Romex pointing system - Advice

[GrahamH]

Tony

Over the last few months I have been building a new garden for my father (now in his 80’s). I indebted to you for the wealth of information and advice provided by your web site. I thought you would enjoy reading about some of my experiences and would also like to ask for some additional advice regarding resin pointing.

The work has involved building a semicircular wall using Bradstone Milldale curved walling blocks, a flight of curved steps to the rear of the house, a new garden path and a new raised patio behind the curved wall. The Patio also features a stone circle. Both the patio and path have been constructed using Indian sandstone flags in Desert Sand. I purchased the walling blocks from Lunts Heath and the stone flags from Corfe Stone. Having never built a wall or laid a paving before, I am really pleased with the result. At each stage I have followed your advice which I have found extremely helpful.

I must admit, however, that I found laying both the riven flags and the walling blocks very difficult and I don’t think I will ever be tempted to undertake such a project again! I had intended replacing my own patios once I had finished my dads but my enthusiasm for he work has, at this stage, just about vanished. As with almost all projects I hit a number of snags. For example, the delivery of the walling blocks was delayed for a month because Lunts Heath had no stock and Bradstone was in the process of refurbishing the Moulds. When the blocks finally arrived most were misshapen. Instead of being a uniform 140 mm height, they varied from 130 mm to 155 mm. This was because additional aggregate had stuck to the sides or the bottom of the blocks during the moulding process. Many blocks also had bulges at the edges preventing them butting correctly with adjacent blocks and some even had bits of rubber moulds sticking to them! Clearly Bradstone were still having problems. I could have sent the blocks back but having already experience a one month delay, and as the faults didn’t affect the faces of the blocks, I decided to press on as best I could. Consequently I had to individually hand dress each block to remove the lumps of extra aggregate or misshapen bulges.

Yet another snag concerned the stone circle. When I was designing the patio I visited Corfe Stone to view its range of Indian Sandstone flags. Having looked at the available colours I concluded that the best match for Badstone’s Milldale walling, which is in a Weathered Cotswold shade, was Corfe’s Dessert Sand paving. I explained that I intended building a semicircular wall at the front of a patio and thought that a circular paving kit would look good surrounded by the wall. I asked what size circles were available in Desert Sand so that I could build the wall to the correct diameter. I was told that three different diameters were available 2.4m, 2.8m and 3.6m. the 2.8m diameter seemed perfect as this fitted nicely into the space available and was the intended diameter for Bradstone’s curved Milldale walling. Having built the wall with an inner diameter of 2.83m (allowing a 15 mm mortar gap around the circle) I returned to Corfe to order all the stone. However, at this stage I was told that Desert Sand wasn’t available in 2.8m diameter kits only 2.4m and 3.3m!

Corfe said that they didn’t know why I had been told that Desert Sand came in the 2.8m size. Strangely Desert Sand was the only colour stone that wasn’t available with a 2.8m diameter circle kit. Mark Corfe, the owner of Corfe Stone, tried very hard to help. He offered an alternative buff coloured stone. He also said that he would exchange individual flags and circle segments if they clashed with the colour of the wall already built. Initially I agreed to this but when the buff stone was delivered just about half the flags where too red or too pink to be of use. They would have looked great next to a red sandstone wall but clashed horribly with the cotswold coloured Bradstone wall. Mark said he was still happy to exchange the pink or red stones but also suggested using a 2.4m Desert Sand circle and surrounding this with two rows of square stone setts to make up the gap between the circle and wall. In the end I sent all the buff stone back and Mark exchanged the lot for Desert Sand. I decided to make up the 200 mm gap between circle and wall by cutting 80 individual tapered blocks to form a ‘soldier’ course to surround the circle. It was a lot of extra work but the result looks great!

I am now coming to the end of the building phase of the garden project, I’ve still got the lawn, rockery, borders and planting to come though! The final building task is to point the patio and path. I didn’t do this as I laid the flags because I was worried about rain showers spoiling the pointing. Originally I intended using a black mortar as you suggest. However, having read your review of the Romex resin pointing system. It seems to me that, although expensive, it is ideal for this time of year when rain can be such a problem. I though on the odd dry day that we get, I could use a patio heater to ensure that the surface of the patio was completely dry, switch the heater off, then brush in the Romex and allow it to cure before the rain inevitably returned the next day. The system also has another great advantage for an amateur like me in that it avoids the potential problem of mortar staining - I must admit I am concerned about this. I would hate to spoil the patio at this stage having spent so much time and effort building it.

