What is mortar?
Simply put, mortar is the material that separates the individual courses of brickwork from one an other. It is not a glue as most people think.Mortar helps to iron out any irregularities when building a wall and acts as a levelling compound and also a decorative feature.
Standard lime mortar or sand and cement mortar are used when building walls but this is not the case when pointing a wall clad with brick slips.
What do I use to point my Brick Slips?
Once the brick slips have been fixed to your wall with adhesive you can then point the wall up with a mortar.
Pointing is a fairly straightforward job but can be rather labour intensive if you do not use the right tools.
The hard way would be to mix a semi dry sand and cement mortar and push in your mortar by hand, this is something that can cost less in materials but be rather expensive in labour.
The time it takes and the method of application mean that this method really does test patience and can lead to heavy labour costs.
The easy way to point a brick slip wall is to use our bagged pointing mortar.
Our pointing mortar comes in 5 great colours:
- Natural white Pointing Mortar
- Light grey Pointing Mortar
- Dark grey Pointing Mortar
- Sandstone Pointing Mortar
- Brick Red Pointing Mortar
The advantage of using this type of pointing mortar is that once mixed up it can be applied to the joints quickly using a mortar pointing gun.
Large areas can be pointed and covered in a third of the time it would take to point a brick wall with standard mortar.
Do I have to point my wall?
The simple answer is no… Traditionally all brick walls are pointed for obvious reasons.
This does not mean that you need to point your wall, we have had many installations where the Gaps of the mortar were kept but never filled in.
This particular method is artistic in its approach and allows you to treat the brick slips as brick tiles rather than a product that is meant to convey an actual structure.
By not pointing the wall naturally the eye is drawn to the slips and the illusion of them being bricks is deconstructed. An effect that is revelled by some.
Another method is to butt joint the bricks allowing no gap, this again is what some might view as a marmite approach. Done well and with the right type of slip the overall canvass can be very impressive.
Summary
There is no rule book and the wheel can be reinvented.
But when it comes to pointing your brick slips we would always advise using our pointing mortar.
Save time and you save money.
The only thing you need to worry about is which colour you should choose?
Hi, please can you send me a picture of the side of a Sandstone pointing mortar bags or what the label would say. The label on the bag I ordered recently is unreadable. Many thanks, Dan Rasmussen
Hi Dan,
We can’t share any order or customer details on public forum so If you can please email our sales team via the contact page they will discuss and sort this out with yourself directly. Thank you.
Can this morter be used for brick slips that will be sitting near a log burner. Is it heat resistant?
Hiya, I was just wondering if there is an easy way to remove the mortar? I’ve pointed all the bricks about a year ago but now I would prefer it without it!