Article from Cornerstone, members' magazine of SPAB (Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings)............ Elmley Castle Monuments

 

 

Buckland Newton

The Church of the Holy Rood, Buckland Newton Chest Tomb

We come across many different challenges in our line of work and this monument, be it small, is no different! Upon arrival to site we found that a rather large elder tree was growing up through the middle of the west end, the monument was sinking into the ground, a section of the lid was missing along with a side panel and the stonework was spalled all over the place from the iron cramps.

 

The Strachey team assigned to the job were Chris Barraclough, Kerry Scrimgeour and Lisa Etherton.

First job was the dismantle, Below Chris straps up the lid for lifting.

 

 With the lid safely out of the way, work can begin!

The monument needs to be completely dismantled and moved out of the way so that the excavation can be carried out. We hope to find the missing bits of stone. Unless they have ended up in somebody's garden!? Has been known!

... as thought, sections of the stonework were found.

Here's what a root can do to a bit of stone, given enough time. Textbook.

The part of the job that was not so expected was the battle that the tree stump gave!

Poor Chris...







Eventually, after a lot of digging and with the help from the lifting equipment....

 Chris Won!

So, the foundations were excavated and most of the sections of stone that were missing were found. Good news for the monument!



The hole was filled and compacted and a concrete block course was laid for the rebuilding of the plinth course.

Once the plinth course has been laid, the stones are dog cramped together with stainless steel as replacements to the corroding iron cramps that were found. This makes for a solid base in which to rebuild the rest of the monument.

The dirty looking side panel was found almost buried.. amazing huh?!

Kerry cleans up all the stones ready for re fixing.

Removing all the remnants or iron cramps and old mortars. Even though the cramp itself has corroded away, the dog ends within the stones will continue to corrode and expand and can cause future damage. This is why we make sure ALL iron is removed!









The best bit about this particular chest tomb are the front and back semi circular ends. Once cleaned up and repaired, the carving really sprung to life. The difference below is remarkable. Check back to the first photos!

The front and back sections are then cramped to the side panels using stainless steel fixed in lime.


This allows the work to be reversible without causing further damage to the monument in the future.

Here's a picture of the carving at the rear of the monument. Its so good, unfortunately it will very rarely get seen.

That's why I'm making sure that its seen here!


























Another course of stone is bedded and cramped and we are ready for the lid.

Its always useful to have Kerry on site. As a mason, she can very quickly produce the parts of the monument that were not found.

Two sections of the top course were missing and re carved on site by Kerry in Chilmark stone to make the course profile read all the way around the monument.

As the lid is in two pieces, it was felt that the broken end could benefit from further support from the floor to prevent any future possible stress fracture or breakage. A simple pier of concrete blocks and the lid is fully supported.

Final adjustments! Cant.. Quite.. See..

Looks bob on from here!






The picture below is how it stands now.

I think the guys have outdone themselves. What a fantastic job.

The before and after photos shows what can be done to save these wonderful monuments from borderline disrepair back to its originally intended beauty. We hope this one will stand strong for hundreds of years to come.

Downside Abbey

Here is a look at the works/report we have recently carried out at Downside Abbey.

We were commissioned by Beech Tyldesley Architects to carry out a condition report to certain areas of the Abbey via the means of rope access.

As part of the survey, we carried out a series of different cleaning samples to the stonework. For these samples we used a few different techniques in a few different areas on the building to see the variation of success.

For the areas of stonework where a build up of black/carbon was not present we found that a mechanical clean using stainless steel wire brushes and warm water worked really well. The crocket on this north aisle pinnacle below shows just how well!

It was amazing to see the difference it made to the detail of the carving. Up close you can see the detail and shadow intended, which from a distance we dont really get to appreciate.

















In other areas there were quite heavy build ups of carbon on the underside of features such as grotesques, string courses and niches for the statues. Below is a before and after photo of the carbon build up on an east facing statue base. The method used for the trial was an ammonium carbonate poultice.

After the poultice is applied, it is covered in order to keep the moisture in. We then leave it on over night for the ammonium to do its magic. The next day it is then removed and cleaned off using a wire brush and water. This particular trial area shows fantastic results after just one application.








Below is a good picture of John Fowler applying the poultice over looking Downside school.

The statues themselves were not found in the best of states. Here is a picture of the statue central on the east elevation of the nave.

Beneath the obvious build up of vegetation and mosses, the stone is found to be in need of surface repairs.

Unfortunately, above the crown of this statue is a water escape route, possibly due to a failed section of string course.





The damage of which can be seen below. 

As well as the poultice traials, the mechanical cleaning trails and the latex cleaning trials internally, we also carried out areas of cleaning using Restorative Techniques 'ThermaTech'. Can be found on twitter as @restorativetech

Quote from their website.

'ThermaTech® is a brand new range of superheated water cleaning equipment. Conceived for the requirements of building conservation, restoration and refurbishment'

I think its fantastic.
I carried out some of the trials using this machine from ropes. Here is picture of one of the gargoyles being cleaned.

And some samples were done a little lower down!

Parapet wall:

Litchen covered buttress:

A flying buttress:

All trials had very sucessful results using the Thermatech.

Some of the level of detailed carving found at high level was stunning. I found this gargoyle underneath a thick layer of moss!

So thats about it for now.

Below are a few more pictures that i hope you all find interesting.

Here I am in the vaulted ceiling internally checking out the condition of the stonework.

 John and I checking out the amazing success of the ThermaTech machine.

John taking detail of condition on the north facing rose window.

John checking out the rose window internally.

Myself, James Preston (left), Jamie Fairchild of Restorative Techniques (middle) and Architect, Mark Taylor of Beech Tyldesley Architects (right)