Do you experience dampness or water rising on your walls causing your paintings to peel off or blocks to start failing? TAKE A READ I had a hectic day somewhere in December and decided to rest in a hotel instead of travelling all the way back to Accra. To my dismay I was greeted with damped walls as you can see in the picture and my night was quite horrible.
I held on to this post for some months now to avoid been beaten the next time I go to the hotel since I do patronize it a lot as I have a project in the town. A lot more people are facing this situation in their homes. Due to that, we now have experts repairing such anomalies in houses though the repair works do not last for long before the problem surfaces as the experts fail to diagnose the real causes of the damped walls. Truth is this kind of situation in buildings can or should have been avoided during the construction of the foundation. Let me mention just a few of the causes of this situation:
- Rain water leaking through roofs and walls
- Ground water intrusion ( waterlogged areas or areas with high water table)
- Leaking or burst water pipes due to improper plumbing installations Let me also mention below some few harmful effects of this situation:
- Wall decorations get damaged due to dampness.
- The floor gets loosened
- Timber fittings (doors, windows, etc) gets deteriorated.
- Can be deadly when it comes in contact with electrical fittings.
- Metal fittings get corroded and rusted due to dampness.
- Dampness travels through walls and ceilings and creates unsightly patches and makes the buildings aesthetically displeasing .
- Dampness breeds germs of dangerous diseases such as tuberculosis, neuralgia, rheumatism, etc
How to prevent dampness:
It is very important that you try to prevent this situation from the construction phase. Below are some of the measures you can put in place to prevent this unwholesome situation occurring to your home.
- Use of damp-proof course (DPC), to act as a barrier through which water cannot pass
- Addition of waterproof materials to the foundation concrete as well as the oversite concrete.
- Proper drainage of the entire house to prevent stagnant water that may find its way into the foundation of the building. Ensure proper slope for easy flow of water to adjoining drains .
- Proper plumbing installations
- Well supervised roofing Let me end this series by telling you why the treatment always fails after some few months of repairs! The experts most often than not fail to correctly diagnose the type of dampness affecting the building but rather just provide solutions. It is important that the type of dampness or what is causing the dampness is diagnosed and appropriate solutions meted. The next time someone wants to treat dampness in your house, kindly ask them to tell you first what is causing that particular dampness!
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