How to mix lime mortar for pointing stone walls

a short demo of mixing traditional lime mortar for pointing stone walls and bricks,showing you tools ratios and techniques. please subscribe to see more and watch our vlog!

Welcome to our vlog, following our lives as a young family in rural France, we are renovating a 200 year old farm house, barns and garden, doing all the work ourselves on a small budget

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[NickVenture]

My first thought was: " This is an aristocratic person showing skills in masonry works". He would also look great wearing ancient body armor with these old walls in the background. Concerning the lime mortar I was a bit surprised that you can use such a dry mixture. It appears to work out fine on your nice stone walls. Now I wish just to point out that lime should stay moisturised for several days even a week to "cook" and harden as best as possible. The chemical process is ongoing during this time frame and moisture is necessary. By keeping the lime from getting dried up too fast the internal transformation of the lime mortar into a rock like crystal which will be able to last hundreds of years can proceed sufficiently in the most effective way. For this purpose you can either slightly spray water with a vaporiser directly on the walls once the lime is already hard enough to not release more material onto the stone surface. Just a bit of moisturising is ok. Or it is recommended to cover the surfaces were lime is recently applied with "Gunny Sacks" which must be moisturised during these several days when the lime underneath is slowly drying in this way and enabled to become much harder. (Get such natural fibre bags at vegetable markets p.ex. Potatoe bags etc). Another information I like to give here is that Beside adding sand to the lime powder it is possible to add red bricks powder or powder made of clay roof tiles. The powder can be made easy by just smashing old bricks and tiles with a heavy enough self made tool. P.ex. a piece of cast concrete and a pipe stuck into it as a handle. To make a test and check the color effects with a small quantity of trial mixture, just a hammer will do too. There are often old bricks and broken roof tiles around houses undergoing renovations and by grinding them into a powder it will give a great option to include these building materials back into the property. Especially nice when these are very old hand cast roof tiles which are made of ancient materials specific to a geographical location. The shades of earth color, terra cotta, to a hue of pink can all be obtained easy by just mixing the lime with this Do it Yourself powder and once the lime mortar is dried the colors look wonderful combined with stones of a wall or also as full covered areas or in combinations.. Give it a try in some places of your property. Make tests and write down the composition to decide once the lime is dried which "pastel" style of color your prefer in which place. There will be old walls were the visible inclusion of larger particles existing in the bricks or tiles powder into the lime mortar seals will add to the beauty. The ancient building masters, Romans p.ex. used this method because they recycled broken roof tiles in this way. Nothing gets wasted and the results are most beautiful and also unique.
Here is an example of a lime mortar mixed with a higher percentage of tile powder giving it a more red color.

[maryg.]

Well done, Dan. You have the gift of teaching. You’re very thorough and clear with what you shared. Great videoing too! The room will be beautiful when it’s all put together. Take care, Mary

[heyjude]

Dan you are a natural in front of the camera, and get videoing by Annalise too - well done to you both :-) Very informative, I will probably never need to do this, but really interesting to see your diy and renovation techniques. Thank you, and I love hearing the family in the background, that's real life right there xx

[marclefebvre]

That was informative, really enjoyed the video, please may we have more, cheers

[erin.wilson]

You guys are really smart, by making a video like this you're probably going to bring in more viewers to your channel. When people go to YouTube to look up how to learn a specific skill they'll come across your channel in the process. 🤞 I just love watching any video you guys put out, you have a very sweet little family. Very entertaining 😄

[cindyfleer]

Now this is a GREAT video! You are showing us how your updating your home while giving us an educational video. At the beginning you quickly but thoroughly listed and showed us the tools and ingredients needed. Then you demonstrated quickly and thoroughly how to do it! Beautiful job!

[hootenanny]

Who the blazes thumbed down this helpful video??? Got the wrong plaster on the walls in my house and found this vlog really helpful...thank you for posting it👍

[k.j.]

Great As more Brits move to France it will be helpful for building and reconstruction. Not as many regulations compared to the U.K. but the years of neglect in the buildings is more evident. It also reveals how large the country is and the change in economy in France in the last 200 years, added to that past wars in Europe. Great job Dan in showing your work.😀

[t.s.]

Maybe one day I'll use your pointing technique on a little cottage in France... living the dream!

[michaelbergantino]

nicely done. That’s a lot of patience and work!

[martinfrancis]

when i use lime for either pointing or plaster i make in mixer fulls at a time then simply put it into a sealed tub. whenever i need some i simply take t out and work it up, the best stuff is usually 2 weeks old

[lw]

Great talk Dan. Explained tremendously well xxx ❤️ it's going to look amazing once finished xx

[maryannknox]

I made my own Hearths for my wood stoves all of brick 🧱 it was hard work but rewarding when your finished I never worked with lime and sand job Dan it is really coming along nice 👍

[kimmurphy]

Keep up the good work Dan. 😃. And keep giving us videos please 🍂🍁

[jacquelynhollinger]

Thanks for taking the time to make this video, very informative.
I appreciate the patience and skill it takes to point this old building.

[lanajackson]

Nice looking Dan. But I think when you said, “quite easy, really”, for you, but not for the average person. I always wanted to build a small English cottage with the wood beam ceilings and the cathedral style windows. We have built two large homes and a cabin in the woods, but never a little Cottage. Really love watching you and your family. 💕🍁💕🎃

[paulinegranger]

Lovely building be beautiful once you finished love your videos keep them coming

[joanns]

It looks AMAZING, but what a lot of work! I so admire your attention to detail and persistence - it must be exhausting!

[ARLITAGARDEN]

Very interesting thank you Dan for sharing your knowledge to everyone

[norsebavarian]

Love the dedicated "how to" videos! keep them coming!