The causes of rising wall moisture lie in the capillary absorbency of the mineral building materials usually used.

In earlier years, due to a lack of knowledge of building physics, no thought was given to the importance of horizontal insulation.

Simplified, the capillary system of mineral building materials can be compared to a sponge. If you put a sponge into a water bath of only about 1 cm in height, the sponge will soak itself to saturation through its greatly enlarged capillary system. This also happens with mineral building materials.

The consequences of damp walls are:

1) Poor living climate due to mould and rot formation.

2) Harmful to health

3) Very high energy loss (already at 6 % humidity the insulating capacity of the masonry is reduced by 30 % !!!! ) = increased HEATING COSTS = uncomfortable living

It is completely pointless to just remove the damaged plaster and replace it with a new plaster or even with sealing slurry. If the new plaster is called "insulating plaster", even this euphonious name does little to change its effectiveness against rising damp. (This also applies to various plaster additives!). Such very water-vapour impermeable plasters can, at most, delay the damage becoming visible. All in all, however, it is only wall cosmetics. The wall in the core or interior remains damp and drives the moisture upwards. Even various plaster additives (such as Baurex or similar) do not change this!

The problem of permanently and reliably eliminating rising wall moisture can only be solved by optimal horizontal insulation. According to the state of the art, the following methods are available for this purpose.

Electro-osmotic systems
a) active
b) passive
Mechanical systems
a) Hammering in steel sheets
b) Cutting through walls and inserting insulating foils etc.
Chemical systems
a) water-soluble silicification
b) Permanently elastic resins (e.g. *KRICHEX*)
In the active version of electroosmosis, an attempt is made to stop or reverse the movement of the water in the masonry by applying an external voltage. For this purpose, electrodes are anchored in the masonry, which are supplied by a power source.

In passive electroosmosis, an attempt is made to build up a galvanic element opposing the field in the masonry in order to counteract the undesired electrophysical support of the water transport. For this purpose, different materials must be used as anode and cathode, which have different normal potentials according to their position in the electro-osmotic voltage series. The resulting voltage should act on the direction of flow of the water in the masonry. All metals in the masonry, such as dowels, fastenings for gutters, lightning conductors, pipes, etc., must be removed or insulated accordingly before installation. (Caution with Cu electrodes and if zinc or galvanised pipes and sheets are present - "electrolysis" = migration of the zinc parts to the CU electrode occurs, consequence: holey pipes or sheets). The electro-osmotic (active and passive) systems are theoretically functional, but in practice it has been shown that they are very susceptible to failure and therefore have a lower success rate.

• low labour input (quick processing without static problems) 
• narrow drill hole spacing 
• cost-efficient (price-guarantee ratio, self-assembly without loss of guarantee is possible!) 
• 20-year guarantee for the effectiveness of the capillary barrier! 
• low dirt accumulation 

*KRICHEX* is a state-of-the-art product for wall drying and has been tested on the market in Austria for more than 30 years.

It is of course also possible to test the *KRICHEX* system on only part of the damp wall in order to establish that the desired success has been achieved. (Reference on your building).