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Spent 2 years butterflying my corners before an old timer set me straight
I was butterflying every corner joint on my brick jobs, thinking it was the right way to hide the seam. Then a mason with 40 years in Portland stopped by my site and pointed out I was actually creating weak spots that'd crack in freezing weather. He showed me a simple trowel-and-tuck method that cut my time by half and looks cleaner. Has anyone else had an old-school guy catch a bad habit you thought was standard?
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bettys514d ago
Wait is this really that big of a deal though? I mean yeah butterflies look nice but unless you're building bridges I don't see how a little crack in a brick corner is gonna cause the world to end. People get so worked up over masonry techniques like it's brain surgery or something. I've seen plenty of old brick walls with butterflied corners that held up just fine for decades through freezing winters. Maybe the old timer was just set in his ways like most of them are, not every shortcut is actually a fix. Some folks just like to make simple work sound complicated so they feel important.
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laura1894d ago
That reminds me of my uncle who tried to fix his chimney with duct tape and good intentions. Funny how the old timers always have a story about why their way is the only way, @bettys51. Did yours ever explain why they hate butterflies so much?
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craig.sage1d ago
My neighbor Jerry does the exact same thing with his plumbing, insists on using brass fittings from 1982 even though the new ones work fine. It's like some people think if a method is old enough it automatically means it's better, which just isn't true. I've seen so many perfectly good projects get ruined because someone refused to adapt to a newer, easier way of doing things. The butterfly corner thing is probably just one of those old tricks that worked okay back then but isn't actually necessary anymore. We all get stuck in our habits and confuse tradition with quality, especially when it comes to stuff our dads or uncles taught us.
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