I wonder if you could provide me with some further advice regarding the Romex system relating to the following points:

1)Would you recommend Romex -Easy or Romex - Patio for Indian Stone Paving Slabs?

2)I need to point the steps and path in addition to the patio. The steps overhang the risers by about 1�. If I used mortar, I could push this into the gaps in the flags that overhang the risers to ensure that it remained in place as it set. Is this possible with Romex or is it necessary to provide some support, perhaps I could use masking tape placed underneath each overhanging gap?

3)Is Romex the same as Geo-fix?

4)Finally do you know of any Romex stockists in my area? I live on the Wirral. I have tried telephoning the Romex advice line provided at the end of your review but simply get a message saying the number is unobtainable. Also the e-mail address you provide is for a company in Ireland.


Best wishes



Graham Handley

[lutonlagerlout]

graham,welcome to the building game
1 i think john from aintree reccomends romex terrace
2yes you just need some kind of shutter to hold the jointing compound in place till its cured
3NO NO NO do not go near geofix ,it is the worst product ihave ever come across (apart from angel delight) its a very poor cousin of romex and will fail in no time
4 tony (the gaffer) is not about try a web search
cheers LLL

[DeckmanAdam]

4)The closest i know of is in preston the number is
01772877087.

[bobhughes]

A photo would be good......

[GrahamH]

LLL - Many thanks for your advice.


Adam - I was hoping to find a supplier a bit closer to the Wirral but if I’m near Preston in the next week or so I’ll call the number you provided.


Bob - I’ll post a picture when I have chance. Probably after I’ve had chance to point the patio.


Cheers

[GrahamH]

Graham

In my attempt to get hold of some Romex, I’ve now called all the local builders merchants I know and telephoned all those in the Wirral Yellow Pages - without success. Many I’ve contacted stock Geo-fix but none sell Romex. Travis Perkins and Lunts Heath both said they used to stock Romex but discontinued it. In the case of Travis Perkins because customers preferred to buy Geo-fix. Does any one know where I can obtain Romex near to the Wirral, Liverpool or Chester?

Regards


Graham

[GrahamH]

John

Thanks for the contact information. In my attempt to get hold of some Romex, I also e-mailed Romex, Germany earlier this week. A Jennifer Schaar replied and explained that Banister Hall was my nearest stockist. I was hoping to get it from a supplier nearer to the Wirral - this Romex stuff seems as rare as Hen’s teeth, certainly in this part of the country! Anyway, a friend said he would be near Preston today and has offered to collect it for me. I called Bannister Hall earlier and spoke to a someone named Matthew. He said he would put some product to one side ready for collection. So, hopefully, I should get hold of some Romex by the end of the day - at last!

Regards and thanks again

[GrahamH]

Managed to get hold of some Romex Easy and pointed the patio on Sunday. What a breeze! Simply brushed it into the paving joints and brushed any residue off the paving surface. For the steps, I took took LLL’s advice and arranged some simple shuttering to prevent the Romex from falling through gaps where the paving slabs overhung the edges of The risers - I used Duck tape. I also found that it was possible to push and firm the Romex into these gaps as it began to set without it falling through. The finished result looks great and no staining! The resin is now rock hard and was rain proof within 12 hours. Well worth the cost and the trouble taken to get it but why isn’t it more widely available, at least in the North West? The cost wasn’t that bad either. I did approximately 30 square meters of random laid Indian Sandstone paving with 4, 19 Kg tins at cost £76 + VAT. That works out at about £2.50 per square meter and I had some of the resin left over too.

[Suggers]

Wow - that's one hellava recommendation - I'm gonna find some of these hen's teeth...!
Mind you, John's been banging on about us using this stuff for ages.

[lutonlagerlout]

be interested to get an update in 6 moths on what it looks like then
cheers LLL