There are 5 major problems with this repair carried out to a rear window at Ayr Court in July 2019 by Armour Hart contractors.

  1. The whole wood frame at the base of the window was completely rotten but only the rotten external cill was replaced. The rotten internal wood was left in place. This was true of all the work
  2. In many similar cases where the rotten external cill was replaced with new wood the contractor did not make a vapor barrier between the rotten internal wood and the new external wood. In this particular case we believe that there is no vapor barrier but this needs to be checked by opening up the new work.
  3. There is no drip groove in the new softwood cill. This will inevitably result in water creeping under the cill and rotting the cill from below,
  4. The upright jamb on the left hand side of the frame was rotten at the base so the surface layer of rotten wood has been replaced with a c. 1 cm thick layer of soft wood to give the appearance that the whole base of the jamb has been replaced. In fact this is just a cover up to conceal the rotten wood below.
  5. The new external cill was made of softwood not hardwood as specified in the contract.

NOTE: The external rotten wood has been removed from this window at the rear of Ayr Court but the internal rotten wood has been left in place because the workman has been told that internal repairs are not included in the job. In fact according to the contract signed by Armour Hart internal repairs to rotten wood are included in the contract.

The orange arrow points to a leaking hopper. This leaking hopper is almost certainly the direct cause of the rotten window sill below.

The rotten window sill from the rear of #4 Ayr Court after it was removed. However the internal rotten wood was not removed at the same time and remains in place to re-infect the poor quality new external untreated softwood sill. Carrying out repairs to this standard is a complete waste of time and money. It is unacceptable that flat owners have to pay for this shoddy work through the service charge.

NOTE: Untreated softwood has been used to replace the rotten external wood and covering up the rotten internal wood. This work is quite unacceptable according to the contract. How can it possibly happen that the Armour Hart workman was allowed to get away with the use of unacceptable materials ?

Three different examples of the Armour Hart contractors sub-standard workmanship are clearly visible in the photograph above;

1. The wooden upright of the of the window frame on the left hand side (called the jamb) was rotten so the surface layer has been replaced with a thin c. 1 cm thick layer of new softwood to cover up the rot.

2. There is no drip groove visible at the end of the cill which is necessary for the cill to work by shedding rain water clear of the frame.

3. The cill is made of untreated softwood not hardwood which costs around 4 x as much eg £45 for hardwood and £12 for softwood cills.