How to repair stone cracks

Merlin5

Merlin5

Merlin5

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Joined
17 Aug 2009
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Finchley, London
I want to repaint all the vertical and horizontal stone around the front windows. What would be the best way to do this and which product to use to make these cracks disappear before repainting? You'll be able to see from the close ups that the lower part of the window ledge had been repaired years ago when a lot of the stone had broken off.

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There's masonry filler specifically for this sort of thing.
Youll need to remove paint, and any loose bits first. I'd probably score a small V where the crack is, so the filler has something to go into and bind to. Less likely to crack in the future.
 
What did they repair it with?

I think the horizontal one might be a bit of a pain. Looking at the photo the way the light reflects off it, seems to show the repaired bit sitting a bit higher than the bit above it. I think filling that and sanding it to be level might be tricky.
 
Scrape them out before filling so the filler has more surface area to adhere to.
 
Thanks guys. That Toupret masonry filler looks good, I should imagine much better than standard polyfilla.
How do I strip the paint off? Or can I just sand over the paint to give it a key for the paint to stick to? I'm basically doing things up with a view to selling within a year (mortgage finished so swap my flat for a house outside london) so I only need it to last a year or two.
 
Merlin5 said:
Looks good. I wonder how fast I can scrape all the paint off with that though? Would it help if I brushed the surfaces with paint stripper first to loosen it up?
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If you are getting stripper use a product called Starchem Synstrip from ebay. But keep in mind it's bad for inhaling etc as it contains dodgy chemicals.

However that scraper effectively pulls paint off. You pull the scraper towards you and it bites under it and lifts it right off. It's made so many jobs a lot easier for me.
 
I decided not to bother stripping the paint, thanks anyway Hedge. I might still buy one of those Bahco paint scrapers though for future use as it's got 5/5 stars on over a 1000 reviews.

However, I've spent the last couple of days prepping the masonry. I washed it all down to get grime and cobwebs off and sanded the whole lot with 80 grit. No sanding machine, did it manually using a rubber sanding pad to put the sandpaper over. I've pulled away any flaking paint and sanded over that to smooth the edges. Even while it was raining today! I've bought a box of Touprelith F to fill cracks and I've scored the cracks with my filler knife to make it easier to fill.

I bought a tube of exterior caulk today and have just sealed the bottom of some of the window frames where they meet the horizontal sills and around the base of the verticals, because I had noticed narrow gaps. I'm not very good at it yet, I got a lot of excess sealant on the frames and the sills, so spent a lot of time wiping it away with kitchen roll and getting it all over my hands. :D There's still some more bits to seal.

Tomorrow, if it's not raining, I plan to use the Touprelith and then I'm looking forward to painting it all with Sandtex white. I'm wondering if I can fill the shallow patches where paint had flaked off, but I don't know yet how thin the Touprelith will spread.




 
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You also get the trade wipes, which are bigger, and don't smell flowery:p

Sometimes I find a bit of isopropyl/IPA good for removing still sticky silicone
 
Adam_151 said:
You also get the trade wipes, which are bigger, and don't smell flowery:p

Sometimes I find a bit of isopropyl/IPA good for removing still sticky silicone
Click to expand...

Wonder wipes are great and don't leave lint on rough surfaces but honestly at about £3 for 6 packets in Aldi/Lidl baby wipes do an excellent job, "soft and gentle on your babies bottom but can also strip gloss paint off your woodwork" :D:eek:
 
I'm getting better. The finger in soapy water really helps smooth the silicone. Finished all the caulking, now ready to start filling cracks with the Toupret.

Guys, do I need some stabilising solution to seal bare patches where I've taken loose paint off to give a thin layer of filler a better chance of adhering or will filler stick anyway? Areas like this

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Or maybe I'll just paint some bits like that without filler and presumably that will need a sealer/primer? I'm thinking of buying this, what do you think. I believe PVA is the same as stabilising solution?

https://www.screwfix.com/p/no-nonsense-pva-5ltr/57248#product_additional_details_container
 
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