Mould, Interior Wall/sub floor musty smell

[theDIYkid]

Hi
we have had a musty smell in the bedroom for a few months now so I decided to locate as I could not see any damp. Finally, I took the floorboards up and could smell it more, after worming around the floor like a worm looking at the brickwork and air bricks (making sure they were clear) I found one ok and one part blocked, there are only 2 in the bedroom and one of them is only brick size not 2 brick sizes as the rest are to the house.

Anyway, I noticed orange, brown crusty mold on the brickwork to one corner of the room, especially in the mortar and its quite soft and comes off easy, like its eating into the mortar.

I need to know what to do with it, do I use oxygen bleach and water and hard brush it off as advised by eHow? also, should I put another air brick in afterwards.

The house was cavity walled about 4 years ago.

Thanks

 

[theDIYkid]

No replies, so went with Borax, scrubbing and removing the traces off floor.

 

[ree]

"the house was cavity walled about 4 yrs ago" - do you mean cavity insulation perhaps?

This crusty brown stuff - was it under the floor?

Did the "musty smell" smell like mushrooms?

 

[theprinceofdarkness]

If this is a bungalow, so we are talking about a ground floor bedroom, before the cavities were filled the brickwork would have been vented by the hot air rising through the cavity sucking in fresh air from the botom air vents. I would guess that you have a foam filling which totally stops the air flow, which blown insulation does not. Any way it sounds as though you need some cross ventilation, an air brick on the other side of the room would help a lot.
Frank

 

[JohnD]

photos of this crusty stuff would be nice. It might possibly be expanding foam. Or fungal bodies. Does it make orange powdery dust when touched?

 

[theDIYkid]

Thanks for replies lads,

The cavity wall insulation was blown as its white soft fluffy stuff, I checked the air bricks which there is one either side of the wall, the one on the back wall where the orange powdery fungus is where the smell is coming from was partly blocked, its clearer now but I think another air brick would help Frank. Ree the orange colour fungus is under the bedroom floor boards on the foundation back wall, so the smell is coming up through the floor into the room, I would say just musty smell not particular mushroom smell, I have a dehumidifier running at mo and windows open, I have scrubbed half the wall now with Borax but because of centre foundation wall I need to take floor boards up at other side to get to the other half of the back wall doh!
John D yeah orange fungus and comes off easy with hard brush, I guess powdery, I will get a pic when I lift the boards to do the other side of the back wall later.

Thanks