Vent: Took me 8 years to figure out my buttering technique was trash

I always buttered my bricks laying the mortar thick on one end and thin on the other. Thought that was just how you did it. Then last month on a job in Des Moines this old mason watched me for about 5 minutes and said my joints would never last through a freeze cycle. He showed me how to butter the whole face evenly with a sweep motion using my trowel tip. Took me maybe 10 tries to get it smooth. Now my lines are way cleaner and I'm not wasting mortar. Anyone else have an old-timer call them out on something basic like this?

3 comments

3 Comments

carr.abby12d agoMost Upvoted

Honestly, why fix what wasn't broken? Your bricks stayed up, right?

carr.abby12d agoMost Upvoted

Wait, they REPLACED bricks with hollow plastic blocks?!

max_cooper2112d ago

A buddy of mine named Tom bought a set of those hollow plastic blocks for a retaining wall last summer. He stacked them up nice and level but after the first heavy rain, they just shifted and started bulging out weird, @carr.abby. The ground froze in January and two of them actually cracked right down the middle, like cheap yard toys. He ended up having to rip the whole thing out and go back to regular bricks anyway said it cost him way more time and money in the long run. Your bricks definitely stayed up, mine did too.