Evansville Tuckpointing: Frequently Asked Questions

Tuckpointing runs $8 to $20 per square foot of wall, with historic lime work and scaffolding at the high end. A single two-story elevation is typically $1,500 to $6,000, brick replacement $20 to $40 per brick, chimney repointing $800 to $2,500, and a rebuild from the roofline $2,500 to $7,000. Most crews carry a $500 to $800 minimum, and the full table is on the pricing page.

In the Ohio Valley the words are used interchangeably, and both mean grinding or raking failed mortar out of the joints to depth and repacking them with new mortar. Strictly, tuckpointing is an older decorative technique using two mortar colors to fake thin joints. What you need on an Evansville house is repointing, and any mason here will know what you mean by either word.

Freeze-thaw and water. NOAA's 1991-2020 normals for Evansville Regional Airport count 92.6 nights a year at or below 32 degrees but only 15.5 days that stay below freezing, so the wall freezes and thaws roughly 77 times a winter. Add 45.31 inches of annual precipitation with the wettest months in March, April, and May, and every open joint is a water channel that gets pried wider each cold night.

If it was built before about 1930, a lime-based mortar. Preservation Brief 2 from the National Park Service explains that Portland cement was not in common use until the early 20th century and that repointing mortar must be softer than the brick. Type N mortar is about 750 psi and Type S about 1,800, while Type O is about 350 and Type K about 75; soft old brick needs the soft end of that scale. For 1930s to 1970s brick Type N is usually right, and for newer brick and block Type S.

You will see it as brick faces popping off next to intact, hard grey joints, especially on the chimney and north wall. The fix is to cut the hard mortar out carefully, replace the spalled brick, and repoint in a compatible lime-based mortar. It costs more than the original bad repair did, but leaving it in place keeps destroying brick every winter.

In the Riverside Preservation Area, the Historic Preservation Commission reviews conspicuous changes to the exterior of historic buildings, and the city's District Guidelines list masonry as a reviewed project type with staff-level and commission-level certificates. City code 2.106.100 allows ordinary repairs that do not conspicuously change material, texture, or color, which is what matched repointing is, but get the staff's letter before work starts. In Lincolnshire the local review covers only demolition, moving, and new construction. Newburgh has its own Historic Preservation Commission, and its Zoning Administrator decides whether a certificate is needed.

No. The Indiana Professional Licensing Agency licenses plumbers, engineers, and home inspectors, not general contractors or masons. Evansville and Vanderburgh County license the trade locally: the Building Commission issues a brick and masonry contractor license that requires a $25,000 bond, $300,000 in general liability insurance, an exam, and three hours of continuing education a year. Repairs arranged through this site are performed by licensed, insured local masonry contractors, and this site does not hold a license of its own.

Kentucky licenses electricians, plumbers, and HVAC at the state level, not masons, so the City of Henderson requires its own specialty contractor license that names masonry, even when the work needs no permit. It costs $125 a year and requires a city occupational license, $250,000 in general liability coverage, and Kentucky workers' compensation or a sole-proprietor affidavit. Unincorporated Henderson County runs permits through the county Codes Department on Barrett Court.

At least 3/4 inch on typical brick, and the National Park Service standard is 2 to 2.5 times the joint width, which works out to 1/2 to 1 inch on most brick joints and several inches on wide stone joints. Anything shallower is a skim that pops out in a winter or two. If a bidder does not state the depth, ask.

No. Buttering new mortar over old is the most common bad repair in Evansville, and it fails in about two winters because there is no depth for the new mortar to bond to. It also usually leaves a wide, sloppy joint that changes the look of the wall, which matters in the historic districts.

Usually not. A stair-step crack rising diagonally from the corner of a window or door is almost always a rusted steel lintel that has expanded and lifted the brick, or settlement. Repointing it fills the crack for a season and it reopens. The lintel needs to come out and be replaced for $400 to $1,500 per opening, and then the joints get repointed.

Repoint if the brick above the roofline is mostly sound, and replace the crown at the same time with a cast concrete crown with a drip edge. Rebuild from the roofline when more than about a third of the brick is spalled or the stack is out of plumb. Repointing runs $800 to $2,500, a crown $400 to $1,200, a roofline rebuild $2,500 to $7,000. Photos from the ground usually settle it.

Efflorescence: salts carried by water through the wall and left behind when it evaporates. It means water is moving through the foundation, which in Evansville's river blocks and along Pigeon Creek is common even with the levee holding. Brush it off, then find the water: failed joints, grade sloping toward the house, or a downspout dumping at the wall. Repointing a foundation runs $10 to $25 per square foot.

Often repaired. Indiana limestone is calcium carbonate, so acid rain and freeze-thaw wear it slowly, and a cracked or spalled sill can frequently be pinned and patched with a compatible repair mortar. A sill that has lost its outward slope, its drip, or a large corner should be reset or replaced with new Salem Limestone cut to match. Either way runs $300 to $1,200 per sill.

April through November. NWS Paducah's records put the average last spring freeze at April 6 and the average first fall freeze at October 29, and mortar should not be placed below 40 degrees and falling or above 90. Fall is the smart time to close open joints before winter. Winter work is possible under heated enclosures but costs more.

Closely, if the mason takes a sample and matches the color, the sand, and the joint profile rather than reaching for grey bagged mortar. Fresh mortar always reads lighter for the first few months and weathers toward the original. In the historic districts we tool a test panel first.

No to paint, and be careful with sealers. The Indiana DNR's guidance on historic brick warns that painting brick traps moisture and spalls it, and that sandblasting strips the fired outer skin. Most film-forming sealers do the same thing as paint. Fix the joints, the crown, the flashing, and the drainage, and let the wall breathe.

Through the form on this site. Send a wide shot of each elevation, a close-up of the worst joints with a coin for scale, the chimney from the ground, and any crack over a window or door. Quotes usually come back the same day with a number from the published ranges and a realistic schedule.