Masonry Magazine April 2003 Page. 29
THE APPLICATION OF A QUALITY WATER REPELLENT
The application of a quality water repellent is part of a sound and effective water management system. You certainly need to be bright enough to understand the dynamics of not putting this stuff on until you've got a wall with a rising temperature.
"If you have a wall and it's really cold, how are you really ever going to get enough initial moisture out of the wall for it to be safe to put a clear sealer on it? We've actually had people who say, "Well, we've done winter masonry, we had it all built in, and now we're going to put a clear sealer on it." And I have to say, "Why don't you let it go through the spring and let it bloom a little bit. Let's let the cements hydrate and all of these things happen before we try to get in there with some magic gunk."
Wallace continues, "With the silane and siloxane materials, we suggest a temperature range of 40 degrees up to about 90 degrees - and that's substrate temperatures, and that's important due to thermal mass. If it's applied at substrate temperatures of 38, it's probably not the end of the world. Obviously, when you have a water-borne system, you can't really push that level."
So what differences are we talking about between water-borne and solvent-borne sealer systems? Wallace says, "It's really just the carrier that the reactive material is suspended in. Solvent-borne materials have been around a lot longer than the water-borne materials. Differences in the two systems include: temperature ranges-you have a much wider temperature range with the solvent-borne materials; and product odor is another issue-as the solvent evaporates there is a temporary odor associated with the evaporation. Solvents may also have a tendency to absorb a little deeper because the molecular size of the solvent is normally a little smaller than that of water, although this is not necessarily true 100 percent of the time. In making your product decision you need to weigh the differences between the two carriers. What temperature ranges do you have? What kind of results are you trying to achieve? What are the VOC (volatile organic compounds) laws in the given municipality?
"We have found in laboratory testing, for all practical purposes, the same type of results in both the water-borne and solvent-born systems."
In summary, Wallace says, "The application of a quality water repellent is part of a sound and effective water management system. There are some redundancies there and the redundancies are there because we know we don't live in utopia. We know that designers don't always understand about through-wall flashing, weep holes and the proper use of control joints, and we also know that sometimes the mason contractors don't have the same quality of work on a Monday morning as he might on a Friday afternoon. Those things do happen in the real world. Water repellents may not be necessary to prevent water intrusion if everything is done correctly, just like we don't necessarily need to take multi-vitamins every day if we eat correctly. How many of us always eat correctly? Thus the importance of preventative measures.
"We understand the real world applications. We also understand that, in a utopian world, redundancy of materials may not be required, but in reality there is a place for a quality water repellent on most masonry structures and substrates."
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