Quality Repair Standards

 

When considering repair (and maintenance) standards for stucco, two different standards apply; one for unpainted stucco and one for painted stucco.  This is because the paint layer reduces stucco's tolerance for moisture due to the risk of loss of paint adhesion (peeling, blistering), which can occur when moisture is trapped behind paint.

 

Recommended repair / maintenance standards for unpainted stucco include;

 

• Repair of movement cracks, or shrinkage cracks that have grown to the width of a dime: open the crack with a grinder, being careful not to cut the building paper behind. fill the crack with a continuous bead of high quality, polyurethane caulk, and refinish with cement materials to the existing stucco plane, color, texture and sheen.

• to . Should hairline (or slightly larger) cracks return it does not necessarily compromise a properly functioning stucco system, filling of such cracks can be considered for aesthetic reasons.  

 

• Repair of all voids: holes in stucco walls should be filled, insuring that lapped paper, wire mesh and adequate backing is in place, with a two-step texture repair starting with the restoration of the underlying stucco “plane” and then a substantially matched texture.  Repairs at high impact locations may be done with concrete mixes that include high psi concrete as a scratch coat, finished to the existing stucco plane, color, texture and sheen.

 

• Stains: should be evaluated for the source of contaminants, and the problem addressed.  Stains (and repairs) can then be eliminated with spot or area color-matched refinishing.

 

Recommended repair / maintenance standards for painted stucco include the following;

 

• All cracks in the stucco must be filled: this is in the stucco field and where stucco adjoins windows, doors or other penetrations.  The material used should be compatible with stucco, waterproofing materials, and paint.  The objective should be a 100% seal at all gaps.

 

• Repair of all voids: holes in stucco walls should be filled, insuring that lapped paper, wire mesh and adequate backing is in place, followby flush repairs of the stucco "plane" and a substantially matched texture.

 

• Stains: should be evaluated for the source of contaminants, and the problem addressed.  Stains will typically require painting of whole walls (corner to corner).

 

• Paint:  should be applied after removing any loose material, surfaces should be cleaned, and an appropriate primer applied.  Paint should be applied at the thicknesses recommended by manufacturers, and reapplied within the recommended time period.

 

Failure to protect paint, such as by repainting within the recommended time period, or according to recommended application standards can create problems such as pinholes as the paint dries and pulls apart from itself at a very small scale.