ground that is already stressed.
Also if huge, heavy concrete underpins anchor just part of the house, that part will be rigidly fixed while other parts are free to move up and down. This can cause whole new patterns of wall cracks!
Advantages of Uretek in wall crack repair
Uretek is the modern way. It’s like keyhole surgery!
- Uretek structural expanding resin is injected into the foundation ground under your house through tiny 16mm holes.
- Occupants don’t need to move out.
- The Uretek resins expand, to fill any voids, compact any soft ground and then raise the home back to level.
- Enormous, but controlled pressure can be exerted.
- This process is controlled with constant monitoring by laser level.
- Releveling your home with Uretek is very fast.
- It rarely takes more than a day, often just a few hours.
- Uretek is also very clean. No excavation, no water, no cement dust, no mess.
- There's usually no need to move much furniture or even floor coverings.
- Wherever possible Uretek work is done from outside.
- For inside work, injection can be done through even smaller 6 mm holes, placed carefully to be as unobtrusive as possible.
Wall cracks usually close up as Uretek lifts the foundation. With brickwork, then only some re-pointing of mortar joints may be required. With plaster or render walls only some fine patching and repainting may be needed.
However Uretek cannot guarantee that all wall cracks will close up as the footings are lifted: structural movement or previous patching and/or pieces of debris in the cracks may prevent them from closing fully. Even then the re-support and levelling will usually prevent future movement and the re-opening of cracks. So surface repair and redecoration can be undertaken
Gaps below skirting boards are also usually closed up.
Windows and doors also usually begin to work properly again as Uretek lifts sunken footings and floors back to their correct levels.
Uretek offers you these additional reassurances:
- There are usually substantial cost savings when Uretek is used to relevel your home.
- The injected Uretek material that supports the house is completely non-toxic, inert and environmentally friendly.
URETEK WARRANTY
URETEK materials injected below concrete have been specifically engineered to resist shrinkage or deterioration causing significant settlement, and as such are warranted by URETEK in strict accordance with the product durability requirements of the applicable Local, State or National Building Code.
See also
Uretek Ground Engineering
Uretek solves many problems by unique and patented systems of resin injection.
Fast, economical, long-lasting, environmental and with minimal disruption.