Georgian Building Restored with Ties & Bars

An imposing and historic building in the City of Westminster has had its external façade restored to full structural integrity by London-based Twistfix-registered contractors Total Wall Care. After carrying out a detailed survey, the specialist repair company designed and implemented a complete, bespoke structural solution.

The six-storey building, now home to a successful law firm, stands in a prime location in an attractive garden square in Marylebone and has done since 1776. Impressively, the main foundation of the building is sound after the many intervening years though the external façade had become damaged, showing many areas of stepped diagonal cracking due to severe lintel failure.

During the Georgian era, arch lintels with a flat gauge were used in buildings. Over time, these lintels lost their camber as supporting masonry above increased its loads, creating the need for full bed joint reinforcement. As specialists in masonry repair, particularly lintel reinforcement, contractors from Total Wall Care decided that the use of more than 400m of Twistfix helical wire, used to create new load-bearing brick beams, along with several hundred long drive pins, used to tie the soldier corses, would admirably rectify the problem.

The helical wires were installed in pairs, each pair above a lintel to resist both tensile and compressive forces, bonded firmly in specialist masonry grout to create the new beams. Twistfix drive pins, 9mm in diameter and 450mm in length, were subsequently driven into 6mm holes and  through the soldier course brickwork to tie them to the reinforce masonry zone above.

Once the reinforcement and tying works were completed all existing cracks were then completely cut out before being injected with the grout to securely bond the affected areas of masonry. Much repointing was also necessary as areas of brickwork had lost their stability; Twistfix WHO-60 masonry repair grout was utilised in order to stabilise the affected brickwork before the repointing was completed using traditional lime mortar for an aesthetically-pleasing and near-invisible match to the existing pointing.

Twistfix sell a wide range of brickwork reinforcement products and wall tie systems to builders all over the UK. These industry leading masonry repair products are designed and made in Britain yet exported worldwide and used in a wide variety of masonry building materials.

On this occasion the Twistfix tie and beam system allowed Total Wall Care to provide a non-disruptive, bespoke structural repair solution that was completed in just two weeks and saved the client many thousands of pounds. The project is now complete and is fully covered by an insurance-backed guarantee.

For more information on the Thor Helical system from Twistfix, please call our team on 0845 123 6006 or email us at sales@twistfix.co.uk.