If building a brick wall up to a known height, like an adjactent party wall built of differently sized bricks, what do you do if the height is not an exact number of courses ? Should you widen the mortar joint over several rows, cut a brick horizontally, or what ? Its these little things you suddenly think about when drawing plans. Cheers, Simon.
You have to work out a gauge for the given hieght of brickwork so tha a full number of bricks will fit. Generally you will divide up th hieght by the size of the brick plus bed and if your lucky it will fi perfectly. If it doesnt work perfectly then you either squeeze anothe course of bricks in or bump them up by using a bigger bed, which yo choose will depend on how much the difference is, ie , if a whol number of bricks is say 1 inch low then you would bump them up, but i they where 2 1/2 inches low then you would squeeze another course in
The easiest way to work is to set out a gauge rod (batten) with th full hieght of the wall from the damp course marked on it and then th individual courses can be marked out, you can then use this rod to mar out the coursing around the site. This all gets a bit more complicated when you then try to set out you door/window hieghts
-- Nick H
You guage down from the top and adjust the first few courses to get up or down to the guage marks.
dg
So if you needed to lose 1 1/2 inches you reckon you could do that in the first few courses"
-- Nick H
You would do it in as many courses as it takes without the joints looking too big or too thin.
In practice though, you would throw in a few tight or big joints on the lower part of the wall as it is less noticable to alter joints lower down the wall.
Remember that clay bricks are not lego, and can accomodate quite a bit of difference in joint thichness without it being too noticable
Also in altering the bed joints , you have to consider the thickness of the perp joint, the actual size/shape of the brick and any chamfered arrises too, as these will visually exaggerate differences in joint thickness. If you alter the entire guage then bed joints can look unaturally thin or thick.
Essentially, you want as much as the wall as possible with joints that look natural in comparison with the bricks.
So altering the entire guage is not always the best thing to do
dg
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